My heart turns within my chest as I consider the implications of my words going into your oculars and filtering down into your chest. There is so much at stake if you miss this word. I’ve been wrestling with this one for months. After battling several intense rounds of severe illness, I’m still weak. Just when I think I’m pulling through or rounding a corner I get pummeled by yet another wave. We can all relate to this feeling. We are no foreigner to feeling dis-empowered, hopeless, and pushed down. I feel encouraged as I consider how we all relate to this feeling. Each of us fight to stay in the game. We have all had seasons of showing serious scrap and grit, the fight that has caused us to see a victory. But these days I’ve been asking myself what am I fighting for? Am fighting to be “strong again” or something else?

I personally struggle with confessing my weaknesses. I love to project strength, talk about my victories, and fight harder but this season has “whooped me.” As we say in the South. The harder I’ve fought the harder the wall of weakness has hit me. So I penned this ode to the beast of weakness. “ My confidence calls out, “Be brave, be strong, stay wild.” With a crazy eye I fight back weakness, slobbering I stagger like a drunk man, with arms flailing quite certain I will annihilate him/weakness once and for all. Why him? This personification of weakness. Through my deft strong eye weakness is a beast so bold that I feel it in the knees, arms, and pit of my stomach when it draws close. I harden myself against its attack. I encase myself like a cyst, an impenetrable cell which cannot allow good in or toxin out. I feel nothing. I watch our back. I mourn. I hiss.”

Our weakness. Behind the black curtain is the truth. Unless our backs are up against a serious wall or we’ve lost most all hope- we rarely confess our weakness. Unfortunately even in the Christian faith, a faith that’s main premise is built on the grace of God we are told- “just have faith.” We idolize strength, we idolize our lives, our health, our fitness, our agenda. We are trying to outrun, outwit our weakness. Many millions of books are written for self improvement. We hurry. We get smarter. We literally work ourselves into a frenetic disaster of trying to call our idols into taking our offering of effort. All to escape this beast of weakness. 

But what if this weakness we scorn so badly is the very playing ground of greatness? Paul of the Bible knew this beast of weakness well. He battled infirmity-a messenger of Satan even. He was confronted daily with weakness and yet clearly states, “Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong.” 2 Corinthians 12:10 he says clearly, “I am content.” What madness. Why? What would compel him to be content? He learned that weakness was the pathway to a life of delight. A mindset shift. A mindset that was like a children’s book that I love. Ferdinand the Bull. Everyone thought that a fighting bull like Ferdinand would be aggressive but as the story relates Ferdinand was content with smelling flowers. They would poke, prod, and antagonize Ferdinand but the more they prodded the more he quietly minded his own business gently smelling flowers. He wasn’t concerned with the Matador or the cloth “capote”. A bull such as Ferdinand could have been respected even greatly feared but he through his gentle nature was content.

What if our times of weakness is the pathway to a different life? What if like Paul and Ferdinand the Bull I learn the power of contentment? What if this beast of weakness is actually the narrow path to delight. Wonder. Ectasty. Consider this, when we see a flower we don’t think about how weak it is. When we see a nursing baby we don’t think “how pathetic.” The fragile wings of a butterfly have wowed entomologists for centuries. What about dandelion seeds breaking away from the flower stem swirling effortlessly in the wind. How do they do that? Through breaking down. Through the surrender to weakness. What if the thorn of weakness is actually the rose of contentment? A slowing down, surrendering to the here and now. Take a deep breath, feel your embodiment. Today realize that you don’t need to be hard, encased, and limitless but you can be like a nursing baby falling into the arms of a love so strong.  If we back up to 2 Corinthians 12:9 we see that Paul sees that God’s power is fully realized through human frailty. That means that when individuals acknowledge their limitations and rely on God’s strength, they experience His power in a way that surpasses what they could achieve on their own. When we reject the burden of being strong, capable or good we embrace the grace of God in our weakness. When we reject lifting ourselves up. God is glorified. My call today is to embrace weakness. Study weakness. Get comfortable with your weaknesses

Weakness is the gentle gift that allows us to go slower, savor more deeply, and lift up Jesus.