Dec 12 (599 words)
How do you feel when God opens up things about your life that show that you aren’t as mature as you thought? What does a revelation of your weakness make you do? When you see your failings… when you fail – how do you respond? When you get knocked down – do you get up again?
I often want to hide! There is something unpleasant about walking in weakness… for some situations this will be an understatement. Think of occasions when people walk in weakness. This might be because of a broken bone, a failing heart, a lack of breath. It becomes immediately obvious for all the world. You need a crutch or cane. You are slower than the rest. When you cross a street, the waiting cars get impatient. You might be leaning on someone.
Perhaps I’m speaking for myself, but human nature doesn’t like the attention given to weakness. People who are weak get the wrong kind of attention- the unwanted kind.
How do I know? The story of Jesus is one indication. His humble weak birth, was shrouded in the shame of a pregnancy outside of marriage. His life was normal enough that when he took up his calling – preaching the Kingdom of God – people who knew him were shocked. “This is Jesus – the one we know – the one we bought tables and chairs from…” In the Gospel stories you don’t get any testimony in the adult life of Jesus that said: “I knew all along that you were destined for greatness.”
Instead of a conquering, super-hero messiah we get a contradiction in terms – a crucified messiah – pinned up on a cross to demonstrate the ultimate superiority of the Roman Empire. Jesus submitted to something the Jews thought was an anti-messiah situation.
This is all because it is in the weakness of love that God conquers. It is in the vulnerability of humble serving that God rules. It is in Jesus – the baby born in a poopy manger – the man nailed naked to a tree – that we find our supreme example. Do your guts twist inside you with those word-combinations?
Western culture gravitates to Norse pagan mythologies – where we are bred for battle and heaven involves waiting for the biggest blood battle of them all!
Instead, the way of Jesus is more about love than power (Faith, hope and love – the greatest being love… even with faith to move mountains – powerful faith – if you are without love, you are nothing (1 Cor 13)).
It is through the weakness of the cross that God’s true power is revealed: 1 Cor 1:18-25 “For the word of the cross is folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written, “I will destroy the wisdom of the wise, and the discernment of the discerning I will thwart.” Where is the one who is wise? Where is the scribe? Where is the debater of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since, in the wisdom of God, the world did not know God through wisdom, it pleased God through the follow of what we preach to save those who believe. For Jews demand [powerful] signs and Greeks seek wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and folly to Gentiles, but to those who are called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.”
