When I am WEAK

God’s divine strength is made perfect in our weaknesses when we let go of our own control and depend on him to be our only source of strength. The crazy thing about this is that letting go of our own control is seen as weak. But it’s exactly that kind of “weak” letting go that opens us up to the pouring in of God’s strength.

Our physical weaknesses and/or situations may not change, but our attitude towards it can, giving God the glory in the midst of it and finding divine strength despite it. We must always remember our strength, our help, our saving grace is not from us, but from the LORD!

"The terrible thing, the almost impossible thing, is to hand over your whole self--all your wishes and precautions--to Christ."

- C.S.Lewis “Mere Christianity"

Handing over our whole selves to Christ seems terrible in that we no longer have control over our own lives, but the reward in doing so brings strength, joy and freedom in ways we could never experience all on our own. The letting go is hard but what we gain is so worth it!

“For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” made his light shine in our hearts to give us the light of the knowledge of God’s glory displayed in the face of Christ. But we have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this all-surpassing power is from God and not from us. We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed.”

-2 Corinthians 4:6-9

Imagine you are a glass mason jar hanging on a tree branch, fragile enough to break if the wind blew you off that branch. God walks up to the tree and places a small lit candle inside you. The wind begins to blow and you start to sway. The wind blows harder to which you swing back and forth until you are finally thrown off the tree onto the ground. But to your surprise you don’t break. You look down at yourself and notice a few marks but no broken pieces and yet you are still made of glass, but how is this possible? It is then you realize the candle God placed inside you is still lit, somehow the light inside protected your fragile self from breaking.

God’s holy spirit living in us works the same way. It may not make sense according to the world, but God is set apart from the world and all that makes sense in our human minds. God doesn’t always change our circumstances but gives us the strength to live through them, we may be struck down but he will never let us break. There have been many times when the wind has tossed my glass jar around but only a few when I felt struck down.

The summer of 2016 was one of those times. On July 1st 2016 I found out I was pregnant. We weren’t trying to get pregnant, in fact we had three foster boys all under the age of four at the time. So, the thought of another baby was somewhat frightening, but we were excited to meet this new blessing God had given us. This was my first pregnancy, so I was excited to go along this new journey with announcement photos, ultra sounds and learning how the baby was developing at each stage. The first ultra sound was truly amazing! All I saw was a little dot but that dot was my dot with a little heart beat we could see blinking on the screen. However, my second ultra sound was different. My dot was there but it wasn’t blinking like before, my little dot was just still. I was nine weeks pregnant and my little dots heart was no longer beating, I was having a miscarriage. During this time the beloved pastor of our church was really sick and had passed away that very same week. That summer was very hard, full of pain, grief and many tears. I still have marks from that grief, one’s I will never forget, but God’s light was always there and my glass jar did not break.

Weakness comes in many different forms. It can be some kind of sickness or disease, it can be the lack of progress or success, it can be loss or grief, sin or temptation, fear or anger, it is anything and everything that takes away our strength. Our human selves are defective, imperfect and fragile, but nothing and I mean NOTHING will ever take away the strength of our God! Our God is perfect, he is everlasting, he is eternal, he is all powerful, he is all knowing, he is infinite, he is mighty, he is holy, he is the creator of the universe and so much more and nothing will ever strike him down! So, any time we find ourselves in weakness, whatever that may be, we need to cling to the one who is never weak, and that is Jesus Christ!