Just days away from Conference Championship Weekend in College Football, teams face the final opportunity to prove they belong in the Playoff.

Last night, the latest CFP rankings were released with undefeated teams, Ohio State, LSU, and Clemson, taking the top three spots… and Georgia, Utah, Oklahoma, and Baylor filling out spots 4-7 with only one loss for each of them.

So, who will be the final four teams to make it into the Playoff? Based on the results this weekend, there will be multiple teams that can make a strong case for why they belong.

It’s up to the College Football Playoff Selection Committee to not only consider which teams have more impressive wins, but also who has the best loss. Who learned from the loss and was actually strengthened by it?

Right now, Georgia is in 4th with their one loss taking place early in the season against South Carolina. Utah lost in September to the other USC while Oklahoma was upset by Kansas State, yet handed Baylor their only loss of the year. Baylor and Oklahoma play for the Big 12 Championship on Saturday.

A lot of possible scenarios can take place, but the Committee will inevitably have to decide what to do with the one-loss teams. They must take a look at how well any one-loss team played during the defeat, how they bounced back from the loss, and what the team revealed about themselves during the loss.

Ultimately, the Committee is not only concerned about winning, but also weighs how well a team fails. Of course, teams are trying to go undefeated, but it’s going to be very interesting to see how the Committee values the losses this year.

When it comes to our own lives, we wish we could be undefeated. We desire to get our dream job on the first try, immediately meet our soulmate, make every wise financial decision, and parent our kids perfectly.

However, we know that we usually fail in each of these areas multiple times and beat ourselves up when we do. Because our culture doesn’t embrace failure very well, we can easily get caught up in perfectionism.

But I would argue that growth and maturity happen because of failure. When we lose, we gain so many intangible gifts – including a fresh perspective and desire to change. I think when we actually look back at our lives and consider the losses, we can see their value.

When we discern the lessons learned from the losses, we can readily bounce back and allow our character to grow in the process. In many ways, we truly need failures.

As followers of Jesus, we can trust that God uses our failures to make us more dependent on Him and more aware of our weaknesses. When we rest in God’s grace and strength during our losses, the suffering leads to hope as we experience the development of our character.

The Bible says in Romans 5:2-5 (ESV), “Through Him, we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God.

“Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.”

We don’t like to lose, fail, or suffer, but we know it’s inevitable. Thankfully we have a perfect God who loves us and provides us victory, despite our failures. It’s not that we try to fail, but when we do, we know God helps us make it a good loss.

I’m Bryce Johnson and you can UNPACK that!

PRAYER: Heavenly Father, I pray that I’d rely on You for strength when I deal with failure. Help me see You’re using my loss as an opportunity for growth and that my failure won’t be wasted. Thank you for the grace and love You show me in my weaknesses. Please help me not to wallow in a loss, but instead, turn to You. I pray this in Jesus’ name, Amen.