Loving Our Limitations

Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his   own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross!

(Philippians 2:6-8)

Limitless.  Creator.  One who sees everything.  Timeless.  Unaffected by gravity.  Not doomed to atrophy.  More powerful than Superman.  Has the largest entourage.  God.

Limited.  Created.  Can only see to the horizon.  Mortal.  Fallen.  Decomposing.  Rescued by Superman.  Follower.  Human.

What must it have been like to be born as a human after being only in the nature of God?  After having the universe at your fingertips, and then to have your fingertips limit your reach?   After speaking planets into existence, and then to have your existence narrated by baby coos?  Discovering the frailty of your new body, did you begin to comprehend the death set before you?  What did it feel like to make yourself nothing in comparison to your former self?

Did you ever wonder why your Father loved us humans so much?  So weak, so small, so fragile, so finite.  Our strengths must have seemed so powerless.  Our vision near-sighted.  Our stride so short.

Did you ever wish you could be your former self – your true identity?  Just for one minute so you wouldn’t have to feel so contained?  Just once so they could believe?  But you did . . . and they didn’t.

And yet you still became obedient to death – even death on a cross.  You submitted yourself to a painful death on behalf of the ones who caused you pain.  You carried all the fragility of our humanness onto the cross.  You felt every agonizing weak point of our bodies.  You experienced all the imperfections to being made in human likeness.  And you still became obedient to death.

You must have really loved us human beings even with all our limitations.

Loving our limitations . . . I’m pretty sure that I don’t love my limitations. I hate being confined, narrowly defined, and kept in line.  I see them as hindrances, holding me back.  If only I wasn’t so . . . If only I was so . . . I want to be perfect.  I don’t want limitations.

Yet in my limitations I learn to love.  I learn to see the unique features of those around me, and how they give me something I don’t have.  I recognize opportunities in my imperfections.  I learn to feel and experience compassion in the delicate nature of others.  I learn to be thankful.  I comprehend how to serve others by becoming like them.  I learn to appreciate the beauty of being made human.

So, thank you, Jesus, for embodying our limitations in order to love us.  Thank you for seeing potential in me.  Thank you for rescuing this Lois Lane.

How do you see God in your limitations?

What are you learning through your weaknesses?

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