Vulnerable


Photo taken during the 2015 retreat of the Men of Purpose of Filinvest Community Christian Fellowship.

There are times we are afraid to admit our brokenness because we thought people would reject us when they know what we are struggling about. Yet, according to Romans 15:7, “Accept one another, then, just as Christ accepted you, in order to bring praise to God.” (NIV) 

That’s what Pastor Steven Lee of College Church in Wheaton, Illinois called “redemptive vulnerability.” In his “Give Your Weakness to God” article, Pastor Lee wrote, 
So what is redemptive vulnerability? To be vulnerable is to be susceptible to being wounded or hurt. In the context of community, vulnerability is opening up about one’s humanity. It’s to admit that we are not perfect people. We have not arrived. We are broken, unfinished people who live in a world that itself is broken because of the fall. We experience depression, burn out, cancer, sadness, death, grief, disability, disease, relational strife, loneliness, lust, anxiety, and the list goes on. [1]
Image credit

We are to open up only to the level that we trust a person. We should only open up to people we are close with. We don’t just open up to anybody because not everybody could be trusted with the sensitive information about us. 

But we still open up. And we open up to be healed. We share how God mended our broken lives, how He made us whole by His grace.
But our story doesn’t need to end with brokenness. Redemptive vulnerability — a vulnerability that leads to life — is where we share our brokenness in order to display the surpassing power and sufficiency of Christ and the gospel, which transforms us increasingly into the likeness of Christ. Vulnerability is not an end in itself. Rather, our vulnerability should point us, individually and together with other believers, to the sufficiency of Jesus. It looks at and hopes in the redemption we have in Christ Jesus and the work of the cross. [2]
I believe the small group is the best place to experience this redemptive vulnerability. Galatians 6:2 commanded us, “Help carry one another’s burdens, and in this way you will obey the law of Christ.” 

Image credit

We simply cannot do it in a big group context. In the small group, we could share our burdens so that together we could carry it. That’s how we fulfill the law of Christ, that is, lovingly accepting people no matter who they are or what they have become.

“Broken” Step

As our church gears towards small groups, pray a prayer of commitment to the Lord that you would either lead or join a group. Pray for wisdom and strength for our church leadership as we take the necessary steps to fulfill that goal. 

[1] Steven Lee (8 October 2015), “Give Your Weakness to God,” Desiring God, retrieved from http://www.desiringgod.org/. Emphasis added.

[2] Ibid. Italics his. Emphasis added.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

God Knows Judas Not Pay

In the National Geographic Magazine (May 2006 issue), in its cover story, The Judas Gospel , Professor Eliane Pagels of Princeton University claimed that the so-called gospel of Judas “ changes the history of early Christianity. ” Even UP Professor Randy David took notice of the Judas Gospel: “Strictly from a sociological standpoint, I think the discovery of the Gospel of Judas makes Christianity a far more interesting religion than what centuries of metaphysical theology has made of it.” (A Gospel for the Postmodern, Phil. Daily Inquirer, April 16, 2006) That’s why I spoke in our Young Pro Fellowship a few days ago on God Knows Judas Not Pay (A Biblical Response on the Judas Gospel). I believe opportunities like this hype on the Judas Gospel or the Da Vinci Code opens a door for us to share the true Gospel. For those who did not attend last Thursday, let me share briefly why we reject the Judas gospel. I came up with the acronym J-U-D-A-S. J udas was portrayed as a traitor in the Bibl
Read more

“Ubus-ubos Biyaya, Bukas Nakatunganga”

Image
That’s what my mother always told us when we were still kids. (Translation: “You spend everything today, you will have nothing tomorrow.” ) Image source: So, What's New ? Dionie did just that. Last April 2008, he won PHP14,125,032 in the Lotto 6/42 draw. Excitedly, he “lived the life of a millionaire, something he had been longing to experience. He lived in a P4-million house in a posh subdivision, drove around in a sports utility vehicle [which he bought the very same day he claimed his prize] , and gave goodwill money, ranging P1,000 to P 850,000, to relatives and friends. He also gambled daily, womanized, and went on regular drinking sprees.” (Source: Manila Bulletin ) He estimated that he squandered a minimum of P100,000 almost every day. He also lent money even to people he did not really know. “I just gave them and told them not to pay me back.” (Ibid) His bank had to issue him a special card so he can withdraw huge amounts of money quickly from the automated teller m
Read more

“Don’t drink the Kool-Aid!”

Image
Forty years ago, this expression became known as a description of blind obedience.   Source: Los Angeles Times On November 18, 1978, members of Peoples Temple, a cult group in Guyana, drank Kool-Aid drink laced with cyanide to commit a mass suicide “at the behest of their charismatic but paranoid leader, Jim Jones”. [1] According to the Encyclopaedia Britannica , “The death toll exceeded 900, including some 300 age 17 and under, making the incident one of the largest mass deaths in American history. ”  [2]  What made those people submit to such atrocity? According to Stella Morabito, a senior contributor to The Federalist online magazine, Peoples Temple is “Exhibit A… [of]  the dangers of the cult mindset or how vulnerable all people are to cult tactics.”  [3] She pointed out that, Coercive persuasion has immense power to shape and twist the human mind.  …[Jones’] utopian preaching of a humane world in which all lived happily in harmony resonated with the
Read more