"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them. Behold, I will show unto the Gentiles their weakness, and I will show unto them that faith, hope and charity bringeth unto me—the fountain of all righteousness."
Traditionally, this has been viewed as a scripture about finding and rooting out individual weaknesses in your personality or soul.
I got a blessing one year that said, "Notice, that scripture doesn't say weaknesses? It says weakness."
That hit me hard. I had been spending a lot of time focusing on the reality that I have specific weaknesses, and they hold me back, and fretting about how to fix that. And I was using that scripture as a justification for my misplaced focus. Doesn't Ether say we have to find our weaknesses and turn them into strengths?
NO. That verse in Ether does not say that.
NO. That verse in Ether does not say that.
And if we use it to mean that, we are forcing into scripture an unhealthy (and unscriptural, and potentially prideful) focus on ourselves. Focusing on us, whether to celebrate our own strengths or to bemoan our own weaknesses, is Pride. And pride is a sin in both the Fake Glory form and the Fake Humility form.
The reality is that we don't actually have the perspective to find and eliminate our own weaknesses. And focusing on our weaknesses is not psychologically healthy. It is depressing and discouraging, and ultimately worthless because focusing on them actually reinforces them instead of eliminating them. It's an unproductive and unhealthy focus on me me me.
At least, it was for me.
Of course when we realize we have bad habits, we should work to eliminate those. And when we have sins we should repent. And if we have handicaps or mental illnesses that make righteousness more difficult, we should seek treatment. But weaknesses in our makeup are much harder to address (and often impossible) and focusing on them isn't helpful. Working with and around our weaknesses is often necessary.
But if you read the actual words in that scripture, and not the social constructs we've place around it, it's not talking about a propensity to tell things a little rosier than they actually are, or an inability to remember names, or bad fashion sense. It is talking about our inherent state of being weak, especially compared to God.
Searching for weaknesses in your soul and trying to root them out is a me-focused activity. Coming before God with a fuller understanding that, actually, you can't do it yourself (succeed at life, overcome your afflictions, change your heart, etc) is the reality of humility. Humility is not putting yourself down. It's putting yourself in your proper place in relation to God (and, in the process, other people).
Here is it again:
"And if men come unto me I will show unto them their weakness. I give unto men weakness that they may be humble; and my grace is sufficient for all men that humble themselves before me; for if they humble themselves before me, and have faith in me, then will I make weak things become strong unto them. Behold, I will show unto the Gentiles their weakness, and I will show unto them that faith, hope and charity bringeth unto me—the fountain of all righteousness."
Recognizing our weakness requires us to come to God because we don't have the perspective to see that actually, in reality, we're powerless. (We like to think that we're strong. Our society teaches us to think that we're strong, and to be strong, and to focus on our strengths, etc.) Recognizing our inherent and absolute weakness requires understanding and perspective shared from Him. If we were powerful, we would not rely on God. We wouldn't need to trust and believe Him (not just believe in Him, but believe Him). We wouldn't be motivated to get, cling to, and practice faith, hope, and charity.
According to this verse, weakness is not something we are supposed to find and get rid of. Weakness is a blessing that God gave us so that we would do the things that are required to get back to Him, and to let Him help us, and to rely on Jesus.
Life is so difficult if we focus on our weaknesses and failures. But life becomes so beautiful when we accept our weakness and let God make that a strength--not eliminate it, but use it to help us succeed at the things that matter to Him (making us more like Him, bringing us back to Him). Our inability to do it on our own becomes a strength when we learn to rely on Jesus and use the Priesthood to get through life. Because of agency, we have to let Him help us. We have to let Him heal us. We have to invite Him in. Recognizing and embracing the reality that we are weak helps us do that. It opens the door to many wonderful blessings, and to an amazing relationship with Jesus and our Father in Heaven. So many, many doors are opened (the windows of heaven, even) if we can recognize our weakness.
And we miss that if we are too busy finding our flaws and busying ourselves making lists about how to fix them.
1 comment:
Interestingly, that false construct came in part because of the way the chapter heading used to read. If you can find a copy of the Book of Mormon 15-20 years old, you'll see that the chapter heading has the word weaknesses rather than weakness. I don't know when exactly it happened, but it was changed to read like the actual scripture fairly recently.
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