God resorts to working through us (Nadia Bolz-Weber)

   We come dangerously close to spiritual self-flattery when we say, God used me to do something.  But perhaps the opposite is true too.  We flatter ourselves just as much when we claim that we can’t do the hard things God sets before us.

   Without higher-quality material to work with, God resorts to working through us for others and upon us through others. Those are some weirdly restorative, disconcerting shenanigans to be caught up in:  God forcing God’s people to see themselves as God sees them, to do stuff they know they are incapable of doing, so that God might make use of them, and make them to be both humble recipients and generous givers of grace, so that they may be part of God’s big project on earth, so that they themselves might find unexpected joy through surprising situations.

--Nadia Bolz-Weber,

Accidental Saints:

Finding God in All the Wrong People

Image source:  https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196722/The-moment-construction-worker-dangled-crane-pluck-drowning-woman-river.html