In her book, Prayer in the Night: For Those Who Work, Watch, or Weep, Anglican writer Tish Harrison Warren takes on Nietzche’s famous phrase, “What does not kill us… makes me stronger.”
Most Christians shudder at the idea of repeating anything attached to Nietzche’s name, but the Christian church has, by and large, completely imbibed this idea that trauma makes us stronger.
I get it. Sometimes. Other times, most definitely not.
Trauma can shape us in good ways and bad, and life is far more complex than any binary around, and strength needs to be defined differently (so perhaps he was right, but not in the way he intended. More about that later).
Warren writes of Nietzsche’s phrase:
“I face things every day, big and small, that are difficult but have not killed me.
And I’m finding that what doesn’t kill me actually makes me weaker, and maybe that’s the point — that the way of glory is discovered through, and only through, the cross.
…. certainly suffering builds resilience, just as a broken bone heals stronger. We can be, perhaps ironically, more fragile if we never know pain or struggle. And there is a kind of hardy faithfulness and grit to be found on the far side of agony.
But this kind of resilience does not form us into Nietzsche’s vision of impenetrable toughness; it does not harden us.
It makes us more open to our belovedness in God, to our own vulnerability, and to the vulnerability of others.
…. Marva Dawn says that ‘even as Christ accomplished atonement for us by suffering and death, so the Lord accomplishes witness to the world through our weakness.’
…. The people who I most respect are those who have suffered but did not numb their pain — who faced their darkness. In the process, they have become beautifully weak, not tough as nails, not bitter or rigid, but men and women who bear vulnerability with joy and trust.
They are almost luminescent, like a paper lantern, weak enough that light shines through them.“
End quote:
Amen.
As Christians, we often think the “stronger” Christians are there to comfort the “weaker” ones.
And the Bible does tell us to strengthen each other.
But by the way, who’s defining strength?
Is the church guilty of defining strength by the world’s definition or by Christ’s?
I think we confuse strength with power all the time. Status. Togetherness. Because that’s how the world views strength.
The Christians I’ve learned the most from are the openly alcoholic (Brennan Manning, for example) and all of the friends I’ve met along the way who are completely vulnerable and transparent about their weakness.
And yet, they praise Jesus while stumbling in their walk with him and their humility is so great that they share their stumbles.
Deep down, I think those are the Christians who even the “strong Christians” can learn the most from.
God says adults have to become like kids to receive him in faith.
Why?
I think it’s because kids inherently know they’re not strong, that they’re vulnerable (which is why older kids feign strength to try to mask the weakness they so glaringly feel).
Young kids mainly spend their lives listening to others telling them how to act and behave, but as we grow into adults, we chafe further and further at the idea that someone else might know better.
After all, a sign of maturity is capability, and if you’re really capable, that’s a strength, and we idolize strength.
But at the same time, it feeds into our sense of pride and, because we want to maintain our good standing, we have to nurture it and hide our weakness.
In the process, we lose our humility.
And when we lose our humility, we lose our greatest witness.
Because that, perhaps more than anything, is what’s so compelling about Jesus.
He was born humble, lived humble, and died humble, and yet it was through that that he changed the world and brought us salvation.
If Jesus had come as the rich, strong businessman, could he really touch us the way he did? Would the poor of the world have trusted him? Would the rich have even trusted him?
They might have respected him. But would he have changed them so radically?
And so, the “paper lanterns” of which Warren writes, illuminate all around them, and we tend to walk away from our encounters with them far more changed than when we fraternize with the “strong.”
If you feel like a paper lantern, then yes, your light will shine brightest.
“That person only has Jesus, and yet Jesus seems enough!”
That’s a more powerful witness than a man or woman who’s been blessed with what the world values.
However, do seek help for your diseases!
But don’t be embarrassed by them either, or think God doesn’t use you.
And even if you’re too depressed to face the world right now, you can face God and tell him, “Please bless the ones I can’t serve.”
That’s called prayer, and it’s kind of a big deal to God, and I firmly believe that’s what God uses to move the world more than anything.
So if all you can do is pray, pray.
Find a psychiatrist here.
Find a therapist here.
[Photo: Pexels. And guess what, that’s the “strong” Christians looking up at you – whether you realize it or not. Don’t think any less of yourself. You are Christ’s magnificent creation. Like Brennan Manning wrote, take Christ’s evaluation of you over your self-evaluation.]
