When You Feel Weak

A friend made herself comfortable in my living room a few evenings ago, delighted to discover the loveseat she chose to sit in was actually a rocker. (I was a little worried she might still be there come morning.) The other girls filled mugs with decaf coffee, and soon we were all cozied up in the living room, talking about everything the way women do. I read a few verses of Scripture, and we focused the conversation on what it means to think of God all day long.

 

It was then that my friend in the rocker said she often stands in her house or at work and wonders that God has entrusted her with the responsibility of all of it. She often doesn’t feel like she knows what she’s doing.

 

Those were some of the most encouraging words I have heard in a long time.

 

I often feel that way, too –that I don’t know what I’m doing.

 

I don’t know how to help my lanky 16-year-old be a godly man. I don’t know how to influence those 40 students to work hard and have integrity. I don’t know how to communicate to my husband what a good shepherd he is to our church family. I don’t know how to convince my friend how lost I would feel without her. I don’t know how I can go all day pleasing God with every decision I make and every word that comes out of my mouth.

I am weak and lacking.

 

Paul says, “I delight in weaknesses.” (2 Corinthians 12:10 NIV)

 

Delight: To be pleased with something.

 

There are things that bring a smile to my face, like when I receive a flirty wink from my husband from across the room. I’m trying to use my imagination to picture myself smiling in that same way over my weaknesses.

 

Paul says, “I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.” (2 Corinthians 12:10 NIV)

 

Ah, there is the reason to smile. There is the delight. The problem is when I only feel my weakness. The end. And I do not carry out the thought all the way, to acknowledging the power of Christ available to me.

 

So I pen this letter:

 

Dear weaknesses,

I was trying to evict you because you are making a mess of things and because I simply do not like you, but apparently Christ wants to do a remodel with you still living here. I am going to stop berating you and instead brag to my friends that you and I are roomies, but I am seriously hoping Christ knows what he’s doing in letting you stay here, when he has made such grandiose promises about how faultless this place will be when he is done with it.

 

My friends, do you feel weak, too? Please say yes.

 

Christy Fitzwater is the author of A Study of Psalm 25: Seven Actions to Take When Life Gets Hard. She is a blogger, pastor’s wife and mom of two teenagers and resides in Montana. Visit ChristyFitzwater.com for more information about her ministry.