I am weak!

Ever since I heard the song some 27 years ago, I have been moved by the depth of the lyrics. Even today when I try to join my voice with the singer, I could feel my voice tremble. This song has become partly the theme song of my life. I am presenting the song which has become the favorite of several persons, and has moved them to tears. “I'm only human, I'm just a woman / Help me believe in what I could be / And all that I am / Show me the stairway, I have to climb / Lord for my sake, teach me to take / One day at a time.// cho: One day at a time sweet Jesus / That's all I'm asking from you / Just give me the strength / To do every day what I have to do / Yesterdays gone sweet Jesus / And tomorrow may never be mine / Lord help me today, show me the way / One day at a time. // Do you remember, when you walked among men / Well Jesus you know if you're looking below / It's worse now, than then / Cheating and stealing, violence and crime / So for my sake, teach me to take / One day at a time.”

Sometimes I wonder if something had gone wrong when God was creating me; if he had forgotten to add the proper proportion of head and heart. The weaknesses that I carry with me become the thorn in the flesh that St Paul talks about in his Second Letter to Corinthians 12:7-10. Why should my weaknesses control and direct my steps and why don’t I have the strength to withstand these temptations? I do not think that God takes pleasure in my weaknesses and falls; he cannot be such a cruel God. The more I become conscious of the ingrained weaknesses in my flesh, I could only utter the glorious words of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane: the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak! There is no dearth of goodness and willingness, but the flesh falters me each time.

Ignorance is bliss; it is all the more true in the case of my weaknesses. So long I was not aware of my weaknesses and limitations, I was in bliss, and there was nothing which disturbed my peace. Though a lot of people made so much of hue and cry, I was not moved; but things have changed drastically now. I am painfully aware of my dark spots and they make me sleepless. The fear of yielding to my weaknesses is yet another demon which is chasing me night and day. Even when I am so conscious of my weaknesses, I can’t even make out when I am yielding to it. It happens so suddenly that I may not be present to those moments. I feel sad that I had not been able to resist the temptation of yielding to the temptations. I have become a loser, again, and do not see much of hope in restoring back my life.

Even in my weak moments, there is one consolation: I am not the only weak person in the world; there are millions who are just as weak as I am, and some of them are even weaker than me, and still they go through life joyfully without complaining or arguing with the creator. It is possible that I am not satisfied with what I am, and always wish to be better than what God had made me to be. I comparison to my weaknesses, the strengths that God had showered on me are too numerous, and yet I only magnify my weaknesses and fail to thank God for the many strengths. It is because of my strengths that I am able to continue with life, without taking recourse to any short cuts. There are brighter spots which are my guiding light, and how easily I ignore them!

St Paul had experienced the strength that came from God during his weak moments, and it would have been a wonderful experience for him. To surrender my weaknesses to him, and seeking him to strengthen me – this is my moment of grace. This implies that I need to take recourse to him, seek his ever abiding help, so that I am not stranded on the life’s path. For God, my weaknesses may not appear as weaknesses, and he could turn them into my strengths; nothing is impossible for him, and that is where I place so much of confidence in him, and live with hope. Even if everything were to fail and part from me, I know God will not leave me, for he would be there every time I fall and seek his help.

Strength of the Weak

There is not a single soul on earth who can claim before God to be strong enough to face all the trials and tribulations of the world; there is no one who can claim innocent before the throne of God. There is a patch of weakness and sinfulness ingrained in each one of us, and no one is spared from this. But this is no matter to worry about, because when we acknowledge our weaknesses, we can experience the strength that comes from God. In fact, those who see their sinfulness and weaknesses before God and acknowledge them are no longer weak and fragile, but are strong persons, because it is the Lord who grants them his own strength to fight against all evils which enslave them. Therefore if I want to experience the strength and power of God, the only thing that I need to do is to acknowledge my weaknesses before him, and trust in his providence to strengthen me in his own time, in his own way.

There are people who cannot see their weaknesses, and would go all length to justify each and every action of theirs, and may pass the blame on to their neighbors, and even to God. These people often look for alibi, scapegoats to pass the bug on to some others. They cannot face their own nakedness, and the blot of sinfulness stare at them and it could become unbearable for them. But who can deny the human nature which is there in me, which makes me think that I am the most perfect person that is possible on earth! I would go no justifying my actions, heaping lie upon lie, until the whole mound crashes and I am made a laughing stock before all. I might then see the Lord standing at a distance and smiling at me. He might be just as helpless as I had been, but the only consolation I could have now is his very presence.

The psalms reiterate in unequivocal terms how God comes to the aid of the weak and the feeble; he gives them the power to stand against all the powers of the world, and they would be able to stand before kings and emperors and speak their mind, and still no one would lay their hands on them. Or take the case of Moses, the man who stammered, and had no gift of speech. ‘But, how can I? I do not know how to speak’ Moses complains to the Lord, and the Lord gives him Aaron to be his mouthpiece. What is the situation of Isaiah and Jeremiah? The weak persons become the champions of God’s justice and retribution. There are several examples for the weak people, who had been strengthened by the Lord, and they found their lives taking a U-turn thereafter. It can happen in my life too; the same Lord can make me stand erect by the strength he would shower upon me.

