WHEN I AM WEAK, I AM STRONG
by Steve Zeisler
I was at a luncheon recently that was in effect a 20-year reunion. It was
the fall evangelistic luncheon of the Christian Businessmen of Santa Clara
County. Dennis Sheehan, an old friend of mine and a member of this church,
invited me and a number of other men who had played football together on
the Stanford team 20 years ago this fall. We were invited because the featured
speaker was Jeff Siemon, who had also been a member of the Stanford football
team, an all-American first-round draft choice to the Minnesota Vikings,
and an all-pro linebacker for them. He is now in full-time ministry in the
Twin Cities in Minnesota. So Dennis seized the opportunity to invite a number
of former players to come to the luncheon and hear Jeff's testimony.
We were all sitting together at the table, and it was a delightful time.
I enjoyed seeing people I hadn't seen since graduating. It was a wonderful
mixture of jokes, memories, and catching up on the events of two decades
gone by.
Then Jeff got up to speak. The essence of his message really took these
men by surprise. He told football stories, and he was funny and engaging.
But when he got to the heart of his message, which was to talk about his
faith, what he said in effect was that the key times he remembers, looking
back over a career that is exalted in the eyes of many, were times of failure,
hurt, and inadequacy. He recalled receiving a devastating injury during
his college career, and it was on that occasion that he gave his life to
Christ. He talked about the final two years of pro ball when he no longer
started for the Vikings, relegated to the bench and treated as an outsider,
and said those were the best years of his pro career in terms of personal
growth and influence with others. All of us have needs that we do not admit
to ourselves if we can avoid it. We live in a society that is competitive,
whether in athletics, in business, or in other areas. But it is facing failure,
inadequacy, weakness, and need that really determines who we are. That was
the essence of his message.
I spoke with one of the men at the table who had been a successful football
player in college, and then had left the world of competitive athletics
to enter the world of competitive business. He had gotten involved in a
shady financial arrangement, trying to make it big. That had landed him
in federal prison, and he was lucky he wasn't serving a 20-year sentence.
He had moved back to California from New York and was looking for answers
in the New Age movement among other things. He later sent me a letter that
chronicled his life just because we had talked about it. He was fascinated
by what Jeff said, although he wasn't yet ready to believe it.
Boasting of weakness
These verses we have come to bring to mind Jeff's message as an all-pro
linebacker that it was the weakest, most difficult moments that were the
most important. We will find that truth in 2 Corinthians chapter 12. This
section ends a long argument in which Paul counters the claims of the pseudo-apostles
who have infiltrated Corinth. He's trying to lay alongside phony and self-important
leadership a vision of that which is godly. He says, "Let him who boasts
boast in the Lord" (10:1), and at the end of chapter 11, "If I
must boast, I will boast of the things that show my weakness . . . [the
time] I was lowered in a basket from a window in the wall . . . ."
He is attempting to make clear by various means that the servants of the
Lord we should listen to are the ones in whom Christ is exalted and self
has been set aside. Paul has made this point using caricature and boasting
of his own, which begins sounding like one thing but actually turns out
to be something else. It's a unique passage in Paul's writings. You have
the sense, reading the letters of Paul, that he's comfortable in debating
truth versus error, the gospel versus that which is not, but he struggles
a bit when he has to talk about himself. He has a desire to clarify things
and yet not promote himself. Even that ambivalence makes this passage fascinating.
Paul had his own strength taken away so that he would draw on the strength
of the living God
Let's look at chapter 12, verses 1-6, where Paul has to speak much of himself
in order to make the truth plain:
I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained,
I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord. I know a man in Christ
who fourteen years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was
in the body or out of the body I do not know---God knows. And I know that
this man-whether in the body or apart from the body I do not know, but God
knows---was caught up to paradise. He heard inexpressible things, things
that man is not permitted to tell. I will boast about a man like that, but
I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses. Even if I should
choose to boast, I would not be a fool, because I would be speaking the
truth. But I refrain, so no one will think more of me than is warranted
by what I do or say.
