We struggle with so many things in this life, but the one thing we struggle the most with is US. Many of the problems of life would be easier if WE did not focus so much on what WE want, need and desire.
There are many things that our Lord uses to help us keep ourselves under His control. He will use people that we might have a personality conflict with to reveal the depths of SELF that are still in us. We keep butting heads with them or pray that God will straighten them out when all the time He wants to straighten US out.
If Jesus lives in me, if I am developing His character in me and if I allow Him to mold me then I will be constantly bumping into ME. I get in Jesus’ way when He is growing and stretching me. I discover this when I clash with another person. I discover this when I allow life to direct me. These clashes, bumps and collisions are God’s way of revealing me to me. My reaction to these things reveals the depth of my walk with the Lord.
The weakest moments of my life drive me to God. It is here I discover His strength. It is in the height of the moment I can choose to walk in the depths of His grace. It is in the moments that I feel the most empty that He can fill me the fullest.
Strength in weakness, life in death, joy in struggle – the legacy of allowing God to use our clashes to grow us. It is worth it!
Thursday, July 19, 2007
Monday, July 02, 2007
The STRENGTH of pain
It appears to me that, at times, God walks us through what St. John of the Cross calls The Dark Night of the Soul. This is a time when God seems distant, our prayers empty and our lives barren. We might feel despair, discouraged and depressed.
Henri Nouwen writes: “There is a real pain in your heart, a pain that belongs to you. You know now that you cannot avoid, ignore or repress it. It is this pain that reveals to you how you are called to live. You are living in solidarity with the broken human race. You must distinguish carefully between your pain and the pains that have attached themselves to you…When you feel rejected, when you think of yourself as a failure and a misfit, you must be careful not to let these feelings and thoughts pierce your heart.” (The Inner Voice of Love; page 97)
Yet, struggling with the pain and heartache may be the exact place God wants us to be. Why? During this time when our senses are darkened and our desires thwarted God is preparing supernaturally illumine our spirits. All of our senses might feel empty and void, like there is a thick, dark cloud over them. We feel afflicted and far from God. Yet, the greater the darkness we journey through, the more strength and security we will discover in God.
Perhaps this is the lesson Paul learned as he wrote in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 “To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly 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." NIV
When I realized how weak I was, then I was on the road to gaining God’s strength.
Henri Nouwen writes: “There is a real pain in your heart, a pain that belongs to you. You know now that you cannot avoid, ignore or repress it. It is this pain that reveals to you how you are called to live. You are living in solidarity with the broken human race. You must distinguish carefully between your pain and the pains that have attached themselves to you…When you feel rejected, when you think of yourself as a failure and a misfit, you must be careful not to let these feelings and thoughts pierce your heart.” (The Inner Voice of Love; page 97)
Yet, struggling with the pain and heartache may be the exact place God wants us to be. Why? During this time when our senses are darkened and our desires thwarted God is preparing supernaturally illumine our spirits. All of our senses might feel empty and void, like there is a thick, dark cloud over them. We feel afflicted and far from God. Yet, the greater the darkness we journey through, the more strength and security we will discover in God.
Perhaps this is the lesson Paul learned as he wrote in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10 “To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly 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." NIV
When I realized how weak I was, then I was on the road to gaining God’s strength.
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