Babies learn to walk by falling until the sense of balance develops. But they would never walk at all if they did not get up after they fell. The Bible tells us the righteous man falls seven times (Proverbs 24:16). That informs us that he has gotten up again and again. We learn about this lesson, but we sometimes fail to apply it to ourselves when we fall. We often are mired in bemoaning the fall rather planning to get up.

Mary Pickford was a writer who wrote, “There is always another chance.” This thing that we call “failure” is not the falling down, but the staying down. Sometimes we feel that our fall cannot be repaired—like Humpty Dumpty. But our Creator is full of mercy and understanding and waits for us to get up. One example was the terrible sin of King David in his affair with Bathsheba and the murder of Uriah. But David got up from that fall, was forgiven (though punished) and once again found grace from God (2 Samuel 12:13). Don’t get discouraged, the failure is not in the initial fall—failure is in not getting back up!