Daily Affirmations - Day 2 - The Blessing of Weakness - So That No One May Boast

Day 2: So that no one may boast

God saves the humble, but brings low those whose eyes are haughty

But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before Him (1 Corinthians 1:27-29).

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The people who have done the greatest good in the world, who have left the deepest, most abiding impression of the divine upon the lives of others, have not been those whom the world called the strong. Much of the best work in our world has been done by the weak, the broken, the despised.

“Successful” men have piled up vast fortunes, established large enterprises, or won applause in some material way. But the real influence that has made the world better, enriched lives, taught men the lessons of love, and sweetened the springs of society, has come largely, not from the strong, but from the weak...

I walked over a meadow and the air was full of delicious fragrance. Yet I could see no flowers. There was tall grass waving on all sides—but the fragrance did not come from the grass. Then I parted the grass and looked beneath it, and there, close to the earth, hidden out of sight by the showy growths in the meadow, were multitudes of lowly little flowers. I had found the secret of the sweetness—it poured out from these humble hiding flowers.

This is a picture of what is true everywhere in life. Not from the great, the conspicuous, the famed in any community, comes the fragrance which most sweetens the air, but from lowly lives—hidden, obscure, unpraised—which give out the aroma of unselfishness, of kindness, of gentleness...

We know that it is from the cross of Christ that the hallowing influence has flowed, which all these centuries has been refining and enriching and softening the world’s life. So it is always—out of weakness and suffering, and from crushed, broken lives, comes the blessing which renews and heals the world.

~ James Miller, The Blessing of Weakness

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Christ came to earth without a crown,

Without His glory and renown;

He came, the meek and lowly One,

To suffer for what men had done.

He came not with an empire grand,

As honored ruler of the land;

But as the servant of the poor,

He came rejection to endure.

Oh, greatest mystery of time—

That God should stoop to serve mankind;

That the Creator, Lord most high,

Should come a criminal’s death to die!

Example of humility,

Teach me to live and serve like Thee;

Abase all self-esteem and pride,

That Thou alone be glorified.

~ Melissa Kauffman, 2018

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