Weakness and Strength

Why do we disdain the very thing God wants to use to make us complete in him?

by Neal Lozano

When I came into a personal relationship with the Lord Jesus, I sort of cheated. I didn't really make a conscious decision to accept Jesus as my Lord, or consciously repent of my sins or embrace a death to my life apart from God. I made no commitment at all. I simply got zapped. Though I was desperate, I would not have admitted it. Though my life was a failure, I could not have faced it. Though I had no hope, I chose to believe the lie that I was okay, rather than to face the truth. As for the things in my life that I did see as weaknesses, I wanted to put as much distance between me and them as I could. I justified them, excused them, minimized them, compared them to others, and so on, all in an effort to deal with the voice of truth within me declaring, " I'm not so bad."

When the love of God was revealed to. me, honesty and truth began to take hold of my life. Only in knowing that "Christ died for me whileI was still a sinner" did I fmd courage to face the truth. Yet my confusion over strength and weakness had its effect on the very foundations of my Christian life. I felt that my present success and my victory over personal problems would be a testimony that would help others to believe. Weakness was not a source of blessing, it was an enemy. So now I had a new motivation for the same old deception.

I remember hearing folks say, "People just need Jesus as a crutch in life." I would try to respond by saying that it wasn't so. "It's not that we are so needy or weak; it's just that Jesus is the fullness of truth and life." While my response was true to a point, I should have taken the opportunity to boast of the things that demonstrated my weakness and said, ~I need Jesus more than a cripple needs a crutch. I need him for my daily existence. I need him more than I need food." Yet I had fallen into the trap. I thought I wanted to be a strong Christian, but what I really wanted was to be a strong person-to be strong enough not to need Jesus anymore.

Hiding from Weakness

Though I knew in my heart that Jesus saved me, my mind did not always agree. Paul said this about salvation: At one time we too were foolish, disobedient. deceived and enslaved by all kinds of passions and pleasures. We lived in malice and envy, being hated and hating one another. But when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of his mercy. (Titus 3:3-5)

Remembering the truth of our need and our condition enables us to walk in the joy of what God has done for us. Titus 3 is more alive to me every day.

We live in a society that values strength and hides from weakness. We run and hide from those things that reveal our weakness. We hide from the elderly and the handicapped, we abort our children, we adjust our appearances through surgery, we flee from the poor and the homeless. As Christians, we often do the same things. Our programs and appearances become more important than the reality of our brokenness. We confuse the strength that we are to have in the Lord with the strength we have in the flesh. We often disdain the very weakness that God has permitted in our lives to produce Godly character and strength. When we read about Paul boasting of his weakness and declaring that when he was weak he was strong, we put qualifications on it, we put distance between ourselves and his experience. We don't understand, and it is threatening to try. Who wants to boast of one's weakness?

Is any of this true about you or your church or prayer group? Are there ways that you have established your life or your group in such a way that you no longer cry out to the Lord for help? Is there very little that you could be criticized for? Do you rarely find yourself in need? Do you have more answers than questions? Perhaps you're walking on the road that I walked.

I think that many in the church today need a conversion in this area. As with every other spiritual truth, we need conversion in order to understand. We need a new mind. We can only know the mind of God by the Spirit of God. Without the Spirit we often see Godly things as foolishness or weakness. We call "spiritual," things that are not spiritual. We call "wisdom," that which is not wisdom.

Boasting of Weakness

Paul faced a particular challenge in the Corinthian church. In 2 Corinthians, chapter eleven, Paul was responding to false teachers who were commending themselves: "For such men are false apostles, deceitful workmen, masquerading as apostles of Christ" (2 Cor. 11:13). He saw them as aggressive, manipulative and controlling (vs. 20).

He was driven to a godly jealousy and concern: I am Jealous for you with a godly Jealousy. I promised you to one husband. to Christ. so that I might present you as a pure virgin to him. ButI am afraid that just as Eve was deceived by the serpents' cunning, your minds may somehow be lead astray from your sincere and pure devotion to Christ. (2 Cor. 11:2-3)

What should he do to protect the Corinthians from being led astray? Boasting was out. He was on record: May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. (Gal. 6:1)

For I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified. I came to you in weakness and fear, and with much trembling (1 Cor. 2:2-3)

Let him who boasts boast in the Lord. (2 Cor. 10:17)

Let us glory in the things that keep us lowly and weak, our suffering and hardship, because that is what keeps us in our place, close to God.