Now remember what we have already looked at: The phonies in Corinth are
attempting to remove Paul from any standing in the eyes of the believers
and replace him with themselves. They have said, firstly, that Paul is physically
unimpressive. Secondly, his rhetoric is unimpressive. Thirdly, his ability
to raise money is suspect. These pseudo-apostles have bragged about letters
of recommendation they have from high-sounding people in Jerusalem. They've
boasted of their pedigrees. They've puffed themselves up and demanded perks
in the way of those to whom arrogance comes easily. Paul does none of that,
and they ridicule him for his lack of self-importance and swagger.
A remarkable revelation
Paul says in verse 1 that he will go on to speak of visions and revelations
of the Lord. It's evident from this letter that his opponents had bragged
about spiritual powers and encounters with God. In order to counter their
claim, Paul tells of a remarkable occasion. It's clear in verse 7 that even
though he speaks in the third person, the man he is speaking of is himself:
"To keep me from being conceited because of these surpassingly great
revelations, there was given me a thorn..." But before we get to verse
7 we have a peculiarly told story ("I know a man...caught up to the
third heaven"). Paul speaks with hesitancy. He is going to tell them
something that is awesome to hear, and yet he is deliberately trying to
distance himself from it, not because it's not true-verse 6 indicates clearly
that he is telling the truth-but because he fears a tendency in his own
heart to exalt himself.
Listen to the ways this ambivalence is expressed. First, as we've already
noted, this account is in the third person. "I know a man . . ."
"I will boast about a man like that. . ." In strange fashion Paul
speaks as if this wonderful event happened to someone else. Secondly, for
14 years this subject has gone unremarked upon. We have records in the book
of Acts of Paul's preaching on the island of Crete, in Athens and Ephesus,
in Jewish surroundings and before Roman magistrates. We have a number of
his speeches recorded in Acts, and he never brings this up. In all his other
letters he never once refers to it. There is no indication that any of his
associates knew anything about it. It went unremarked upon for a long time,
yet it was a staggering thing, an overwhelming experience that left an indelible
impression on the apostle. I'm sure it was transforming to him.
A third way we see Paul's ambivalence is in his inability to say exactly
how it happened. He says twice that he doesn't know if his body went with
him or not. He was taken into the presence of God in such a way that he
heard things, saw things, and was dazzled by an experience at the very throne
of God. God knows, but he doesn't know what it meant for him to be swept
into the presence of the Lord. He refers to it as the third heaven and paradise.
Those mean the same thing. The ancients thought of the earth as covered
with an atmosphere made up of air, clouds, etc., which was the first heaven.
Beyond this were sun, moon, and stars, which was the second tier of heaven.
And beyond that is the third heaven-the world of the invisible spiritual
realities, the throne of God. Evidently Paul was transported there by the
Lord, but he didn't know if his body went with him or not.
A final note that sets this experience apart is the apostle's observation
that he heard things he was not permitted to speak. That raises such curiosity
in us! He was allowed to know what he must never express.
There's something that is absolutely moving to me about his description.
We want to know more about what happened. There is within all of us who
know the Lord a longing for an exalted vision of Christ, an opportunity
to see him face to face, not "through a glass darkly" any more;
to hear him say secret and wonderful things. Paul had that remarkable experience.
A thorn in the flesh
Now Paul's problem is to undercut the deceptive bragging that's taking place
in Corinth and at the same time to keep himself from being undeservedly
exalted in his eyes or anyone else's. He says in verse 6 that he refrains
from boasting so no one will think more of him than is warranted by what
he does or says. He wants their relationship to be based on what they heard
him say and saw him do, on what they could verify in their experience, that
he is a man in Christ called into his service. He doesn't want what he just
told them to ruin things, to become more than it ought to.
