IN THE MARGINS: Quit studying the rung. Keep climbing.
Tony Martin
Editor
Don’t waste your time on failures and shortcomings. Consider the lessons learned from them as rungs in a ladder. Step up, and don’t even wonder how the rung was made. Really — if it served its purpose, does it matter whether it was carved out of joy or sorrow, success or failure?
We spend so much energy performing autopsies on yesterday. We replay the conversation we botched, the goal we missed, the habit we dropped. We become forensic experts in our own shortcomings, as if staring at the splinters will somehow lift us higher. But ladders don’t work that way. Rungs are for stepping, not studying. Their value is in the lift they give, not the story they tell.
Scripture points us in the same direction. Paul writes, “One thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, I press on…” (Philippians 3:13–14, ESV). He doesn’t say the past is meaningless; he says it’s not the place to live. The past gives us rungs. The calling of Christ gives us the upward pull.
If you’ve fallen (and who hasn’t?), take heart: “The righteous falls seven times and rises again” (Proverbs 24:16). The emphasis isn’t on counting falls; it’s on practicing rises. Every stumble can become a step if we let God transform it. James even frames trials as raw material for a stronger faith: “The testing of your faith produces steadfastness” (James 1:2–4). That’s ladder-language. Testing produces something. Endurance forms something. God isn’t wasting your pain; He’s fashioning it into a rung.
Maybe you’ve been tempted to label a season: Failure. Detour. Waste. But remember Joseph’s words to his brothers: “You meant evil against me, but God meant it for good” (Genesis 50:20). That doesn’t romanticize the suffering; it reframes the outcome. The rung may be rough, but it still holds your weight. And in Christ, it still points up.
Here’s the trap: we think we have to understand every rung before we can stand on it. We want to know why it happened, how we messed up, and what we could have done differently. Reflection is healthy; rumination is not. Reflection asks, “What did I learn?” Rumination asks, “Why am I like this?” Reflection produces a next step; rumination freezes your feet. The enemy loves frozen feet.
So how do we turn lessons — good, bad, and ugly — into upward movement?
1) Pause, pray, and name the lesson.
Resist the spiral. Get quiet before the Lord. Ask, “Father, what’s the one thing You want me to carry from this?” Not the twenty things; the one. Write it down as a sentence you can act on. “I learned to prepare the night before.” “I learned to ask for help sooner.” “I learned to speak with gentleness.” That sentence is the rung.
2) Convert the lesson into a practice.
Rungs become ladders when lessons become rhythms. What small habit can you start this week that embodies the lesson? Keep it tiny: a two-minute checklist, a calendar reminder, a weekly call to a mentor. Faithfulness beats intensity. Jesus spoke of the wise man who does His words (Matthew 7) — not merely hears them. Doing turns wood into structure.
3) Release the rest to God.
You don’t have to polish the rung, justify the rung, or explain the rung. You step on it, and you climb. “We know that for those who love God all things work together for good” (Romans 8:28). All things includes your missteps and your wins, your tears and your breakthroughs. Let grace have the last word over the episode. If you need to repent, repent. If you need to forgive, forgive. Then move.
4) Share your rung with someone else.
Testimony multiplies usefulness. When you tell a friend, “Here’s what I learned,” you hand them a rung for their ladder, too. Paul says God comforts us “so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction” (2 Corinthians 1:4). Your lesson isn’t just for you; it’s kingdom lumber.
A word about joy and sorrow: both are teachers, but they have different accents. Joy often shows us what to repeat; sorrow often shows us what to release. Success reveals strengths to steward; failure reveals gaps to close. In God’s hands, though, they aim at the same outcome — Christlikeness. We don’t worship the rungs; we worship the Builder. And the Builder knows exactly how to set each piece for our good and His glory.
Maybe today you feel stuck halfway up — tired, embarrassed, or afraid to take the next step. Hear this: you are not your last rung. You are not the story of a single stumble. You are a beloved son or daughter, being shaped by a wise Father who never wastes anything surrendered to Him. Even if you’ve been clinging to the side rails, white-knuckled and weary, His hand is on yours. “The steps of a man are established by the Lord…though he fall, he shall not be cast headlong, for the Lord upholds his hand” (Psalm 37:23–24).
So let’s do this together:
- Look back just long enough to harvest the lesson.
- Turn the lesson into a tiny, repeatable step.
- Take that step today, not someday.
And when your mind tries to drag you into the workshop to analyze the grain and count the knots, smile and say, “Not today.” Then lift your foot, place it firmly, and climb.
A simple prayer:
“Lord, thank You for never wasting my story. Show me the one lesson You want me to carry from this season. Give me grace to practice it, courage to move forward, and compassion to share it. I trust You with the rungs and the climb. Amen.”
Don’t study the rung — use it. The view from the next step is waiting.