Strength in Weakness | itsawonderfilledlife

Posts Tagged ‘Strength in Weakness’

The Blessing of Curses

Posted in GOD, life, WONDER, tagged Blessing, curses, heartaches, heaviness, independent, seek you, strength, Strength in Weakness, weakness on October 9, 2012| 4 Comments »

When things are going good, when life is hiccup-free, when smiles abound there is a lightness to my step and to my soul that opens me up to a carefree spirit. I feel like singing the The Happy Song .

Those times are times of lightness, and freedom, and a feeling that I can do anything!

Then there are the other times. The I just can’t lift my head off the pillow times. The I just want this day to be over before it has barely begun. The days when I feel like Atlas with the weight of the world on my shoulders, except that I do not have the strength that he has.

Those times are times of heaviness, and bondage, and a feeling that I can do nothing.

But …

When things are going well, and I think that I can do anything … I do, and I do it all in my own strength. I am a pretty independent person, and that independent spirit can come back to bite me in the butt. You see, my strength, it’s powered by me, and I do not have endless energy resources, so eventually all of the excitement of ‘I can do it’ fades.

When things are not going so well, and I am overcome with doubts and stresses, it is then that I know I cannot do it alone, and I lean on a far more viable energy source, my Creator God. And it is then that I soar like the eagles (instead of fly with the turkeys), because I have an undercurrent of endless momentum.

It is not an easy thing to do, but I am starting to realize the blessing of heartaches, disappointments and curses that this life inevitably hands over to us. My prayers are changing. I do not pray that God will protect and keep me from the ‘nasties’ of life, because I know that they are around any and every corner. Instead I pray that, through them, I might learn to rely more fully on God to get me through.

Thank you god for the heartaches,
the disappointments,
the fall on my face moments …
They make me cling to You like nothing else.
They make me yell and scream
and be more real more honest with You my Creator.
No joy,
no blessing
can make me yearn for and seek you.
It is only when I am at my weakest,
neediest place
that I fully rely on You,
and You alone.
Amen

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The Hurt and the Healer

Posted in GOD, life, WONDER, tagged 2 Corinthians 12, Disappointment, Mercy Me, Pain, Strength in Weakness, Struggle, The Hurt and the Healer on March 19, 2012| Leave a Comment »

As I spoke with a dear friend, my heart was so full of so many contrasting thoughts. She has been going through a really tough time lately. Actually she has been going through a tough time, probably for years. Recently though, her husband left.

We have all been through times when we beat our chests, and moan from a place so deep within us that the moaning is inaudible, except at extreme volumes, in our own ears. We might not have had a husband move out, but we have had our heart so broken that we were not sure how to keep going, how to keep it beating, how to keep breathing … how to stay … alive.

Maybe we were unsure of how to do all of that because we really just wished that our heart WOULD stop beating, that our lungs WOULD stop breathing, that we would no longer be alive. Maybe, our heart was so broken into pieces that we could not imagine going on another day.

I am sure that my friend had felt all of those feelings. I am sure that she has had days when she awoke in the depths of despair, and had no idea of how she would life her head. But, the other day, as I was speaking to her, I was in awe of the woman in front of me. She was hopeful, she was confident, she was ALIVE!

My friend talked of the various ways that God is working in and through this horrible situation she is going through. She talked about how her needs are being met. She talked about how this horrible, awful, hurtful situation has allowed her to know the love of God, and her need for Him only. She talked to me with the most peaceful, beautiful smile on her face, and bright wonder in her eyes.

She brought 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 to life for 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.”

She did not say her pain was gone, nor did she tell me that the pain was all worth it. What she did communicate to me, with her hope and with her words and with her outlook on life is that, DESPITE the hurt and pain, she is resting in the strength of someone who can shoulder it for her. And her reliance on that source of strength is empowering her to live life more alive than maybe ever in her life before.