He then goes on in verse 7 to speak about how the Lord ensured for him that
the exaltation of this vision would not become too much:
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. 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. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly
about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why,
for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in
persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
The phrase "to keep me from being conceited" in verse 7 is actually
recorded twice in Greek. The NIV translates it only once, but it's plainly
emphasized by the apostle. He was in severe danger of becoming filled up
with himself in recalling and speaking to others of the exalted day when
he traveled, bodily or not, into the very presence of God and was told things
that no one else knows and that he may not say. So God deliberately caused
him a difficulty that he would not take away in order to remind Paul that
it was in his weakness that he was strong.
We don't know exactly what the thorn in his flesh was. He is speaking of
some bodily torment that recurred for him. There are three possibilities
you'll run into most often in commentaries. One is that it was malaria,
a feverish illness he contracted in his travels that would repeatedly beset
him. A second is that it was epilepsy, regularly recurring seizures that
would take place. Ancient people viewed epilepsy as an indication of rejection
by God. These seizures would undermine his standing in the eyes of others
and weaken him. The third and, I think, the most likely possibility is that
it was an eye disease of some sort. He says in the book of Galatians, "If
you could have done so, you would have torn out your eyes and given them
to me." (Galatians 4:15.) At the end of Galatians he says he has to
write with especially large letters. Both of these things could indicate
his vision was impaired. It may have even been an oozing sort of disease
that made him physically unattractive. But in any case he had something
difficult that would periodically descend upon him and lay him low physically.
We read that he went to the Lord three times, not lightly, but in protracted
seasons of prayer. He begged that he would not have to go through this problem
again. The answer of God was the same in each case: "My grace is sufficient
for you." If Paul had not had this thorn, his propensity for conceit
would have overwhelmed him. It was the grace of God that sustained him in
times of physical difficulty, and grace that used pain to prevent the greater
evil of spiritual haughtiness.
Something else worth commenting on here is that he calls this thorn a messenger
of Satan. Just in passing, this is a helpful commentary on the role of the
evil prince in human lives. He is a tormenter; his entire role in life is
to hurt, destroy, and cause pain and ultimately death. Even, as we've seen
before, when he masquerades as an angel of light, it's only to gain entrée
to do more damage. But he is limited in his role. He may do only what God
the Father allows for the ultimate good of his children. The very torment
itself in the hand of God becomes that which gives Paul great spiritual
blessing. It's a remarkable insight, isn't it? It was intended by Satan
to harm, but God intended it for good (Genesis 50:20).
Rejecting the flesh
We are often told Christian truth in such a way as to bring out "the
best" in ourselves. We hear preaching that uses biblical terms in such
a way as to call forth a maximum response: "Do your best for the Lord,
do your best for the church! You were meant for greater things than you've
ever experienced . . . ." There's a rush of adrenalin, and we're set
to march forward to make a vital contribution. It sounds Christian, and
it often uses the language of the Bible, but it's terrible! It's terrible
to marshal the flesh in its proud array, to be made to believe in our own
greatness, as if such were real Christianity.
Paul says, having been given an extraordinary revelation, he was also given
something to deflate him, because what he needs to know above all else is
that it is the grace of God that makes human life worth living. I am becoming
more than ever convinced that the life and resources of Jesus Christ mediated
through us is the only way to live. We have learned to think less of our
capabilities and to count more on the resources of God.
Someone won $30 million in the lottery last week. The intended and unfortunate
result is that millions of others become inspired to bet at terrible odds,
thinking maybe they're just on the verge of magnificent successes themselves.
That sort of thing seduces us. We get the idea that success in promoting
ourselves into something we really want to be is just around the corner.
In contrast, what the apostle is saying is that God has refused for Paul's
sake to do what he has asked him to do. This thorn would be for Paul a lifelong
experience. The temptation, and therefore the need for that lesson, would
never end. Therefore in verse 10 we have a wonderful statement of these
things: "I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions,
in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
I don't particularly delight in insults, just to be really honest! If I
know people are going to treat me in an insulting fashion, I don't want
to be around them. I tend to fight back, finding subtle ways to undermine
those who demean me. I would rather be thought well of and praised. But
Paul says he has finally come to the point where he can honestly say he
delights in insults. Those times when he has been put down in public are
times he has learned to derive benefit from.
