It has been a rough week in the Morris house. Amber, Molly, and I have all been down for about a week with this flu thing that is going around. For three days our house was predominantly us lying around, coughing, and watching old movies. Thankfully we seem to be nearing the end. While every day I long for the infection to pass, I wonder, “In the midst of this sickness and weakness, is there something I can learn about the ways of God?”

Principle 3 in Emotionally Healthy Communities is to live in brokenness and vulnerability. Peter Scazerro says, “[Weakness] is a universal human experience, cutting across all ages, cultures, races, and social classes. It is God’s gift specially crafted for you so you can lead out of weakness and brokenness, not your own strength and power.” Wait, did God give me this brokenness and weakness? God is not up in heaven handing out weakness and brokenness. He is our redeemer and restorer, and one day we will all be completely whole. But today we are broken and weak. This should not drive us away or remove us from God’s goodness. Weakness is actually intended to drive us towards God’s goodness, his great love, and his unending mercy.

Lying on my living room floor as the fever wracked my body, I felt the desire to be out doing and showing that the virus wasn’t going to get me down. It wasn’t going to stop me. But sickness is an unfortunate reality in our lives. We look forward to the restored Kingdom in all of its fullness where there will be no weeping or pain. But, we currently live in a fallen world where sin and brokenness still remain. We are in the in-between, and in the in-between we are broken and sometimes we get sick.

The good news of the gospel is that when we bump into our own weaknesses, God is right there with us. He is not mad or disappointed. He’s not waiting for us to power up before he encounters us. Jesus’ power is made perfect in our weaknesses. We don’t need to overcome to encounter him, but we encounter him in our brokenness and he puts us back together, and through him we overcome.