even recognize how distorted is the view of God they propagate — an incarnation-less God who has no real compassion for or solidarity with the people of the world he claims to love. Humankind has a fatal tendency to make God into our own image, and if we can’t authentically draw near to those who are not like us, we begin to subconsciously believe God cannot draw near to them either.
The further out of touch we become with our own weakness, the more we distance ourselves from anyone outside of our particular “correct” bubble of faith. We dutifully seek to meet the needs of the world while denying that those outside our bubble might actually be able to meet ours. In neglecting to first embrace our own weakness before addressing the weakness of others, we lose the value of reciprocity that Jesus modeled so profoundly. We miss the gift of receiving a sacred God through vessels we have deemed unworthy.
Jesus, on the other hand, didn’t sort people into boxes labeled “acceptable” or “in need of ministry.” When the God of heaven came to earth in human likeness, he chose unethical tax collectors, prostitutes, and low-income fisherman to be his closest friends. He told parables that cast an immigrant as the hero (the good Samaritan), a pious religious leader as the villain (the Pharisee and the tax collector), and a rich man as the fool (the rich fool). He offended social mores, breaking class and gender lines, and challenged the status quo. People called him “a friend of … sinners” (Lk 7:34) and he wasn’t embarrassed, nor did he correct them.
If we’re honest, we can’t deny that modern Christianity looks much different. Today Christians of all stripes are largely concerned with living clean lives of personal morality and feeling affronted by the secular culture around us. When we do attempt to follow Jesus’ model of the works of mercy, there is a tangible sense of relief when the service is over and we can go back to online shopping and dinner at our favorite restaurant.
Yet we profess this faith because we believe in the way of Christ. Somewhere within us, we long for more. Despite the attraction of comfort and ease, we know we were created for something deeper.
Through his Incarnation and Passion, Jesus gave us the secret of a more meaningful life; and that secret, shockingly, is embracing our weakness. Rather than reigning from a palace and ruling with an iron fist as he could have done, Jesus came quietly, humbly — willingly accepting the disappointments, limitations, and sufferings of the human experience. The Eternal Word took on flesh so that we could be in full communion with God, without walls dividing the Divine experience from ours as humans. In the way of Jesus, we, too, are invited to make peace with the weakness of our humanity. We, too, are invited into a communion without walls.
For too long we have approached justice and evangelization through our interpretation of “rightness.” Embracing our weakness frees us from this subtle reach for power to find our own reflection in the eyes of the marginalized or the face of the non-Christian. As we open ourselves to encounter God in our own places of pain, disappointment, and self-disillusionment, our judgments of others disintegrate. As we risk authentic encounter with the limitations and sorrow of our own humanity, we grow in empathy for those around us. This willingness to embrace our own weakness allows us to see fewer “projects” or “issues” and more individual human beings with stories of their own. It allows us to relate to those who are different with the reciprocity of Jesus, a posture of the heart that believes and expects all people — even and perhaps especially the least likely — to have something important to offer us, not merely vice versa.
When we are honest about our own pain and disappointments, we can experience the freedom that Jesus knew. This is a freedom that births solidarity and compassion with our fellow man, a freedom that allows the Spirit to inhabit our gaping holes and imbue our lives with meaning.
Our lives must be more examined and less self-medicated if we truly want to be communal, spiritually vibrant, and rich in mercy. Making the decision to stop numbing our pain and embrace transparency in our relationships does not mean our lives will be transformed overnight. But making this decision empowers us to commit to an ongoing conversion. Yes, this conversion will take all our lives, but there is no need to be daunted by the prospect — after all, this is what the Christian life is all about. The benefits are wholeness in our being, authentic relationships, and a world of more compassion and joy.
In the pages of this book, I share vulnerably about my own journey. Even while knowing that we each have been given our own stories, I confess that I hope you recognize a bit of your own in mine. We are traveling together, you and I, as are billions of other people on this planet, and we are none of us so very different after all. I offer you the greatest beauty and the most painful aching of my life thus far, and I ask that in exchange you might offer me an open heart. Embracing our weakness can be an uncomfortable endeavor, but Jesus beckons us beyond comfort, beyond control, beyond strength: to where only love remains. May we say yes and follow.
Chapter One
Where We Go Wrong
I sighed happily, closed the book in my lap, and gazed out the window. It was the perfect kind of day for a transcontinental flight. Cerulean sky and cirrus clouds affirmed my confidence that this was the path my life was always meant to take. I gave my husband a gentle elbow to the ribs and we exchanged grins. There had been a few tears at the airport between our families and us, but I was so excited I barely tasted the salt of them. Missionaries, I thought to myself. After two years of training, we finally got to wear the title. After a quarter-century search for meaningful adventure, my life was finally about to begin.
Sodas on airplanes always taste a little better than they do on the ground, and my small cup of Sprite was no exception. Sipping the bubbles, I picked up my book again and studied the cover. A middle-aged charismatic American missionary in Mozambique was pictured surrounded by African street kids. The fiery wife and mother of two was everything I dreamed of becoming. Her autobiography told of her work in the slums of Mozambique, where she had seen illnesses healed, the dead raised to life, and the traumatized hearts of orphans set free to love and worship God.
I couldn’t envision a more desirable way to spend a life, and having traveled to Third World countries for short-term mission trips several times before, I wasn’t intimidated by the sacrifices it would cost. We were being sent to Indonesia — not Mozambique — through the missions arm of our nondenominational church, but still I read my own hopes in black-and-white print somewhere over the Pacific Ocean.
My life was going to matter. I was going to be fearless, and I would see miracles. Yes, of course, if God willed it and all of that, but why wouldn’t he? Looking around down here on earth, there didn’t exactly seem to be a surplus of people willing to do the brave things that I was doing. I wouldn’t say God needed me, but I wouldn’t deny he was lucky to have me.
I reclined my seat back the eighth of an inch it was designed to go, happy determination in my heart. This was going to be a wild ride.
To be human is to carry around the companionship of an internal ache. Some of us have become so adept at ignoring this, that we deny it’s present at all. But I would argue that most of us are willing to own up to the presence of a gnawing pain within. Dorothy Day famously dubbed it “the long loneliness,” but it goes by other names, too: fear, shame, disappointment, disillusionment, weakness. Such deeply rooted motivators generally manifest in one of two ways: either they woo us into spells of depression, or they repel us so much that we spend our lives trying to run from them.
Differences
