Are you ever reminded of a sermon when you watch a TV commercial? I was when I saw this one:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-lmw0d6S6jU
Oh Tarzan, you crazy fellow. But we all know that classic exchange. Probably many of us have lived it out. Asking for help is hard. Something in us resists the whole idea. Something in us is determined to handle it ourselves. To be strong. To be self sufficient. And it’s always been that way for people.
Strength is what living things want. It’s what animates life. The word describes what powers us. Weakness, on the other hand, is the absence of strength. This isn’t something we desire. Not something we normally pursue. After all the epitome–the fullness– of weakness is death. Who’s after that?
But Ray David recently preached a great sermon titled I Will Save You and in it he said, “True strength is found in our weakness.” And he quoted 2 Corinthians where we find that the Gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, tells us to not only acknowledge our weakness but glory in our weakness– to boast in it.
“Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.” 2 Cor 12:9
Every day we draw breath is a gift from God because humans are weak, whether we know it or not(Job 33:4). We have no strength of our own. We were made to house the strength of our Creator. We were made to run on his power. Realizing this is the first step to finding real life.
Pretending we have strength rather than weakness wastes the opportunity we have to be filled.
A great line from RD’s sermon was “Don’t waste your weakness.” Pretending we have strength rather than weakness wastes the opportunity we have to be filled. This is why Jesus says we need to lose our lives in order to find our lives (Matt 16:25). It sounds backwards to the world. And it would be apart from Jesus.
But boasting in our weakness means we see who we really are and what we are really made to be. And it celebrates the glory of Christ Jesus who has reconnected us to our power source– God himself.
Okay, so all that’s great and good. But what does that look like? How do I live out ‘boasting in my weakness’? Where’s this article going?
Haha, well once again we are faced with the seeming folly and foolishness of the Christian life. Boasting in weakness seems so crazy to this world.
But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong;
1 Corinthians 1:27
The activity of prayer by its very nature reflects the truth that God is our strength alone.
Boasting in our weakness is the outworking of humility. And I submit that the hallmark of humility in the Christian life is prayer.
If you want to boast in your weakness dive headlong into prayer. If you want to glory in your weakness, “so that the power of Christ may rest upon you”, glory in prayer. The activity of prayer by its very nature reflects the truth that God is our strength alone. It does so so purely that our very flesh–the remnants of sin that still dwell in our earthly bodies and nature– recoils at it.
Okay, so perhaps you’re reading this article right now and are pretty disappointed. All this build up and then the payoff is just… “prayer.” I get it. But here’s a recommendation that I’m sharing with myself and with you. Take all that which is recoiling and whispering, “Prayer is boring, useless, pointless, a waste of time, a cop out, a last resort, old news, a backup plan, if we have nothing better to do, unproductive, uninspired, uninteresting, depressing, wearisome, too time consuming, passive and weak,” take all that and politely tell it to go straight to hell. Because that’s where God is taking it. And praise Jesus, for we, who are in Christ, are free from its fate and its power.
If then you have been raised with Christ, seek the things that are above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth. For you have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God.
Colossians 3:1-3
“To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.”
– Martin Luther
Martin Luther said, “To be a Christian without prayer is no more possible than to be alive without breathing.” Do you ever feel in your Christian life like you are struggling for air? Like your faith is drowning a little or a lot? Let’s ask the question then– are we breathing?
Prayer looks like folly to those who don’t believe. It looks like fools gold. A pipe dream. A bunch of daydreamers whiling away their time on pie-in-the-sky wishful thinking. And for that reason prayer has all the more value. The very nature of prayer expresses the heart of the Gospel. God alone is strong to save. And God loves and rescues those who call on him. (Psalm 73:26)
So I say, walk by the Spirit, and you will not gratify the desires of the flesh. Galatians 5:16
The earthly nature hates asking for help. Walking by the flesh, in its very nature, is opposed to depending on anything other than itself. But walking by the Spirit, in its very nature, is a life depending and rejoicing in another; depending on the Spirit of God living and moving in and through us.
Let’s not be like Tarzan, who won’t ask for help, who tries to find his own way. Let’s live the Christian life we have been raised into, with all its joy and peace and freedom and power. We don’t need to struggle and flounder on our own anymore, like we did before we were in Christ. We don’t need to walk by the flesh anymore, futilely trying to make headway with nothing but empty weakness. We are plugged in to strength, we have Christ’s Spirit in our hearts and we are alive in Him.
So pray and tell your body and soul that God is your strength and your salvation, your wisdom and your refuge. Pray and be reminded of your Heavenly Father’s love for you. Pray and see your thoughts and affections attune to him, knowing that his yoke is easy and his burden is light and that he desires your joy. Pray and participate with the Holy Spirit in his will for you, your friends and our world, as you give voice to his work and proclaim it to the seen and unseen. Pray and fix your eyes firmly on our Lord Jesus, who is the radiance of the glory of God, our greatest love and the champion and finisher of our faith.
“I have so much to do that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.”
– Martin Luther
Martin Luther had another great quote about prayer. He said, “I have so much to do that I shall spend the first three hours in prayer.”
Let’s stop aimlessly wandering the jungle, swinging from random vine to random vine and instead ask for help. Let’s retune our lives to depend on another; not as a second choice, backup plan or last resort, but as our normal rhythm and only source of life. And let’s rejoice that our help comes from the Lord, the maker of heaven and earth. And his name is Jesus, the lover of our soul and the way, the truth and the life– who has already won the victory over our every foe.
Starting March 8 we are gathering as a church on the next four or five Tuesdays to pray for our communities and our city for one hour (7pm-8pm). Come and gather and let’s begin boasting in our weakness together!
