Strength in Weakness

Being strong physically has never been a word that I have naturally associated to myself (unless it was being used with irony!) 

I’ve never been able to do a pull up, went on a body composition analysis machine which deemed my body type as ‘weak’, and even use a special grip to help open those jars that just won’t budge!

Whilst physical strength can be helpful, what about when tough times come in life? What about when everything seems against us and we feel weak emotionally and spiritually - when being able to open a jar without assistance just isn’t cutting it. Where do we then get our strength from?

Different people will have different answers - some will reach out to family and friends, others to their mental health toolkit, some will go for a run, or book a holiday, and others will raid the chocolate stash. There are lots of ways (both helpful and unhelpful) that we use to give us strength to face life’s challenges.

For me personally, whilst I utilise many of the above for temporary help/support, I know that without the confidence that God has got me and loves me, I would be a nervous wreck in a lot of situations. 

Don’t get me wrong, I still worry and get anxious about things - I can think now of situations I’ve got coming up in the next few days, weeks and months that I’m already nervous about. As part of the work I do with an international charity there is the opportunity to travel and see the projects that we support. This is something I’m excited about (more on that in the future!) and am grateful I'm able to do at this stage of my life, but is also clouded with anxiety about everything from the travel, to the food, to meeting lots of new people, to the potential of being unwell whilst away. 

I know there are challenges like these that I will (and do) find particularly difficult but I can face them because I live with the sure knowledge that I have a loving, all-powerful Father by my side, who didn’t even refuse giving his only Son, Jesus, to save me from an eternity without Him.

The Bible also gives us many examples of people who faced extraordinarily difficult circumstances and God saw them through – Joseph was accused and imprisoned for something he didn’t do, Esther was a refugee, the widow of Zarephath was on the cusp of starvation, Paul was shipwrecked not once, not twice but three times (!), amongst many others. 

So, in the absence of human strength where do I go? To God. For, ‘the joy of the Lord is my strength’ (Nehemiah 8:10) - the 'joy' spoken of here is the knowledge that in whatever circumstances I face, God loves me and will help me through. 

That doesn’t mean it’ll be easy. That doesn’t mean that life will be perfect and every challenge will have a happy ending. But I have faith that God has a plan for my life and it will be better by far than anything I could hope for. Once my life on earth has ended, I’ll get to spend eternity with Him in paradise, where the best day I’ve ever had on earth (and there have been some pretty good ones!) will pale in comparison to how perfect it will be there.