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Weakness
- 03/11/10
- 26
I woke up this morning feeling just a bit discouraged. I guess there’s a fair bit of uncertainty in certain parts of life right now, the kind of uncertainty that tends to be on my mind late at night or early in the morning (or, worst of all, smack dab between the two). I’m facing a day in which I need to be sharp and creative; a day in which I’ve got to make some good progress on my book. That deadline is creeping closer and closer and I can’t afford to be complacent. And yet few things are more difficult than a day of concentration and creativity when faced by that discouragement. For some reason the thought of even trying to settle down to write today it is both terrifying and paralyzing.
When I got out of bed I found myself doing what I often do when discouraged—tidying the house. I don’t know why, but for some odd reason I find this therapeutic. So I prayed while I went, putting away the dishes in the rack, tidying up the kids’ toys in the basement, putting away the winter boots piled near the front door that, hopefully, we will not need again this year. I got breakfast ready for the kids, woke them up, got ready for the day and ushered them out the door to the school bus. I came up to my office and wrote a pretty good blog post which, with one errant touch on the wrong button, promptly disappeared, just like that. It’s been a long time since I made such a rookie mistake. This was probably not the best day for it.
Along the way, somewhere between tidying the house and making breakfast, I turned to the Bible, asking to find in it words of life.
Though lately I’ve been studying 1 Peter, this morning I just flipped through the Bible for a moment or two and started reading where I landed. It turns out that I was in 2 Corinthians 12. Could I have chosen better? There we find Paul coming to the credscendo of his long discussion of weakness; here he glories in his own weakness, realizing that God works through his weakness rather than despite it. “‘My grace is sufficient for you,” said the Lord, “‘for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Paul knew that his own weakness was the very key to anything God would accomplish through him. In fact, in order to keep him humble and to keep him from depending on his own strength and power, God gave him that mysterious thorn in the flesh, some kind of burden that hurt or discouraged or embarrassed him. Somehow it made him weak so that he would find strength only in the Lord. Kent Hughes points out that “power in weakness” is a thread through the whole letter of 2 Corinthians and that the repeated statements of power in weakness are meant to be forceful in capturing our souls and making such weakness the motif of our life.
Hughes goes on:
But what we most need to see is that power in weakness is shorthand for the cross of Christ. In God’s plan of redemption, there had to be weakness (crucifixion) before there was power (resurrection). And this power-in-weakness connection is what Paul reflected on when he contemplated Christ’s praying three times admist his weakness and powerlessness in Gethsemane before his death on the cross, which was followed by the power of the ressurection! Paul came to understand and embrace the fact that his thorn in the flesh was essential to his ongoing weakness and the experience of Christ’s ongoing power.
So maybe I need to turn to my book today in weakness, not in strength. Maybe this discouragement, this fear, is exactly what I need. If I were strong today, I might seek to go forward in my own strength. But instead God has shown me my weakness and his burdened me with that weakness. I think he is calling me to be thankful for it. And what a promise he offers. Paul says that he will boast only in weakness so that “the power of Christ may rest upon me.” Here he turns to the language of the tabernacle where God would “pitch his tent” with his people, tabernacling with them (see Exodus 40:34). God rests upon his people, giving them his strength to compensate for their weakness.
Once more Hughes has something to say. “Life is not as it appears to be. We are led by today’s culture to imagine that God pitches his tent with the especially famous and powerful—those who can speak of ecstasies and miraculous power and who command large crowds as they jet from city to city and enjoy the spotlight of center stage—but it is not so. Christ pitches his tent with the weak and the unknown, the suffering shut-in, the anonymous pastor and missionary, the godly, quiet servants in the home and the marketplace.”
This morning I am aware of how little I have to offer him and I am aware that if I am to do anything, to say anything, I will need his strength. I pray that today he will pitch his tent with me that his strength may become mine.
I am a follower of Jesus Christ, a husband to Aileen and a father to three young children. I worship and serve as a pastor at 
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Comments (26)
I too have been in a funk. For me it is looking forward to retirement and not the 8 to whenever I now work.
I am in the book of James for my study, verse one talkes about being a servant to God, or a bond slave and giving your all to only HIm.
It gets me through the day as we struggle to do what is right in the sight of God.
LOVE this post! thank you for sharing it!! praying for you as you write today…
Tim,
Thank you for your transparency. God used you in your weakness to minister to me today, so I thank him for it.
Thanks for your openness, Tim. I’ll join in praying that you receive the Lord’s strength as you write and work.
A powerful testimony for us all.
Praying for you today, brother.
…Remember that incident of the man who fought off hunting dogs to save a little fawn after it had come to him for protection…”I felt that all the dogs of the west could not, and should not, capture that fawn after its weakness had appealed to my strength. So it is when human helplessness appeals to Almighty God…”
I pray God will strengthen you today.
Quietly contemplating your words. I think you may have just encouraged us THROUGH your weakness.
We do everything we can to run away from weakness — afraid of what it will expose. Instead we should embrace it.
Tough duty my friend!David, Red letter Believers, www.redletterbelievers.com
Thanks Tim,It’s exactly what I needed to read this morning.
Thanks Tim,
I began this day in my own strength. After reading your message, I was reminded that I had not started in prayer and immediately stopped what I was doing to seek God.
I appreciate the weakness and power reference. I had not heard it stated quite that way, but have always been convinced God’s power is really displayed in what we consider are the weakest moments.
I am encouraged by Paul’s words on contentment in weakness, that God’s grace is sufficient.