I cry to the Lord and tell him that I am utterly powerless to withstand the storms that threaten my life, and he looks at me lovingly and asks me to put my trust in him. Paul was such a man, who was conscious of his weaknesses, and the riddle of life – he could not do the good that he wanted to do, and was doing just the evil that he did not want to. This is a great irony of life, and Paul could not be freed from this predicament. He felt helpless and the Lord stood by his side and provided him with the strength to accept life with all the light and shadows. We have no authority to question the Lord’s ways; they may be quite contrary to human thinking, but all generations would prove that there can never be better justice than in the Lord. If I do not surrender myself to him, and acknowledge my weaknesses before his presence, I might be slowly sinking in my own sinfulness.

The Lord looks at our hearts and not our physique. We have the beautiful story of the anointing of David by prophet Samuel, who looking at the brothers of David thinks one of them should have been chosen by God; but God warns the prophet and tells him not to look at the physique because the Lord looks not at the body, but the heart. A heart that is broken and is supple before the Lord can win the favor of the Lord and he would shower his strength on his chosen and help restore life. Life cannot drown us, so long the Lord is at our side; but if we decide to take full control over life, and do not allow the Lord to take control over our lives, then we might have to regret. Today my only prayer before the Lord is that I might see my nakedness before my eyes and acknowledge my weaknesses before the Lord, who alone can strengthen me and make me his very own!

Life in Abundance of Losers

Life is quite charming and enticing for the people who like to see the brighter side of things; these are the people who would look at the darkest clouds with a magnifying glass to trace thin silver lining, and that is all that is required for them to get back the zest and zeal that they require to fight back in life. There is no failure or challenge which is insurmountable to these people, because they have the inner strength to withstand all adversaries. These are not the brightest, cleverest and the smartest of people, but they know the art of living, and have learned it through the hard way, by submitting themselves to innumerable trials and errors. They have no pride to claim that they are beyond all vices; they know how vulnerable and fragile they are and yet they depend on a power which can put them at a level too difficult for the brightest, cleverest and the smartest to scale.

Let me again fall back on the wonderful miracle stories found in the New Testament. Every miracle that Jesus performs presents to us people who are weak, vulnerable, incapacitated, voiceless, unable to fight the odds by their own strength. The first step towards recovery for them comes from the fact that they do not shy away from acknowledging the situation they are in. Jesus helps them to acknowledge their vulnerability; it could be deemed as a testing on the part of the master healer, who plunges to purge their inner self, before healing them physically. What do you want? or what can I do for you? Or look at the mighty Centurion, I am not worthy to receive you, but you say only a word and my servant will be healed!

Why should the Centurion acknowledge what he is incapable of, and what was the need for him to strip himself naked in front of the wonder worker? But it is only when he stands naked could he expect the Master cover his nakedness with his own cloak. It is only the empty pitcher, which can be filled. If I do not acknowledge that I am empty, no one can fill it. I shall present one lovely poem by Rabindranath Tagore from his Song Offerings (Gitanjali, 77) : “The day is no more, the shadow is upon the earth. It is time that I go to the stream to fill my pitcher. The evening air is eager with the sad music of the water. Ah, it calls me out into the dusk. In the lonely lane there is no passer-by, the wind is up, the ripples are rampant in the river. I know not if I shall come back home. I know not whom I shall chance to meet. There at the fording in the little boat the unknown man plays upon his lute.”

Those who cannot accept what comes in life knocking at their doors, do not want to accept their vulnerabilities, their weaknesses. It requires far more guts and courage to acknowledge one’s weaknesses than to accept the strengths. That is why Jesus strengthens every person why present their vulnerability in front of him. The first lesson towards freedom, and its subsequent peace and happiness comes from accepting my own frailties. No one on earth is perfect; even the most perfect person would be quite impure in the sight of God. Thus to acknowledge one’s weaknesses is not a heroic act, but one which requires quite a deal of humility and submission. True healing can come only when I have the disposition to surrender myself fully before the all-powerful God, and prepare to follow his counsel.

Any loser who accepts and acknowledges his or her own defeat or loss immediately springs to hero or heroine. The healing that Jesus bestows is as an acknowledgement for the heroic act that they have displayed by accepting their weaker selves. Consider the story of Barthemeus, who is fully aware that he lacked sight and longed to see. ‘That I may see’, he cries out to the Lord, and he restores sight to him. The woman who had been suffering from haemorrhage for twelve years knows that only Jesus could restore her health, because she is aware that that was her real self, which had been haunting her for all these years. If I want to taste life and be enveloped by the aroma it emanates, all that I need to do is place myself before the Lord and accept my vulnerabilities, so that he could touch and heal me; why a word from his mouth may be enough to bring wholeness to me!