What does it mean to go from “strength to strength?”1
Well, if God is our refuge and our help, then He, being the Alpha and Omega, the Beginning and End, is always with us; therefore, we are never weak because He is always strong.
It doesn’t make logical sense.
We rely on trust to see God as a shielding light, who gives grace unto the glory of a true walk with the Lord, who at once strengthens our faithful first breath and last step.
As children of God, we are refugees in a lost world. So many of us were born into Babylon, and it was disguised as church pews, Sunday school, and vacation bible camp. The places and activities are fine and good if we see them for what they are – invitations for the Holy Spirit to come and lead – but otherwise we risk reducing love to a performance metric and quantifying faith on a quarterly report.
Actions have consequences, and in my experience the world does not teach us that because many consequences are profitable. Industry thrives on products that conveniently allow us to avoid the sinking sorrow that lurks between push notifications, to numb the hurt of being lied to by a world that wants to pay for our souls with counterfeit bills.
I have multiple diplomas from the school of hard knocks; those scars remind me there is more to life than acquisition, and there is more to faith than religion. Our abundance and belief are in the person of Jesus, the perfection of Christ, and the pursuit of what Jesus Christ gave His life for – to live once again in our Father’s house.
It’s ok to feel homesick being apart from God and longing for heaven; the question is what do we do with the desolation? A consequence of participating in the culture of false promise – that money satisfies, that fame fills, that pleasure lasts – is that we must teach ourselves how to be hungry and grow compassion in the hollow.
The Holy Spirit capitalizes on consequences too, but Kingdom consequences are fruit God cultivates to bring hope and healing. And what the Lord gives to us, Jesus also shares through us, for we can do all things through Christ who gives us strength.
As we wait for the Kingdom to come, let us make our hearts the dwelling place of the Spirit, the consoling melody of truth that fills nothingness with meaning because when we are weak, we are strong.
- Psalm 84:7 ↩︎
