“God is weak. And for this reason I love Him.”

I stared at my friend. Blinked a couple of times. Maybe his English was failing him because I had certainly never thought of God as being weak. “What exactly do you mean?” I pressed.

With a little further explanation I came to realize that he meant exactly what he said. God is weak. He is weak because His love makes Him vulnerable.  He is weak because His creation is capable of breaking His heart. And for this reason I love Him.

I’d never really considered it a weakness, but I’m familiar with the depths of God’s sacrificial love. I know that nothing else would compel Him to endure the cross for me. And I know it didn’t stop at the cross.

God cares so deeply about every little detail of my life that He grieves when I grieve. When Lazarus died and the family was in mourning, what did Jesus do? He wept. He cried right along with those who were hurting. And I’m fully convinced that He was hurting too.

I grew up knowing that Jesus loves me – that He catches every fallen tear and knows the number of hairs on my head. I was raised with a God who loves. The god my friend once served was quite different. It was because of his experience with a god who lords his power over his creation that my friend found himself attracted to God’s vulnerability. This is why he could look me in the eye and say, “God is weak. And for this reason I love Him.”

I serve a God who concerns Himself with sparrows just so He can say that I’m worth much more than them. I serve a God who loves with such fierce passion that He is moved to tears. I serve a God who would give His life as a ransom for many, even knowing that the majority would reject Him in the end. For this reason, He may be considered weak; but it is for this reason I love Him.