Hey everybody, welcome to "The Trench", my name is Christian and today we're getting vulnerable with Jesus.
Last week when we talked about having a relationship with God,
we touched very briefly on the idea of vulnerability. Vulnerability is one of the most important
parts of any deep relationship. But unfortunately, it's something that often makes us really
uncomfortable and even more unfortunately, it's something that we don't really understand.
In our tell-all culture, in a world of Facebook, oversharing, and live tweeting, we may think
that being vulnerable is just about laying it all out there, so we mistake harsh truth
telling for honest vulnerability. But before we can understand how to be vulnerable in
our lives and in our relationships, we need to understand what vulnerability actually
is, why it's terrifying, and why it's essential for relationships. And to do so, there's no
better place to look than at the Person, and particularly, at the Passion of Jesus Christ.
Let's Christology!
First, vulnerability is a kind of self-revelation. And we see this
in the way Christ reveals Divinity to us. We sing every Matins, the morning service,
that "God is the Lord and has revealed Himself to us..." And He does this, in order that
we may know Him. He comes to us as a fellow Human Being and moves into the neighborhood
to save us, to enter into a relationship with us--a real and never ending one, that is based
in God's self-revelation and His invitation to know Him intimately and to commune with
Him eternally. This means that when it comes to having a relationship with and knowing
God, there's no where else to look than at the humanity of Jesus Christ. If you need
a little more background to understand this, check out this episode of "Be the Bee" on
who Jesus Christ is. The miracles performed by Jesus in His human body are manifestations
of His Divine power. And so we can't separate or compartmentalize the two Natures of Christ.
As Father John Behr, the Dean of Saint Vladimir's Seminary writes "We can't say that Christ
died because He was human, but because He is also God He is able to get Himself out of the grave.
To put it in such terms would be very misleading and, in fact, a travesty." And it would be
a travesty. Because it's in Christ's humanity that He shows us what it is to be God. The
human touch of Jesus is the Divine touch of the Son of God. It is as the God-man that
Christ healed the sick, dined with sinners, fed thousands of hungry people, lived a life
completely for the sake of others. And went to the Cross. And this is the next point about
vulnerability. It's self-revelation with the risk of rejection. True vulnerability does
not seek to control the response of other people. When we look at Christ, we see that
the Son of God came into the world in meekness and humility with the frailty of all that
it is to be human. We see that His self-revelation was a true invitation to know Him. And it
was an invitation that we can reject. Now I don't know about you, but if there's one
thing that I want, it's bacon. All the bacon. And if there's another thing that I want,
it's for people to like me. And often, I find myself pretending to be somebody else, so
that they won't reject me. Whaaaat! You're a vegan? Me too! Sometimes. Whaaaat! I totally
don't like pokemon either. Whaaaat! You like Miley Cyrus? I totally know songs by her.
All of this however, is born out of my very insecure need to avoid rejection. Even if that means
the only way to do that is to lie about who I am and to create a false connection with somebody.
But with Christ, we see that He takes the ultimate risk. That He shows us
who He really is. Even if that means being rejected and ultimately put to death. As Father
Meletios Webber writes " God takes risks. The Incarnation of Jesus was perhaps the greatest
risk ever taken.God shows His true greatness when He shows His ability to be weak. To condescend-
to get down to us on our level-is the way God makes Himself open to us. And by doing
so, He makes Himself vulnerable." This vulnerability leads Christ directly to the point where we
are free to accept Him, or reject Him. Christ didn't try to control people's response to
Him then, and He doesn't do that now. Christ didn't lie to us, He didn't change Himself
to avoid being rejected. No, Christ shows us who God really is. And by willingly enduring
death and rising again, Christ transformed us. In Jesus, in the Crucified Christ, we
see God vulnerable, exposed. But this shows that vulnerability is not weakness, it is
strength. It is power. It is love. It is truth. And it is truth that sets us free. As Father
John Behr writes, " By His most human action, an action which expresses all the weakness
and impotence of our created nature, Christ shows Himself to be God. The profundity of
this puts one at a loss for words." In the Cross, we see that true love is born out of
true vulnerability. And true love is humble enough to be rejected. To be Crucified.
To be killed. But we also see that true love and true vulnerability dies with arms wide
open, as if Christ continues to say "Yes" to us, even as we say no to Him. So, is vulnerability scary?
Yes! Because it looks like the Cross. But we need to go through the Cross to get
to the Resurrection. And we need to go through vulnerability, through the risk of being rejected,
if we hope to reach the sort of relationships in communion that come from being fully known
and fully accepted. If Christ had shown us anything but Himself or if He had controlled
our response to Him, then our relationship with Him wouldn't be one born in freedom or
in love. Our response to Him would have been coerced because we would have been convinced
to love Him. But Christ doesn't want to convince us, He wants our free response. He wants us
to see and love Him for who He really is, just as He sees and loves us for who we really are.
In His humanity, Christ shows us the truth about who God is. And invites us to
know God, Face to face. And next week, we're going to take a look at what all of this Theology
means for us practically in our lives. So until then, let's take courage in the midst
of vulnerability. Knowing that while vulnerability looks and feels like dying, in Christ, it
does not end in death, but a new and everlasting life. So join the fight. Live Orthodoxy.
Remember to like and subscribe and join the rest of us inside the trench.