There is a strange level of comfort in the recognition that its ok to be weak because in the light of God’s grace for me His strength is made perfect through that weakness. I’ve prayed countless times that God would give me a new heart, a new set of thoughts, a completely different way of acting. But much to my dismay it hasn’t happened. I have almost felt cheated and hopeless because my prayers haven’t been answered, because my thoughts haven’t been transformed into righteous pure thoughts. My flesh and the enemy mock my sincerity by calling me not sincere at all because if I was then I would be different. I almost believe them…except I remembered Paul.
Paul had a thorn in his flesh, something that he asked God to remove over and over. But God told him no. I’ve heard preachers speculate that it was a physical infirmity but I would like to think it was a mindset or perhaps a behavior he fell to despite his best efforts and his intentions not to. God told him my grace, its sufficient for you and your weakness, well that’s where my strength is made perfect so deal with living with this.
Its so hard to except that God calls us friend, son, daughter, or child when our fleshly acts can be so contrary to His holiness. When I hold up my right acts to his righteousness they are nothing but filthy rags but so often I act as if those actions entitle me to some special audience with the Lord when Jesus himself told us the story about the two men who came into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a publican. The Pharisee proudly went down the list of why he was better than publican boastfully reminding God of his righteous acts. But the publican recognized his need for mercy and for grace, he knew he was weak and undeserving of God’s attention but God justified him anyway.
As soon as I really come to terms with “its not what I do that earns me salvation but what he did to give me salvation” the sooner I can let go of these possibly unrealistic expectations of God removing this thorn from me and I can just live in the knowledge that his grace will see me through and that whatever state I’m in I should contently forget about the past, reach for the future and press towards the mark to become that which he has called me to be.