Glory Strength

 

                                                                                                                        

*John Wayne from the movie”True Grit“

We all have little quirks that sometimes only our immediate family can detect. But…if you work with someone or hang around them long enough they’ve probably picked up on some of those quirks as well. (Surely not!) When I’m concentrating on something here at home, I often reflect what is known as a “mean smile” as our middle son used to call when he was little.

I can be beating an egg, sweeping the floor, or just trying to open a package. There it is, that odd quirk. That little “teeth-gritting-mean-smile” action. What’s so funny about this odd quirk, our middle son when putting a little “oomph” behind something does the exact same thing! Thus, a family quirk that has been passed down!

Whenever I hear that word “grit” I can’t help but think of the 1969 movie “True Grit” with John Wayne. Grit personified.

This is what we do, we grit our teeth and smile at the same time as we are trying to accomplish a task set before us. Grit the picture? (I couldn’t resist that one) Gritting teeth and smiling at the same time, is that what’s called an “oxymoron”?…Or just moron?

Sometimes we “grit” our teeth when we don’t like or want to do something. (*note to self – I must have never liked housework or cooking)

I know that I am defiantly a weak person, but praise God, when I am weak…He is strong!

Not only does our Papa God give us His strength, but He gives us what’s called “glory strength.” Now that sounds even better than a regular kind of strength doesn’t it? Sounds like strength with “Pizzazz“, pizzazz with a capital P!

Paul says in Colossians, “As you learn more and more how God works, you will learn how to do your work. We pray that you’ll have the strength to stick it out over the long haul – not the grim strength of gritting your teeth but the glory-strength God gives.”

If Paul stopped right here and didn’t say anything else, this verse would be great…wouldn’t it?

“Glory Strength”

Oh, but this verse gets even better… “It is a strength that endures the unendurable…”

“A strength that endures the unendurable”

We all go through situations and things in our lives that are unbelievably hard, unfair, and yes…unendurable.”Glory strength” is a strength that endures the unendurable that only God can give!

This “glory strength” spills over into joy, thanking the Father who makes us strong enough to take part in everything bright and beautiful that he has for us.”

When you are in those unendurable times how in the world can this “glory strength” spill over into joy?

It can…

Because…

“God rescued us from dead-end alleys and dark dungeons. (What are your dead-end alleys and dark dungeons? What have they looked or look like?) He’s set us up in the kingdom of the Son he loves so much, the Son who got us out of the pit we were in, (what is or was your pit?) got rid of the sins we were doomed to keep repeating.”  Colossians 1:9-14 MSG

“We can go through life with a “grim-strength” of gritting our teeth, or we can have a “glory-strength” that spills over into joy.”