Yet, in order to protect them, Paul decided to boast. But what did he boast of? Spiritual gifts? Healings? Churches? Abilities? Awards? College degrees? No! He boasted of hardships, persecution. , suffering, the burden of concern he carried for all the churches and an experience of God that was inexpressible (beyond his ability to communicate). All these things were the opposite of worldly success and power. All were things that caused dependence on God, things he could do only by grace. His weakness was the means of God's grace being active in his life. He said "If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness" (2 Cor. 11:30). Paul was being consistent, after all. To boast of one's weakness is to boast in the Lord, the Crucified One, because it is our very weakness that reveals the power of the cross of Christ to others. Paul was used in mighty ways to heal, to deliver, to set the captives free, yet his boast was in something that afflicted him:

To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpasstngly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.,' Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
(2 Cor. 12:7-10)

Through his suffering Paul understood the great paradox that when we are weak then we are strong. God's power is made perfect in weakness; therefore our weakness is something to take great delight in.

Delighting in Weakness

Webster defines weakness as lacking strength; being frail or feeble; lacking moral strength or willpower. A bible dictionary defines it as being infirmed; the inability to produce results. Paul defined it in terms of insults, hardships and difficulties.

Understanding our weakness is vital to our grasping the message of the Gospel. We are told in the Gospel of John, chapter fifteen, verse five, that we must remain in him, for apart from him we can do nothing.

The Psalmist writes, "For he will deliver the needy who cry out, the afflicted who have no one to help. He will take pity on the weak and the needy and save the needy from death" (Psalm 72:12-13). It seems like a good deal to be in need. It's healthy to be afflicted. Jesus came to save sinners, not the righteous. He said it is the sick that need a doctor, not the healthy. The needy are the ones who cry out, and the needy are delivered.

It's when we don't know how to pray that the Spirit comes and helps us. "In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express" (Rom. 8:26). It's when we come to an end of our resources and abilities that God is there.

This is one of the reasons Jesus was hated so much (and still is). He came to seek and save the lost (Luke 19:10). Only those that accept their weakness and know their need can come to him. Those who deny their need, like the Pharisees, cannot receive him.

Salvation is an ongoing process. Life's circumstances, the scriptures, the work of the Holy Spirit, all lead us to the discovery of our blindness, sin and separation. This gives us awareness of our helplessness, desperation and dependency on God, which, in turn, leads us to confession of sin and crying out to God. The clarity we have about our need relates directly to the quality of our repentance. Then we can pray with the psalmist who wrote: "Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord" (Psalm 130:1). "I sought the Lord, and he answered me; he delivered me from all my fears" (Psalm 34).

So, we cry out to God out of our weakness, and God hears our cry and delivers us. Is deliverance possible apart from weakness? Is salvation possible apart from the cross? Is not God's foolishness greater than the wisdom of man? Should we not then learn to delight in our weakness?

Shaming the Strong

"But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong" (1 Cor. 1:27). God chose those parts of the body that seem to be weaker as the indispensable parts. The presence of weakness is vital to every work of God. The presence of the poor, the disabled, the elderly, the handicapped, are vital to society. Do they not confront society with the truth of our condition, the consequence of sin and our need for a savior? Those who can't handle their finances, control their emotions or their children, or those that don't bathe properly or know how to put on a good appearance, are all a vital presence in our churches and groups. Do they not reveal to us, through their external situations, the reality of our own hearts and the mercy of God? "On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable" (1 Cor. 12:22).

"My message and my preaching were not with wise and persuasive words, but with a demonstration of the Spirit's power, so that your faith might not rest on men's wisdom, but on God's power" (1 Cor. 2:4-5). Paul came to Corinth in weakness, so that their faith might rest in the power of God. Their encounter with Paul was overshadowed by their encounter with God. Paul was a human being, with frailty and weakness. They could not trust in his power, but the power of God.

In Luke, we read that God lifts up the lowly and scatters the proud; his mercy is on those who fear him. Should we glory in the wisdom we have, the fellowship we experience, the gifts God has given to us? Rather, let us glory in the things that keep us lowly and weak, our suffering and hardship, because that is what keeps us dependent on God. It keeps us in our place, close to God. If it were not for the ever present weakness in my life- my inability to produce results, or things that seem to continually oppose me as I seek to do the right thing -I would not have been as faithful to the Lord, nor would I know my Savior as I do today.

The Right Response

A few years ago our community received some wonderful teaching on Christian manhood and manly character. Yet many of us became more afraid of our weakness, more concerned about what others thought about us and whether or not they knew how insecure we were about our own identity. We began to try to change from the outside in, not motivated by love for God, but by a love for ourselves and a denial of our true condition.

