“Should I be honest?” I wondered. “What if I start crying? What if she doesn’t really have time to listen? What if she is just asking to be nice? I could keep it simple and tell her I’m fine.”
There I was, standing in the lobby at church waiting for my husband, when an old friend walked up and asked how I was doing. Our then three-year-old daughter had been diagnosed with a severe speech disorder a few weeks earlier, and I was not “fine.”
I was exhausted. I was overwhelmed. I was afraid my little girl may never be able to talk.
Yet I felt like I shouldn’t be any of those things. I should have more faith, more stamina, more strength and courage to navigate the unknown path of special needs parenting.
Sometimes it’s hard to let people know how we’re really doing because we don’t want to be high maintenance, right? We don’t want anyone to feel sorry for us. Or we fear that if we’re honest, someone might perceive our struggle as a lack of faith.
Other times we don’t let people know how we’re really doing because we assume they’re only asking to be nice and don’t really have time to listen. And what if we’re honest but it gets awkward because they don’t know what to say?
Sometimes someone sincerely wants to know and we just don’t want to tell them. That is the place where things get tricky for me. I will tell people I’m fine even when I’m not, because I want to be.
I don’t want to be weak and broken. I want to be okay. I want to feel strong, resilient, and courageous.
And that is where I stood that day in the lobby at church. Everything in me wanted to keep my guard up, keep my heart sealed off and my lips sealed tight. But I was tired of hiding and pretending. So I took a risk and let my heart, my words, and my tears spill. I shared the hard parts of Aster’s countless assessments, unexpected diagnosis, and the heartache of not knowing her future.
Although Kelly probably had places to go, she stayed with me and listened. She grabbed some tissue when the tears started down my cheeks, and asked if there was anything she could do to help.
When I wanted to be strong, God showed me the powerful gift of being weak.
Paul describes what happens when God allows struggles that make us feel weak. And what God does in our weakness when we’re willing to rely on Christ. How God’s power comes and rests on us.
Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. 2 Corinthians 12:7 NIV
Paul had been struggling and asking God to take away the pain. But somehow he realized and accepted that God allowed the hardship to continue to protect him from pride and the danger of becoming self-sufficient.
There’s nothing that can hinder community and friendships more than us not needing each other. Like Paul, I think God wants us to become more comfortable with our weaknesses because it keeps us dependent on Him and needing each other.
We don’t need to keep pretending we’re fine. What we need, to have and to be, is a friend who says “you don’t have to be strong all the time.” A friend who gives us permission to be weak and remind us of the truth we so easily forget: God’s power shows up in our weakness when we’re willing to be real about our struggles and our need for His strength.
Before we went our separate ways, Kelly asked if she could pray for me, right there in the lobby at church. Afterwards she thanked me for telling her what was really going on, and told me that knowing I didn’t have life all figured out made her feel normal.
God is able to work His grace and His strength in our weakness. When we’re willing to be weak, He gets to be strong for us. When we’re willing to be real, others get to see, pray for and get to know the “real” us and the real God we so desperately need and love.
One of our deepest God-given longings is to be known, by Him and each other. I’m so excited to celebrate the launch of Craving Connection, my new all time favorite book about the beautiful, vulnerable, hard and holy gift of friendship. Grateful to have my heart and my story tucked in these pages with thirty other friends from the inCourage community who took turns writing each chapter for you. If you want to invest in meaningful relationships right where God has you, become the friend you wish we had, and embrace the desire God has placed in you to connect with friends, you are going to LOVE this book!
BOOK GIVEAWAY: In partnership with DaySpring’s inCourage and Broadman & Holman publishers, we’re giving away 6 copies of Craving Connection!! Three of you will receive t books – one to keep and one to give a friend.
ENTER TO WIN:
- SHARE this post – on Facebook, Twitter and/or Instagram using the hashtag #CravingConnection and @ReneeSwope.
- SHARE your thoughts under this post, and let me know who you’d like to give a copy to.Winners will be randomly chosen next week and notified via email. If you are reading this via email, click here to leave a comment on my blog. All entries must be entered on my blog for participation in the drawing.
Today’s post is a partial excerpt of my chapter in Craving Connection, a new book written by 30 different women from the inCourage community,
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This a beautiful writing. Thank you for sharing. I would love to read more of your work and look forward to hearing you speak this summer in MN. I would give a copy of your book to a friend who is struggling with be hospitalized when she is such a social person.
Love your Honesty!! I struggle a lot with insecurity I’m trying to live who God created me to be!! Your book has been a tremendous help to me!! I’d would share this book wth abspecial friend Annie who means a lot to me!!
Guilty! of “being fine.” Sometimes I just don’t have the emotional energy to share; sometimes I just don’t take the time – mine or a friend’s. Or sometimes the person I would share with moves away – & that’s with whom I would share the book – my good friend I see too infrequently!
This is something I struggle with daily-how much to share, is this showing a lack of faith, is God disappointed in my complaining, am I too much for people, etc. I would share this with a friend who never shares anything, who always comes across as perfectly together. Thanks so much for this book and opportunity to win the giveaway!
Thank you for this giveaway. This sounds like such a great book. I would probably share with my best friend because we share everything. ?I tried to spread the word by sharing this post on fb, twitter, and instagram.
I would love to read through this book with my friends Tracy and Karen.
This couldn’t have come at a better time. I find that I really have no one that I connect with other than the people in my home, social workers, and therapists. I do foster care and we don’t get to church often enough because one of our littles just can’t handle social situations. I often feel if I need/want to share some of my weaknesses, it will be things people don’t want to hear or that it will be a burden they don’t need. Many of the people we used to hang out with have stopped coming around. If I were to win, I honestly don’t know who I would share it with. I guess whomever crossed my heart and mind as I was reading it.