Strength in Weakness

Text: 9 But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." 10 For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong-- 2 Cor 12:9-10 INTRODUCTION: My dear friends in Christ, "I ’ll be back.” That’s what “Ah-nuld” promised to a desk clerk in the first Terminator movie back in 1984. True to his word, he returned in 1991’s Terminator 2: Judgment Day.  Then he returned in Terminator 3 in 2003. In the terminator movies you can see scenes of massive destruction and feats of strength only the movies can portray.  In one scene Arnold looks at the camera and says, “Desire is irrelevant. I am a machine.”  Over all it is a picture of unfeeling, deadly power and strength.
I. The apostle Paul, a superstar of  1st century Judaism shows his strength in a very different way.
	A.  He described his qualifications by saying, “If anyone else has reason to be confident in the flesh, I have more: circumcised on the eighth day, a member of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew born of Hebrews … as to righteousness under the law, blameless” (Phil 3:4-6).
			1. In other words: Yale University, Rhodes Scholar, Harvard Law, Wall Street, the White House.  Paul was proud of his strength – his ability to tackle the world on his own.  2. And to top it all off he was like a religious terminator.  He did terminate the lives of Christians – especially Stephan.
	B. And We’d like to be terminators to revel in our strength too.  Hopefully not like Arnold or Paul.
			1. But strength is what we see being revered in our society, isn't it? We're told we have to be strong and independent. That's part of what this country was founded on.
					a.  I still remember the Charles Atlas ads in the comic books. You remember the ones about the 99 pound weakling and the guy who kicked sand in his face? b. We haven't changed much. If you watch any television, you know it's still the same hype, there's just more of it. There's the Bowflex, Nordic Trac, stair steppers, treadmills, you name it. Now don't get me wrong, we need those things. We all need to exercise and most of us don't get enough of it.
			2. But we've bought into a bit of the marketing of America. Instead of getting fit we want to get strong. Instead of being healthy we want Hollywood looks. Because a well chiseled body not only looks good, it makes us look strong. None of us wants to appear weak.
II.  Now in our text Paul espouses a completely different message. His is a counter culture message. It goes against everything we've been taught. Everything that Hollywood and Fifth Avenue have been feeding us for years.
	A. Paul says God isn't interested in our strength. God is only interested in our weakness. Paul says: "We are made perfect in our weakness. For whenever we are weak then we are strong."   That just goes against what we see and hear everywhere in our society.
				1. But When we say we are strong we are saying we can do it on our own. Then we don't allow room for God to enter or act in our lives. You see, the strong don't need God, they are self-sufficient. They don't need anybody. It's only the weak who know they need God. 2. In a lot of ways God’s message to us can be seen like this: The story is told of a Renaissance artist who made the world’s most prized vases. A visitor came to observe his method. After laboring for many weeks with one piece of clay firing it, painting it, baking it he placed it upon a pedestal for inspection. The visitor sat in awe at this thing of unspeakable beauty. But it appeared that the artist was not yet finished. In a shocking and dramatic moment, the artist lifted the vase above his head and dashed it against the floor, breaking it into a thousand shards. And then, quietly, he reconnected the pieces by painting the edges with a paint of pure gold. Each crack reflected invaluable gold. In the end, this magnificent, but imperfect, piece became the most valued piece in the collection.
					a. God brings us to realize that we are not strong like the Terminator.  Really we are totally weak before him.  We are that broken vase.  We can do nothing to help ourselves.  We have nothing to boast about.   b. When we reach this point He shows us the help he sent.  He can show us grace.  Grace is applied to weakness.
	B.   And this grace comes to us from God through Jesus – My favorite definition of Grace is an acrostic that goes like this:  God’s Riches At Christ’s Expense.
				1. And His expense is centered around His giving of Himself on the cross for our sakes. He took on the weakness of our flesh to overcome death and sin. In His weakness He became stronger than sin and death.  In His weakness He conquered sin and death for us. 2.  And now the gift is given in Word and Sacrament.  We are given forgiveness and life.  And because of His gift of life, we are brought into His Kingdom and He says: "Remember: You are made perfect in your weakness. For whenever you are weak then you are strong."  When we are weak we are reflecting the strength of God and not our strength.  We are saying we depend on Him.  We are not like the terminator, not like our society, but starting to be like Christ.
