Perfectly weak, perfectly strong

Many times as I write, I feel the thrill of it; the joy of creation; the indefinable, indescribable exuberance of crafting something good.  Often, I laugh out loud in that corner, sitting at my round table, as I’m scratching out the next piece.  Sometimes, I cry, tears rolling down cheeks as I spell out my heart in pen and ink, it flowing in cursive, longhand, across the page.

There are days, seasons, when it pours straight out, lines filling up, thoughts clicking, syncing, pieces falling into place.  Voila!  Column done.

Then there are days, seasons, when it doesn’t flow.  It doesn’t come easy.  It’s labor; hard, reminiscent of a birthing with pangs and sweat and blood and tears.

This week’s column on marriage was one of those.  I nearly scrapped it, putting it on hold and moving on to something easier.  “I can come back to this later.  Why on earth don’t I just LEAVE this and move on?”  Then, picking up the pen again, I ground on, one word, one sentence, one paragraph at a time.  And then it was done and edited and typed and sent.

We have a joke, The Mister and I.  The very columns that “aren’t my favorite” and “aren’t going to go over well” are often the very ones that hit the nerve, strike the mark, bark a collective laugh from the readers, or, oddly, make them cry.  It’s happened often enough that we’ve learned to look for it and chuckle about it.

That’s exactly how I felt yesterday, coming up to post the column on the blog.  “It’ll be quiet today.  This one’ll fall flat.”

“O, ye of little faith.”  That’s what He might have said to me for sure.  Inexplicably, and to my everlasting surprise, it was a near-record-setting day on the blog.  From far and wide they came – from Greece and Spain, from Korea and Beverly Hills, from LA and Wisconsin, from Kansas and NC and Quebec, folks came to read a little piece on marriage that was written by a tired, struggling girl with a tiny mustard seed, but a big, big God.

“Little is much when God is in it.”  Oh, let me shout this from the rooftop to you, my friends.  And let me tell you, too, of The Shepherd’s whisper to me last night as I was mulling it all over in my mind. “My strength is made perfect in weakness.”

Perfectly weak.  Perfectly strong.  In the Upside Down Kingdom, that’s how it works.  Where you are weak today, just there is where His strength can come, doing what you cannot.  He, bearing you up, takes you where you could not otherwise go, causing you to bear fruit, causing your desert to “blossom like the rose.”

Keep walking, my friend.  Keep walking.

And may I tell you how very, very grateful I am for all of your kind words and for your sharing this piece (the one I ‘knew’ would fall flat) with your friends.  I am deeply thankful for it all, and for you and your love.