Therefore strengthen the hands which hang down, and the feeble knees, and make straight paths for your feet, so that what is lame may not be dislocated, but rather be healed. (Hebrews 12:12-13, NKJV).
I don't care whether you've just aced the gold medal in the Olympics, you are a cripple. You were born that way.
Each one of us, at the very point when our humanity commences at conception, are congenital invalids. We are spiritually deformed and dysfunctional, and there is no treatment regimen or therapy that will completely cure us this side of Heaven.
But God, who is rich in mercy, has given us His Son, and the Son, through faith in His sacrifice and resurrection from the dead, has given us His Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession, to the praise of His glory. (Ephesians 1:14, NKJV).
Until that day of our final physical regeneration, Christ has given us the means to begin the journey down that path of healing - our sanctification. He has created in us a new heart, and made us alive together with Him so that what was once dead in trespasses and sin, is now alive and new.
This transformation begins at conversion, the heart-and-soul-deep confession of our faith in Christ Jesus, but that is only the first step in our walk with Him, unless He has ordained for us a deathbed conversion like the thief on the Cross - and that can happen.
But beloved, if you haven't been called home yet to Heaven, it is because you still have a job to do in this life. The goals may be richly unique to each one of us, but be assured that your time here has not ended because you are still gainfully employed - by Him. For His glory and your edification.
No matter how infinitely varied each of our individual job descriptions may be, the above verse is a succinct encapsulation of the intent and purpose of all. And unlike mere human employers, Christ not only provides the tasks, but He also empowers us through His Spirit to carry them out, and then rewards us as if we did it all ourselves.
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them. (Ephesians 2:10, NKJV).
Essentially, we are to come alongside to exhort and encourage the kind of righteousness that leads to life and wholeness. Not the superficial kind that makes us feel self-satisfied, or puts in place an acceptable facade that looks decent on the outside.
No, it is the inward, often invisible, painful and costly righteousness that rips out the old nature to make room for the new; that puts to death our inherent sinfulness so that the new nature may rise unfettered in glory.
That is what this verse points to, and the world, and even our own unregenerate flesh, hates it with an undying passion.
The devil and his evil minions and allies in the world would much prefer the outward kind of decency that is only skin deep. The kind that anesthetizes and inoculates a soul against any true righteous transformation while providing a deadly and false example to others. The ultimate in placebo cures and spiritual snake oil.
To really strengthen the hands and the feeble knees, takes an investment of time and energy and commitment and self-sacrifice that makes gestation and birth seem like a picnic.
To really make straight paths for your [own] feet, means that you must follow the path of good forged by the Great Shepherd over a terrain of unmitigated evil, no matter what the cost, following the example of our Lord Christ Himself.
And all this not for your own praise and glory, but for His, so that our congenital defects, rather than inevitably worsening with time, are healed forever.
One day, no matter how broken and bent we are physically, no matter how many dents and scrapes, we will receive our new bodies that will never sicken or die or weaken.
Until then, we are to engage in our new life now, leading others through love and truth, like wounded soldiers helping each other on the battlefield, to the safety and assurance that comes only in Christ.