III. St. Paul was the second most influential person who ever lived. Paul, more than anyone else except Christ, fashioned our faith. If anyone deserved to live a charmed life, it was St. Paul.
		A. But of course he did not.
				1. He was shattered on the Damascus Road.  But then God began rebuilding Him into a vessel to carry the news of Jesus.  Only Jesus was to be seen, not Paul.
					a. Paul had tossed all those credentials away, He has pitched them into the garbage. He has rejected his own strength, because he has discovered the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus as Lord. b. For Paul, a connection to Christ is what saves him from sin and makes him right with God, and he values this relationship above all else. Because of Jesus, Paul moves from self-reliance to God-reliance.
				2. And to be a vessel to carry the news of Jesus into the world God gave Paul great revelations.  Here is what he had to say about his experience: “To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me.”
					a. According to one authority, the Greek word here for thorn is stake. Not a tiny thorn found on a rose, but a shaft of wood sharpened at one end to be used in battle to impale someone. This is not a minor little oops. In other words, Paul felt that he was stabbed by a sharpened wooden stake, by a messenger of Satan, he says, ‘to torment me, to keep me from being too elated.’” Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’ b. Here’s the deal: Sometimes deliverance and victory come by removal of the source of pain. That’s not how it worked in Paul’s case. The lesson he learned is that often God will give us deliverance and victory in the midst of the pain!  God’s gift of himself, his gift of Jesus, is enough — enough to overcome the world.
		B. God has shattered our strength and has shown us that salvation is only through His gift of Grace supplied by Jesus in Word and Sacrament.  We are made his.
				1.  Now He rebuilds us as His vessels as He did to Paul.  Those vessels may not be what we expect.  Thorns may remain.  But these thorns are not reminders of God’s grace.  They work to bring us to focus on Him and not ourselves.  Like this: Some of you may have heard of Roy Campanella, a catcher for the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball team, who the Dodgers’ Most Valued Player award went to  many times; and played on baseball’s All Star Team.  In January 1958, Roy Campanella’s baseball career was cut short after a car crash left him a quadriplegic. The unthinkable had happened to him. This is the point at which so many people would give up on God and life, but not Campanella. After he was injured, he spent a lot of time in the Institute of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation in New York City.   One day he stopped to read a gold plaque upon one of the walls. This plaque resonated deeply with his Christian faith. Some of you will recognize these words: I asked God for strength, that I might achieve.   I was made weak, that I might learn to humbly obey . . . I asked for health that I might do great things.   I was given infirmity that I might do better things . . . I asked for riches that I might be happy,   I was given poverty that I might be wise . . . I asked for power, that I might have the praise of others.   I was given weakness that I might feel the need of God . . . I asked for all things, that I might enjoy life.   I was given life that I might enjoy all things . . .” In response to these words Roy Campanella wrote,  “I got nothing I asked for, but I received everything that I had hoped for.” Roy Campanella inspired more people off the field than he ever could have on the field.
					a. This is the mistake we often make. We think it is the perfect athlete who makes the best spokesperson for God . . . the glamorous actor . . . the polished speaker . . . the successful business person. People want to be just like them, we reason, including appropriating their faith. This leads us to think our witness is somehow inferior because we’re not athletic, glamorous, polished or successful. Nothing could be further from the truth. The best witness for Christ is authentic Christian living in the face of daunting adversity. b. All through history God has chosen and used nobodies, because their unusual dependence on him made possible the unique display of his power and grace. He chose and used somebody only when they renounced dependence on their natural abilities and resources."
				2. Now we are included in that number – those whose strength is shown in weakness, like Jesus, like Paul.  Like the no bodies --Like those with thorns.
CONCLUSION:    Strength in weakness – that sounds contradictory, but we can see how it works in Jesus and in Paul and in others  And also from them we can see that the Christian life is not all roses. There are thorns as well. But the thorns are to keep us grounded and focused on our Savior.  And in the midst of the thorns of life we are always reminded of God’s GRACE.  Amen.