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Another Christian Cliche: God’s Strongest Soldier

May 20, 2018 By Tara Johnson 3 Comments

I’ve seen the photos and memes of one particular phrase floating around the past several years and I bet you have too. It’s this: God gives the hardest battles to his strongest soldiers. Judging by how frequently it’s shared, it’s a rather popular sentiment. 

After all, it sounds good. Perhaps even a trifle comforting. There’s nothing we need more in the middle of our personal storms to know that our crisis won’t destroy us. That we’re strong enough to handle it and emerge victorious.

I understand the warm fuzzies that come from this well-intentioned phrase but honestly, I believe the idea that God gives his toughest battles to His strongest soldiers is wrong.

Here’s the thing: thinking we’re strong enough to handle a hard battle might be the very reason we’re having a battle in the first place. Let me explain.

Being one of the ‘strongest soldiers’ implies that we have strength of our own to fight and emerge victorious. It’s saying that we can handle a tougher challenge, more so than the ‘weaker’ soldiers out there. Isn’t this a form of pride? Not that we’re going through a tough time, but because we believe we are strong enough to handle it on our own?

The blunt truth is, we’re not strong enough to handle our storms. Speaking for myself, I have trouble getting through the day-to-day stuff, much less the big stuff that life throws us: the cancer diagnosis, the job change, marital stress, wayward children, financial difficulties, cranky people, etc. We all go through tough, messy stuff and a sure way to make a messy situation even worse is to think we can handle it on our merits and abilities.

God doesn’t give us those battles because He thinks we’ve got it together. If we did, we wouldn’t have needed a Savior. Sometimes, we go through some tough stuff because we need to work on our weak areas, our sin-filled cracks that we’ve so desperately tried to cover up. He has to strengthen us, toughen us up to prepare us for something greater on down the road. 

Think of it like a trainer trying to prepare an boxer for a fight. Say the trainer lets the athlete sleep in late, eat donuts and potato chips nonstop, and allows him to spend most of his day watching TV. What happens when the athlete must step into the boxing ring and strap those gloves around his sugar-coated fingers? Yeah, he’ll get creamed.

A good trainer pushes the athlete to grow stronger, faster. For each milestone, the trainer sets another and another. He adds more weights, more resistance until the athlete is in prime fighting shape. It involves a lot of sweat, a lot of determination and a lot of pain. Far from the donut-eating, television watching scenario we often prefer.

It’s the old karate kid wax-on, wax-off mentality. We may not always understand why we are going through something that doesn’t make sense, but if we want to survive in the ring, we have to trust our Trainer.

If we let Him, God can use those battles to chip away the hard places in us until we resemble His Son.

We don’t move in our own strength. We move in His. And ultimately, God’s children don’t need to fight for victory. Jesus already bought that when He rose and conquered death. We fight from a position of victory. Switching your perspective changes the battle. 

Yield to the Trainer. Keep fighting. Keep growing. Keep on keeping on. Your Trainer knows what He’s doing.

Have you ever gone through a hard time that you didn’t understand only to see God use it in a big way? I would love to hear your thoughts!

Filed Under: Walking with God Tagged With: athlete in training, christian cliches, God, God gives His strongest battles to toughest soldiers, handling our storms, Jesus, pain, pain helps us grow, Trainer

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. AvatarLinda MacIntyre says

    May 20, 2018 at 11:54 pm

    Maybe that cliche’ referres more to Job than most people?
    I think of my self as a wounded warrior …one who has gone through hardships and struggles and made it through the dark time to the other side with Jesus help. Wonder, but wiser and more able to show the same compassion and love for others going through the same thing we went through. The love and compassion Christ showed us. ♡

    Reply
  2. AvatarJ says

    December 19, 2019 at 9:55 am

    Our strength is measured by our faith in Jesus. Not physical or mental strength. Did Jesus not say physical strength does not matter? I believe when people are saying this statement they are thinking these weak outcasts God chose had immense faith in Him. They were strong in faith, but weak in other ways. So really God does give His hardest battles to His strongest soldiers. The ones who have most faith in Him. 🙏 stay blessed, in Jesus name.

    Reply
  3. AvatarJ says

    December 19, 2019 at 9:57 am

    However I do agree with you that we have no strength of our own, our efforts have no weight. Jesus is the vine and we are the branches, without Him, we can do noting.

    Reply

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Tara JohnsonTara Johnson is a writer, singer, speaker and passionate lover of stories. Tara uses fiction, nonfiction, song and laughter to share her testimony of how God led her into freedom after spending years living shackled to the expectations of others. She lives in central Arkansas with her husband and children.

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