Each morning, I make a pot of coffee, and I try to create
enough time in my schedule to actually sit down and enjoy it. I also try to take that time to meet with the
Lord and (tongue in cheek) solve the problems of the universe. I call that time, “Coffee with Jesus.”
This
morning, my coffee time with the Lord led me to study 2 Corinthians 12. Although I have read and meditated upon this
scripture many times, I have learned not to balk at the familiarity of the
passage. The Holy Spirit can evoke many
revelations out of one scripture. As I
read, I focused on particular verse: “(9) my grace is sufficient for you. In your weakness my strength is made
perfect.” As many may know, I am a
student of words. I like them, and the
emotion or action that they may evoke.
Words were enough to create a universe, and their power is enough to
destroy any relationship, opportunity, or even a nation. In this case, the words grace, sufficient,
weakness and strength stood out to me. There,
in the midst of what even Paul calls boasting;
smack-dab in the middle of a very descriptive and enviable supernatural encounter with God, was a very simple statement. When
I finish recounting any celestial encounters, my favored opportunities, or even
my moral failures there is but one thing left: the sufficiency of a loving and
kind God.
The
word grace literally means “loving kindness”, “benefit”, or “favor”. “Loving kindness” is defined in the Greek by
the word “agape”, which is also love; but it is the most deliberate and
selfless love there is—the God kind of love. God’s unconditional love is what
prompted Him to create a world for man to inhabit, dominate, and become
fruitful in and multiply. It is that
same love that compelled Him to send a savior in Christ to rescue man when he
so epically failed in his attempt at independence. It is the love that John describes in 1
John 4 when he writes that “God is love.” God is not facsimile of love, He is
not a type of love, nor is He the embodiment of love. Quite simply, yet complexly-- He is love. His very being is love. If I took a glass and filled it with God’s
love, the content of the glass would not be love—the glass itself would become
love. David explained it well in Psalms
63:3: “Your love is better than life”. The mere fact that I inhale and exhale is
evidence of God’s love. Do you know what
that verse really says to me? It says
that I cannot be good enough to earn God’s love, and I can’t be bad enough to
lose it. His love is, because He is. I
need a minute to pause and think about that.
His love is sufficient; it is enough. It is satisfying. Back in Psalms 63, David said that God's love sated him like rich food. So God’s love is like mom’s mac and cheese,
pancakes on Saturday morning, or Sunday pot roast with potatoes and carrots. It’s the comfort that I am looking for when I
stand in the refrigerator staring restlessly, because I want only the one thing that
will end my craving. When I finally meet
God in the secrecy of my closet; or even in the single mindedness of worship in
the sanctuary I am finally full, content, drowsy-eyed, and warm, because I
finally got what I long for deep in my spirit. I receive from Him a sense of
well-being and surety despite what the circumstances of my life may otherwise
indicate. Nothing else can compensate.
That’s why when I sought to satisfy my flesh with food, sex, power,
pornography, or work; I was left hungry, irritated, weak and feeling foolish. Eventually—usually through trial and error, I
found that only He can give me peace.
Weakness is the feebleness and infirmity I
feel when I expend all my energy trying to prove to God how much I don’t need
Him. Oddly enough, it is the fear of
being weak that drives me to assert my independence in the first place. It’s funny how although I know that nothing
but God will do, I must often try my own remedies first. That whole concept is laughable because it is
only in my feebleness that I receive God’s strength. When Paul writes about
God’s strength, He is speaking of God’s power in the midst my circumstances. That’s the power that moved to create a
universe. It fuels the strength of angels. It is the power that raised a dead
Jesus, and it is the power that works in me through the Holy Spirit. I mature in God only when the circumstances of
life overwhelm me. It is then and only then that when I learn to find
contentment in the fact that no matter what comes or goes, no matter what I suffer
through or lose, God’s love never fails me.
I am never alone, and I am never left behind. The all-sufficient God is always enough for
all of my insufficiencies.
