we are we

When I was very young, my mom taught me how to sing "Jesus Loves Me." My vocabulary then was small as my child's frame, so what I heard when we sang was this:

Jesus loves me, this I know
For the Bible tells me so
Little ones to him belong
We are we, but he is strong.

I woke up this morning with that tune and those words refraining in my mind...the childhood ones.

I'm actually grateful that the words my mom sang were "we are weak", not "they are weak." She sang words that impressed upon me that all of us, even she - my grown-up mommy who knew everything and kept me safe - are the weak ones. All of us.

And what of my words? We are we, but he is strong.

We are weak...and we are also terribly sinful: prideful, hurtful, angry, untruthful, selfish. Sometimes it feels like they're thorns in our flesh, the way they're buried so deeply into us. Sometimes they feel like such a part of us that we have to ask, Is this really me? And sometimes it is.

We are we. We are ourselves in all our beauty, weakness, and sin. I am me, who gets lonely, oversensitive, and ungracious.

I am me...
we are we...
...but he is strong.

And his power is made perfect in weakness.

Thank God.