I need to be weak for awhile.

Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need. -- Hebrews 4:16

Sometimes its easy to forget how unfairly blessed I am. Most of the time, I can make it through the day without any semblance of hardship, and the truth is, while things often aren't as easy as I’d like for them to be, in the eyes of most, I have never really experienced hardship at all. But pain is relative. Pain is what happens on the inside, sometimes without regard to what is taking place outside of ourselves. Perhaps I've never been in a literal gutter, but my heart has known anxiety and despair.

And sometimes, despite the countless times in my life when I have seen God at work, moving in his mighty love and goodness and provision, my eyes begin to wander down to the waves crashing around me and I sink back into the oblivion of cautiousness and haphazard, the halfhearted and afraid. I give into the chaos. I realize that I’m drowning, and my instinct is to save face, because drowning can be a violent way to go and I would rather not draw so much attention to the downward spiral happening within. I crave the control.

But His love goes further, still.

I realize my need for Him, and that when the waters overwhelm and the climb seems to be insurmountable, it is okay to reach up. It is okay to be weak. Scripture says that we should boast in our weakness, because when we are weak, He is strong. Father God will be good. He breathes the victory over us.

So I learn, hard and softly all in the same silent and fleeting moment, that I must be weak, but for a brief following moment, I resist. Knees buckle and fists clench in the tension that comes before the delicate letting go. Lord, let there be nothing in my life that points to me.

My heart craves quiet solitude in a world that screams the emergency of life. This is the lie that we have taken up in place of the truth. How can I become less so that Christ may become more?

Lord, may I cling only to the Mercy Seat.

Nothing in me has the power to save.

It takes boldness to be weak.