| You know, my mom used to sit me down when I was little and I'd gotten my 100th spanking for the same offence. She'd tell me I was like a wild stallion - strong willed and wild and free and untamed. She said just like that stallion, no matter how strong or capable I was, I would never be of use to anyone until I learned to obey, that all my willpower would just be a danger to myself and those around me. But she'd always remind me that God has a special place in His heart for stubborn people. She said that God chose Abraham basically for his steadfastness. "For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the LORD, to do justice and judgement; that the LORD may bring upon Abraham that which He hath spoken of him." (Gen. 18:19) And then there's Paul, hellbent on persecuting the church and destroying the memory of Jesus Christ. He was perhaps the most hardened person God could have chosen, but once he was broken, he became the most zealous evangelist the world has ever known. The stubbornness he held for the Jewish people and religion, became wrapped around the truth of Jesus Christ, allowing him to face all the opposition he did without wavering. God's strength sustained him, of course, but I believe that God gifts us with unique strengths and weaknesses of personality that He then uses to establish His work in us. Brokenness is the key to converting our strengths into weakness, and our weaknesses into strengths. But what things were gain to me, those I counted loss for Christ. Yea doubtless, and I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord: for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and do count them but dung, that I may win Christ, 9And be found in him, not having mine own righteousness, which is of the law, but that which is through the faith of Christ, the righteousness which is of God by faith: That I may know him, and the power of his resurrection, and the fellowship of his sufferings, being made conformable unto his death; If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead. ~Philippians 3:7-11 |