"My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in
weakness"
I don't like difficulty. That's a term that has to do with the ordinary
hassles of life. Last night our family had planned to go out to dinner.
It was to be a three-generation event with my parents. A series of problems
developed, and our plans fell apart amid difficulties. I was irritated with
the circumstances. I didn't for one minute, until I was dealing with this
passage much later, think of any benefit at all that had come from the difficulties
that had taken place in our home.
Weakness that leads to strength
Yet Paul says he has learned to delight in difficulties. This isn't dysfunctional
thinking or masochism. He isn't saying he enjoys hurt or rejection because
there is any inherent good in it. But he isn't beaten down to stay beaten
down! Inevitably when these things happen he is reminded of the greatness
of the power of God. He has his own strength taken away that he might draw
on the strength of the living God. Then, without Paul's arrogance, Christ's
glory is displayed.
My wife is an instructional aid in a class of retarded children at Palo
Alto High School. A wonderful result of having this class on campus is the
Special Friendship Club. Normal kids are given a buddy from among
the mentally retarded kids in this class. Those in charge set up activities
for them to do together, and try to arrange for a bit of mainstreaming for
the handicapped kids so they can be around regular high school kids and
learn from them. But to me the most remarkable thing is not the mainstreaming
of the handicapped kids; it's the learning experience for the normal kids.
This is a very competitive, arrogant town, and the kids feel it. It's a
tough place to grow up in many ways. \
The academic competition is extreme, as is awareness of vast differences
in family wealth. One of the things that the Special Friendship Club
has done is give normal kids a chance to see life through the eyes of those
who have severe weaknesses, yet aren't always conscious of them, who have
limits and yet are often joyful. They have a chance to see that competing
and winning can go on only so long, and at some point we all have to address
the fact that we can't win every time. Just as Jeff Siemon talked about
injury and loss of a career and the learning experiences that those things
were to him, the awful drumbeat inside every one of us if we are honest
is that we are really weak, and what we need is a savior who can make us
strong. We've been foolishly seduced if we think anything else. That's the
succinct message Paul has drawn from all this examination of the phony leaders
versus those who are of the Lord. God said, "My grace is sufficient
for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore, Paul
delights in weakness.
Amazing grace
The public broadcasting system in this country did an hour-long TV show
on the American hymn Amazing Grace. I didn't get to see it, unfortunately,
but I read a review of it. The reviewer marveled that there could be an
hour's worth of material generated by the discussion of one hymn and its
historical place in our culture. This hymn has had a wonderful ability to
win its way into the thinking of people, including those who don't know
Christ and little about the gospel. I remember hearing folk singers in the
'60s sing the song, although they wouldn't have claimed its truth. The tune
is engaging, but the message is irrefutable. It's telling a truth, explaining
something that people can't deny. "Amazing grace . . . saved a wretch
like me." Many have been captured by the imagery and testimony of John
Newton, the slave trader who came to Christ. Another gentleman some years
later wrote a final verse to the song, which we've also enjoyed singing:
When we've been there ten thousand years,
Bright shining as the sun,
We've no less days to sing God's praise
Than when we'd first begun.
I think it's a fitting end to a song about the grace of God, because we
will never make a dent in the outpouring of grace we receive from him; we
will never run out. Bright shining as the sun though we be, it will always
be reflected glory and praise of the grace of God. We will forever be in
a position of thankfulness-for ten thousand years or ten thousand thousand
years.
God made us to need him, and gloriously he has offered himself to us. This
is a wonderful compilation of Paul's own story. He speaks of himself and
his struggles, his weaknesses, his revelations, and his message; and finally
he says he has learned a lesson he would never want to live without: "When
I am weak, then I am strong."
Catalog No. 4233
2 Cor. 12:1-10
Nineteenth Message
Steve Zeisler
November 4, 1990
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