Tag: weakness

Through the Bible in a Year – March 25

theelvesareheadingwestLeave a comment

The Scheme for March – April can be found here

Num 17-18; 2 Cor 12-13; Psalm 106:1-23

Paul goes further to elucidate the mystery of the triumph of the way of weakness – that in weakness the Power of Christ may more fully reside.

Again we are confronted with our own emphases on our talents and gifts and abilities. It is hardly surprising we pray so poorly in the church in the West, we are so talented and gifted, there is no need!

Hard as it is for us to hear – it is in our need, our emptiness, our weakness that Christ deigns to dwell – as he himself is revealed as the one who triumphs through the ‘weak’ way of Love – the one who empties himself for our sake – the one who comes to us to seek somewhere to lay his head.

Paul’s boasting in werakness, is in fact nothing more than his identification with Christ

Through the Bible in a Year – March 24

theelvesareheadingwestLeave a comment

The Scheme for March – April can be found here

Num 16; 2 Cor 11; Psalm 105 vs 26-end

‘If I must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness’

Paul as we know is not interested in glorifying himself – there is no whisper of ‘my ministry’ here. In doing so he sets an example of humility which is perhaps the cardinal virtue of faith.

But boasting in weakness is a wonderful gospel ploy – for if we boast of that which is nothing, then all that can be seen must be of God – that Christ may be all, in all

Also it is interesting to note that we do not take Paul’s example all that seriously in the contemporary church, with our eyes all too often set on the glittering array of seminary qualifications – all the things which Paul has put behind him. What is more Paul speaks not of his glittering acheivements in his faithfulness to the gospel, all he will speak of is his afflictions.

He himself has known little comfort in the world – he has known little but tribulation, but finds his peace in the one who himself, ‘made himself nothing’, the one who has overcome the world.

Paul, like the Lord he serves knows in his flesh that the way of Life is the Cross.