Fr. Bob - Handball was my strength
How do I say this? In the seminary when it came to “the books” I didn’t exactly set the world on fire. What I’m saying is that I was no Ray Ortman. You know what I’m saying? Okay. I didn’t study that much either.
But there was one place where I really felt at home. It was the library. It on the handball court. It was the place where I could really let off some steam. I always say if it wasn’t for handball I’m not sure I could have survived the seminary.
But more than that it was the one place where I could excel. I mean you practice anything long enough and you get good at it, right? And I got good at handball. It was my strength. And in my strength, I was strong. At least that’s how it felt with handball.
And that’s how it was for me back in the glory days in the glory days of handball. the day. Butt now all that has changed. First of all, you couldn’t find someone to play with if you wanted to. Someone to play pickle ball, not problem. But handball not so much. The game has kind of disappeared. And even if I were to find someone to play with as you know I’m blind as a bat now and couldn’t hit that ball if I wanted to. So, in what used to be my strength, handball, I am now the weak link.
So, if back in the seminary I could boast that in my strength, I was strong, at least when it came to handball, in today’s second reading from II Cor. Paul says the opposite For him it’s not in my strength am I strong. Rather he boasts “In my weakness I am strong.” How can he say that?
Well, as we heard three times Paul begs God to remove his annoying thoron in the flesh. And the only answer he got? “My grace is sufficient for you for power is made perfect in weakness.” And so, it goes. The very thing we think to be our weakness becomes our strength as God uses it to draw us close to himself and to one another.
That’s how with time Paul learned to accept his thorn in the flesh and be content with weakness. You see, in that weakness the power of Christ’s love grew string in Paul. And that’s how Paul is able to boast. “In my weakness I am strong”.
What about us? Think of the thorn in the flesh you’d like to get rid of. What would it take to come to accept that annoying thorn in the flesh and be content with weakness? We’ll get there when like Paul we learn to trust that God’s power is made perfect in our weakness. That’s when we can say, “It’s when I am weak, then I am strong.”
Am I still good at handball? Not at all. But that’s okay. I’m learning something better. When I let God’s grace be sufficient in me that’s when my weakness can become my strength. And when I let God use me in my weakness to be for others, things like handball or whatever else it is important to you, really don’t matter as much.
