We hear that word in sermons, in preaching snippets on insta, and we speak about it with our innermost circle, but are we really living a life as transparent as we talk about?
Being vulnerable is scary. Being vulnerable is unknown. Unknown for how we respond with our defenses down and unknown for how people around us will react. What if they knew… what would they say… what would they do…
Being vulnerable is not something that we will typically fall into. Being vulnerable is something that takes continual conscious effort, strength and bravery.
When we chose to be vulnerable we are opening ourselves up to exposure, good and bad. We are showing our weaknesses, our pain, our sorrow, our hurts, our struggles our joys our loves and desires. When we become vulnerable before God or man we are saying here I am truly, no facade, no stained glass window.
I believe that is one of the most powerful places to start and yet so many times we do this as a last resort. Let me explain. How many times have you gone through a circumstance in life, in your marriage, children, finances, or maybe in your relationship with God, where you try to fix it on your own. You have the “tools” and the “know how” and still you try and try and try again to only have things get worse instead of better.
For most of us, people looking in from the outside would have no idea about these inward struggles. We continue on with our everyday lives as if nothing was wrong as if it was just another Tuesday. I wonder just how many hours days and years would I have saved if instead of trying to “fix” I would have just been vulnerable. If I had just been vulnerable with God, who knows every hair on my head, and vulnerable with the people around me. How much heartache and pain I could have been saved from had I reached out to the one who counts the stars first.
The truth is that when I am in my most vulnerable state that’s when I am less likely to be in charge and when I surrender my control that is when God can do His work and He can do so much more than I ever could. He supplies every need and every good thing.
In my weakness He is made strong.
How come we only truly believe that when we are at our weakest?
When we water down our testimony we water down our God. Unless people know where we started they are not going to know how far we have come. That isn’t to say that we need to shout every bad thing that we have done or thought from the mountain tops. BUT, the only perfect person God ever used was Jesus, the rest of us have fallen time and time again.
The rest of us still have a constant walk of redemption to be on. The rest of us still deal with things like un-forgiveness, doubt, hurt, pain, joy, passion, love. The rest of us still have things in our lives that we need to overcome. The rest of us still live a life filled with the good, the bad and the ugly.
We all have had different experiences with being vulnerable throughout our lives. Sometimes it was well received by those we loved and trusted and sometimes that same vulnerability was doubted, ridiculed and judged. But the truth is that Jesus became vulnerable for us when He came down and died and rose again, and I have to believe that I can trust Him with my own exposure.
The reality is that vulnerability is not the end of the story, but the beginning. Are we willing to allow God into our weakest moments regardless of what others might think, do or say? Do we trust Him enough to say, “Here I am Lord, help me” first? Are we ready and willing to lay ourselves, our pride our status down to allow God to do the true healing work He longs to do in our lives?
I said before and I will say many more times, when we water down our testimony we water down our God. When we are fake with our struggles we are not only robbing ourselves of the truth that God has for us, we are robbing our neighbor who is dealing with this same struggle and is too ashamed to ask for help. We leave not just ourselves in this vicious cycle, we leave our neighbor in it as well.
We were told that in this world there will be trials, but take heart I have overcome the world.
Let’s make a stand right now sis to lean into the one who has overcome and live from a place that we can be known truly known. A place where we can be truly loved.
Be brave. Be bold. Be courageous. And know that the King of kings knows and loves you right where you are, and He loves you too much for you to stay there. Trust Him.
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