I honestly don’t know what will come today as I begin to type…
Perhaps I’ll tell you about my morning.
It has been an interesting morning –the kind I’ve had to “push through” in order to “break into.”
I plopped into my chair feeling discouraged and frustrated about hang-ups, and all of the things about myself that I feel I just can’t seem to get right.
“God, why do I have such a hard time with [insert thing that doesn’t seem to be too hard for most people]?”
Some mornings I just have to take my bag of burdens and dump it all out for Him to see. Everything open and exposed to His light.
You know, He’s not afraid or annoyed by my questions or concerns…I can come to Him about anything. He just wants me to come to Him with a willing and open heart.
“God, why have You made me with all of these flaws? Why have You made me with all of these things that make living my life such a challenge?”
I’ll narrow it down a little bit for you…
“God, why is it so hard for me to speak my mind the way I want to? Why is it that I can write to express myself, but when I want so badly to be able to speak my heart, when I try so hard to have words to say, I often just feel such a “lack” there…. sometimes what I want to speak is just. not. there. when I desperately want it to be there.”
“God, why did You make me this way? Why do I have this annoying flaw? Why is it so easy for some to flow with their words, with expressing themselves so beautifully, so expressively, so fluently… and for me, the words never seem to come when I want them to… and when the words do come, I feel like they’re often so blubberingly awkward and messy. God, I’m frustrated with myself.”
?
…And then I remember that even when I’m not pleased with myself, He is pleased with me.
…And then I remember that He is a Father who is always proud of me. I am His daughter. He is always proud of what He made.
…And then I remember that He sees things in me, in my design, that perhaps I cannot see.
…And then I remember that I just have to trust Him, no matter what I may think about my flaws and weaknesses and areas of lack…
The enemy would love to convince me of my “insignificance” so that he can get me to shut myself down in advance, to quit even trying, to deem myself “unusable, too big of a mess, useless” — those are lies. I have to recognize that.
Because I know that when there is an attempt of the enemy, there’s something God is doing on the other side of it. I know that with every lie of deception, there is a deep truth on the other side of it.
“Ah, Lord God! Behold, You have made the heavens and the earth by Your great power and outstretched arm. There is nothing too hard for You.” – Jeremiah 32:17
How many times has God shown us through His Word, through the stories of the lives He has chosen to highlight in the bible…. time and time and time again, how He has shown us that His power can work so beautifully and perfectly in our weaknesses.
Our “lack” gives room for His strength.
No matter how small we are, there is no limit to what He can do through us… when we just don’t try to stop Him. When we just don’t try to shut it all down. When we just give Him a chance to fill our areas of weakness with His strength.
(I’m writing this to myself this morning, but perhaps I am writing to someone else too.)
I don’t need to worry over my areas of weakness. I don’t need to be overly concerned about any of these things. I just need to be willing to hand them over…
Because God needs my areas of weakness far more than He needs my areas of strength.
He wants me to lay down my areas of strength, and He wants me to hand over my weaknesses with a willing and trusting heart.
He wants me to trust Him enough to hand over my weaknesses and say,
“Here, God…. I am handing all of these weak areas over to You, I don’t know how You can do anything with them, but I’m going to trust that You can do something with them, somehow. Because there is nothing too hard for You.”
And you know… all of the challenges, all of the battles, all of the struggles we face… they’re all used in preparation. They’re all used for building something up within us that He wants to build, even if we can’t see what He’s building yet.
Thank You, Father. I will trust You with my flaws and my shortcomings and my weaknesses. I know that You can do anything. Help my heart to be willing to hand all of my weak areas over to You so that You can do, what only You can do. There is nothing too hard for You.
-Heather ?