What does true strength look like?

Maybe you picture veins bulging, a thousand-pound deadlift, a stadium roaring like you see here with Thor Björnsson.

While it’s a breathtaking sight to see someone push the limits of their God-given body, what if there’s something more to strength? What if the culture’s measuring tape (size, aggression, dominance) is an inadequate yardstick? The bible paints a picture of strength that is quieter, harder, and far more subversive:

  • Strength is restraining the three-inch muscle in the mouth capable of sparking wars and destroying relationships.
  • Strength is praying for God to grant repentance to your enemy just as He did for you.
  • Strength is fleeing temptation when you could indulge passionately and privately.
  • Strength is calmly enduring slander, mockery, and insults while believing “Vengeance is mine says the Lord”.
  • Strength is turning the other cheek in wisdom when vindication screams.
  • Strength is radical, hidden generosity, when no man can recognize and praise you for it.
  • Strength is serving the vulnerable and the oppressed when it costs you convenience or reputation.
  • Strength is repenting publicly instead of hiding sin to save face.
  • Strength is entrusting your life and outcomes to a Father who sees all.

Consider these biblical examples:

  • Strength looks like David courageously calling out the uncircumcised Philistine for disrespecting the Lord of lords.
  • Strength looks like Joseph, fleeing Mrs.Potiphar rather than betraying His God.
  • Strength looks like Stephen being pummeled with stones and crying out, “Lord, do not hold this sin against them”.
  • Strength looks like Paul boasting in his weakness so that Christ might be strong in him.
  • Strength looks like Jesus, who could have summoned twelve legions of angels in an instant, yet chose the path of spit, slaps, slander, and scourging, for the sake of the world.

So instead of that >1000lb deadlift, maybe greater strength looks more like this:

Gary Ridgway pleaded guilty for killing 48 women, making him the biggest serial killer in the US history. He admitted the murders to superior court on November 5th in 2003. During the trial, he sat there stone faced as victim relatives damned him and mocked him, saying: ‘He’s an animal’, and ‘I wish for him to have a long, suffering, cruel death’, and ‘He’s going to go to hell and that’s where he belongs.’ But then, the emotionless façade finally cracked when a father of one of his victims appeared to surprise him with a dose of human kindness. This father addressed him: ‘Mr. Ridgway, there are people here that hate you. I’m not one of them. You’ve made it difficult to live up to what I believe. And that is what God says to do. And that’s to forgive. You are forgiven sir’. And Gary Ridgway broke. (Shady Habashy, 2003)

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/OZg31d6XRFY

Train your eyes to see as the Lord sees.