FATHER ALMIGHTY
We like to think of God as the “Almighty” …and God is. And as Creator …and God is. And as all-powerful, all-knowing, and all-present — omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent …and God is.
We don’t often think of God as vulnerable — that would make God weak. We worship strength, whether in people, nations, or our God.
Consider Jesus, the second of the Trinity. Consider His arrival. Consider that God became human! Born in a stable. Born to a young girl and her betrothed. Scandal, upon un-believability, upon scandal, yet this is how God chooses to enter this world.
If God, through Jesus, “…did not count equality with God something to be grasped, but emptied Himself, taking the form of a slave, becoming as human beings are…” [ Ph 2:6-7], what does that say about our God? Where is the strength? Where is the power? Where is the glory? Who is in control as Jesus hangs, nailed immobile, suspended between heaven and earth, being of both, yet in that moment, belonging to neither?
God is Love [1 John 4:8]. Love is vulnerable, and where ever people are involved, pain seems to be inevitable. Pain is the flip-side of the joy that love also brings, while fidelity and faith are the edge that holds them together. Jesus’ fidelity to love is what led Him from the joy of God-incarnate, to the pain of God-crucified. His commitment to showing us who God really is, is what compelled Him to allow us to do with Him as we did.
Vulnerability is the second of the two prerequisites of love. The first is the freedom to choose. The second is the choice to be vulnerable. Without vulnerability, we are a fortress of cold stone, standing tall and on a firm foundation, but also excluding what is not like ourselves and armed to defend our control.
Vulnerability is not weakness. Vulnerability is a warm heart that disarms in its humility while it invites what is different. It is all about the strength it takes to co-operate and even compromise once in a while. It is all about love, and love is either vulnerable or it is nothing.
God is the Almighty Creator. God is the dying Man on the cross.
God would not have one without the other.