Change begins with the truth. When we are confronted with the truth we need to admit it and seek to understand it as fully as we can. We need to confess it and cry out to God from our weakness. Then we can act on what we have learned with the confidence that he is producing change in us.

There wasn't anything wrong with the teach ing; what was wrong was our response to it. If we seek to respond to a teaching about the Christian life without confessing our weakness, then we will be seeking to grow by our own wisdom apart from the grace of God. To do so is to miss the mark. King David demonstrated this in Psalm 18:

I love you, O Lord, my strength, the Lord is my roe*, my fortress and my deliverer; my God * my rock, in whom I take refuge. He is my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold. I call to the Lord, who is worthy of praise. and I am saved from my enemies. The cords of death entangled me; the torrents of destruction overwhelmed me. The cords of the grave coiled around me; the snares of death confronted me. In my distress I called to the Lord; I cried to my God for help. From kits temple he heard my voice; my cry came before him, unto his ears. (Psalm 18:1-6)

David began by declaring who God is, then he honestly confessed the truth of the situation and, in his distress, he cried out to God for help. David understood about weakness. When he went out to face Goliath, he was offered the armor of Saul. He chose five stones instead. He chose weak things and defeated Goliath by the power of God.

Jesus himself cried out in human weakness like David. "During the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission" (Heb. 5:7). Jesus offered up prayers with loud cries and tears. It's likely that others heard him. If so, in his cries he imparted something of great value to his disciples. He taught them that strength is found in weakness. Jesus, like David, chose weakness to defeat Satan. Instead of five stones, Jesus chose five wounds to defeat the enemy. We too defeat the enemy, not by what we put on, but by what is worked into us through the weakness we embrace.

The Meaning of Weakness

Being weak means recognizing and accepting thorns in the flesh. What are the thorns in your life? Is there someone with whom you are having difficulty: your child, your parent, your spouse, a co-worker? Is there someone who brings out the worst in you, someone who makes you look bad, someone who opposes you in everything you try to do? Do you have a physical problem? These things are indispensable; they are the things that keep us humble and under God's grace. It is not good to always succeed-in fact, it can be dangerous.

Being weak means being honest with ourselves. We tend to deny our weakness or to call it something other than weakness. The truth is that we should embrace it and delight in it. When Ispeak of weakness, I am not referring to sin, but of our inability to do anything apart from God, and our vulnerability to sin. Accepting our weakness keeps us dependent on God. Our strength is that we are trusting in the Lord and looking to God for what we need.

Being weak means being truthful with our brothers and sisters. Things kept in darkness have power over us, through fear. When we say them out loud we face our fears about ourselves and we begin to gain authority over them. If our weakness is in the light, it doesn't have to rule over us, so we don't have to act out of it.

Being weak strengthens our unity. Our weakness confirms the necessity of the cross of Christ, and our unity is most real to us when we stand together at the foot of the cross. To deny our weakness before one another undercuts the love and support that we give to one another.

Choosing to Need

Those who are married need to communicate to their spouse that they need them. Sometimes we think that our spouse's greatest need is for us to be strong. What we end up communicating is, "I don't need you," or we make a virtue of not being vulnerable. Our spouses need to know that they are important to us, that we receive life and strength from them. It's not that we inappropriately depend on them for life, but we can receive it from them, and be grateful for it, as we look to God for life and strength.

God has chosen us to be partners-unequal partners-in the work of salvation. God's love is so strikingly pure precisely because it is not rooted in need. Yet he has chosen, in a sense, to need us. Not because he lacks, but in order to more fully express his love in Christ. In a similar fashion by choosing to join ourselves to our spouses as partners (equal partners) for life, we have "chosen to need" in this relationship. If we fail to delight in our weakness we fail to appreciate the gift that our spouse is to us in Christ.

If we don't reveal our weakness to our children they will get discouraged and lose hope that they can be godly men and women. If we appear to be perfect, they will think that they should be perfect, too. They should know that we need their prayers. We should be honest in difficult times (while being careful to always be the parent and not reverse the roles). They need to see how we go through a problem, not just the resolution.

Wounded Leaders

Whenever we are in relationships to give counsel, or in leadership, we can lead the way in being honest about our struggles. If we present ourselves as more holy than we are, then those we lead will present themselves as better than they are, or become discouraged by their weakness. Let our leadership challenge others to be honest and sincere in their struggle rather than successful in appearance. Let us reveal our need as we serve others, so that they may know that every member of the Body is important and needed by the others.

We have heard it said that the only healer is a wounded healer. It's true also for leaders. It is out of our brokenness that we reveal the power and love of God to others. We cannot give what we have not received.

