Do you find yourself in a place where you feel limited by your weaknesses? Maybe it is your short temper or your tendency to say the wrong thing at the wrong time. Maybe it is your long legs or your hair. Maybe it is your personality that always seems to get in the way.
[Tweet “Do not be discouraged. There is more to you.”]
Yes, you have limitations, just like me, but the truth is that all our limitations cannot determine our identity and value unless we allow them to. Our weaknesses do not have hold us back, but they have the potential to be the platform from where God’s glory can be displayed through our lives.
The Bible tells us the same thing:
And we know that God causes all things to work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. (Romans 8:28 NASB)
And He has said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is perfected in weakness.” Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions, with difficulties, for Christ’s sake; for when I am weak, then I am strong”. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10 NASB)
How encouraging are these words from God?
We are no surprise to God. He made us. He knows what we are capable of. He knows our struggles.
He knew that we are going to face hard times and gave us the hope that if we let Him, if we surrender to Him, He will let all things work for our good. Nothing bad has to have the last say in our lives. God does. But will you let Him?
Paul wrote in 2 Corinthians 12 these powerful words where we read that we do not have to be ashamed of our weaknesses. We do not have to limited or defined by them because in Christ, His power can bring greater glory.
When we are weak and do not rely on our own strengths, that is when God’s glory and strength can work and be displayed through our lives.
I have always treasured the idea that when I am working, God is watching, but when God is working, I can only watch.
No effort of mine can bring forth the results of God’s work. The same applies to the way we embrace our weaknesses. If we are focusing on them and allow them to define us, God has no place to display His beauty in and through our ashes. But when we give them to Him and let Him work His strength through our weakness, His strength is perfected through our weakness and whatever was meant to pull us down, God uses to lift us up.
When life is all about us, there is little place for God’s glory to be displayed, but when we clear out the pages and give the pen to the Writer of our lives’ stories, there is the potential for beauty and greatness we would never be able to orchestrate by ourselves.
I would like to challenge you to turn a new page on the weaknesses you may have.
Do not let them hold you back and determine your value. Surrender them to Jesus and ask Him to renew your mind and let His glory shine through you so that when people see your weakness, they will only see God’s glory. May their reaction be: “That can only be a work of God!”