Amen!
If we were strong, He would not get the glory. Praying for you, Mr. Challies.
Jon Acuff had a line in his Wed. blog - “(God) doesn’t give us solutions. He gives us a Saviour.” We want our problems/writer’s block/etc. removed, but God leaves them in place and sends Christ to minister to us in the midst of them. I think you’ve hit the nail on the head, Tim - “God has shown me my weakness….I think He is calling me to be thankful for it.” An awesome testimony.http://hurricane-camille.blogspot.com/2010/03/heavy-chains-of-grace.html
It is a biological necessity that strength is built on weakness. Strength does not become strength unless it was not strength to begin with. Exercise tells us so. Just as strength is always built on the foundation of weakness from the previous workout, so it is with our spiritual lives. When we acknowledge weakness in a moment of resistance, we are strengthened by what is newly built.
Tim,
My soul was refreshed by your encouraging (or discouraging?) post. I happen to be feeling as you describe, however, tidying doesn’t do it for me!
However, what an awesome reminder to trust God who is strong despite our weakness.
Thank you for being a transparent, humble, man of God!
To God be the glory!
Dear Tim,
It is nice to know that I’m not the only one, I too am writing and am discouraged because I am behind. It is so easy to put everything else first…
Chris
“For when I am weak, then I am strong.” I was thinking and pondering this very verse this morning. I am very weak at many things in my life right now. And somtimes I actually do sinfully complain and blame, but other times His grace strengthens me, in spite of me.
Our Father loves us to the utmost. But as CS Lewis said:
“Love may forgive all infirmities and love still in spite of them: but Love cannot cease to will their removal.”
Thanks for the divine appointed post. Actually they all are, even when we do them wrong, for God ordains all things for our good, those who love Him in Christ.
Thank you for this honest post.
Tim,
Your confessed weakness elicited an intense yearning in my spirit to comfort you, even as the Lord comforted me just last week. But upon reading how the Spirit and the Word ministered to you, I found that it was I who was consoled, all over again. How faithful and loving is our heavenly Father! How tender He is with the bruised reed! How good it is to suffer alongside of you, with our Lord and Savior, as members of His body!
I think that the temporary inability to compose thoughts and shape ideas into something beautiful and true is, to the writer (whose trade relies on these and other tools), as unsteady hands are to the nervous surgeon or the threat of unseasonably inclement weather is to the poor farmer. The troubled heart, the anxious mind, the diowncast soul—these are the shadows that are cast in the light of day, when we turn away from the sun. When we are mindful to cast our cares upon Him who cares for us, we turn toward the Son, trusting in Him alone even when we can’t understand His purposes, Then, He fills us with the peace that surpasses all understanding; and the work He has prepared for us is suprisingly easy, His burden suddenly light. For it is no work at all to receive His love; it is a conscious delight!
I will remember you in my prayers as you go about kingdom work.
Humbly,
Lori
Hi Tim,
It looks our Lord did in fact move through your weakness…what an excellent post.
Hey brother! I am sorry you had a discouraging day and perhaps are having many discouraging days lately! I will make a point of praying for you, that your book would come along, etc but even more that you would find hope in every part of the day!:) I am thankful for your vulnerability in this post…often when many of us live so far away from each other, I feel as though I have absolutely NO clue anymore what is going, besides what I see in Facebook statuses so thank you!
Love middle sister:)
Quite the helpful and encouraging post. Thanks Tim.
One evening while clearing my snowy car for the long scary trek home in a blizzard after work, I prayed “Jesus, I am really going to need your help getting home tonight.” Then the thought came straight away, “How do you think you get home every night?” I’m often reminded in those days when I am weak and can’t do what I ought, that even in those days I am doing well, it is only by His grace. He uses those “weak” days to remind me that all I do/have/am comes from Him.
Thanks Tim. Let me add my voice to the many that appreciate your thoughtfulness and honesty.
One soapbox moment, if I may…
“There we find Paul coming to the credscendo of his long discussion of weakness…”
The word “crescendo” means “to get louder” in music. It’s an increase of volume/intensity and not a climax or destination. Although many people use the phrase “rising to a crescendo,” it really translates “rising to an increase” or some such nonsense. If I can try to stem the tide of an etymological mishap and steer others away from using it, I’ll give it me best shot.
I now step down from the soapbox and wait for rotten tomatoes to fly my way…
In all seriousness, thanks for all you write and for this ministry. I appreciate it.
Hey Tim, this was a great post. I can’t tell you how many times I wake up feeling the same thing. Same thing goes for waking up in the middle of the night…not only feeling discouraged, but that a few things in my life are right. Bad decisions, a rebuke from the boss, indecision about direction of my life.
All can cause discouragement and weakness.
I think part of the problem is that I expect my life to be extravagant and that I’m not in the place or position that someone my age should be. Of course this is quite silly [Reminds me of Schaeffer’s sermon, “There Are No Little People”.
But in the end this is were we come to depend on God more than ever before. It’s healthy to recognize our weakness. To feel it. And to beg for God’s help.
Then as professionals we push through this slump and do what were called to do. In our cases, write. And lead. Even if we feel like losers.
Appreciate your thoughts, sir.
Thank you Tim for this post.
Being an unemployed IT worker in the states is hard since so many are submitting for the same position. I find that I tend to pray many times during the day for God’s strength to “press on” as I have heard it said. Thank you for the reminder and scripture references. You are in my prayers as you continue with your writing.