I used to pride myself in my ability to sit down with folks and help them resolve the relational difficulties they had. That is, until I met my match-which happened to be my own children. I regularly failed in my efforts to help resolve their conflicts and restore their relationships.

One day as I was headed upstairs to help resolve a conflict one more time, I asked God for help. As I was asking, a story came to mind. Someone once told me about the pastor of a large church. Whenever there were problems among the leaders, he would gather them all together and begin to pray and confess his sins. As he prayed, the others would follow. Since I had nothing left to give, it seemed worth a try. So I asked my sons to kneel with me, and I cried out to God from my heart.

Within moments, both of my sons began to weep as they asked God to forgive them and help them. Grace was released and, for several weeks following, there was a work of grace in their hearts, expressed through patience, forbearance and love. Things eventually resumed to normal. But from that point on, there was a freedom for them to grow through their difficulties that had not been there before. A root of bitterness had been broken, not by human wisdom, but by the power of God manifested through human weakness.

Remaining in Christ

Jesus himself taught us the principle of weakness and strength. In Matthew, chapter 5, Jesus tells us who are the ones that are blessed. The ones that are blessed are those who are poor (who know their need), the meek (who know the greatness of God and therefore their lowliness), the ones that mourn (who feel the pain of loss), the peacemakers (who, like Jesus, suffer the loss of their life for the sake of bringing reconciliation to others), and those who are persecuted for the sake of the Gospel (who have lost or given up their rights).

The attitudes to which this scripture calls us are attitudes of poverty, lowliness and weakness. These are not attitudes we can achieve by willpower or effort. These are attitudes that we develop as we yield to God in the circumstances of our life, embracing our weakness, not seeking to be happy on the basis of our own achievement, but rather, trusting in him for happiness that comes from our relationship with him, a relationship that increases as we decrease, that is strengthened as we are weakened.

To be truly strong is to remain in him. In Exodus 15:2, we are told that the Lord himself is our strength. Nehemiah 8:10 tells us that the joy of the Lord is our strength. It is the joy flowing from his presence in our lives that is our strength. It is his joy that gives us strength. Judges16:17 tells us that we lose our strength through sin, and Mark 9:18 tells us that we lose it through unbelief. Sin and unbelief cut us off from the Lord, who is our strength. We are strong only when we are weak enough to confess our sins and live by trusting in his saving power.

The Cross

In Matthew 17:9 Jesus tells his disciples, "Don't tell anyone what you have seen, until the Son of Man has been raised from the dead." There are things that can never be understood except when viewed from the cross. Conversion finds its source in the cross.

Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God to wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength (1 Cor. 1:22-25)

The cross is the very foolishness of God, it is the weakness of God. At the cross we see the great paradox. There the Author of life dies. The One that knows no sin is punished for sin by his loving father. The cross, which is the wisdom of God, is foolishness before men. The strength of God himself is presented through weakness.

Millions of people in twelve-step programs begin their journey by admitting that they are failures, that they are powerless before their addiction. That is not a truth reserved for the addict, that is a truth the Gospel has always proclaimed for all of us. The cross of Christ tells us that we are failures, hopelessly lost. That is the very reason for the cross. The cross tells us that we are guilty and condemned and that we need a savior. The cross declares to us that we are hopelessly weak, that all the wisdom of man is foolishness if it does not come under the wisdom of the Cross. We are indeed powerless, unable to overcome the separation between us and God.

Therefore, let us boast in our weakness. Let us delight in our weakness, because being weak means being strong. To boast of our weakness enables us to boast of the cross of Christ through which I have been crucified to the world and the world to me." In Christ we are not lost, but found. In him we are not failures, we walk in victory. We are no longer guilty, but forgiven. In him we are not condemned, but accepted. We no longer need to demonstrate our value by what good we do; we have become good by receiving the life of the Son of God, through the presence of the Holy Spirit.

On the cross Jesus bore our weakness. He took them on so that we could walk, not in accordance with our weakness, but in accordance with his strength. In Christ we walk in great power and victory. We delight in our weakness because God chose us, "the weak things of the world, to shame the strong" (1 Cor. 1:27).

 

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Neal Lozano is a leader of the House of God's Light Community, in Ardmore, Pennsylvania. Neal is a Catholic who also serves with Renewal and Reconciliation, an interdenominational movement in Philadelpia, Pennsylvania, USA.

Portions of this article are contained in his book, 'The Older Brother Returns.'

If you would like to purchase a copy send a check or money order for $10.00 (U.S Currency please) to:
Neal Lozano
213 Cricket Ave.
Ardmore, PA 19003 USA

Copyright ©1998 Faith and Renewal
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