The Power of Vulnerability

To begin, watch https://youtu.be/iCvmsMzlF7o?si=jf9GW4DgYSWdS8AD Brene Brown's Ted Talk on the Power of Vulnerability

August 31st, 2025

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Last week you heard a message from Brene Brown on the power of vulnerability. There is a lot to unpack from that message that I believe aligns with the gospel and I’m happy to make it into a sermon series. Today we add another layer as we think about celebrating Labor Day and enjoy a much needed extra day of Sabbath rest.

Growing up I was never really taught the significance of Labor Day, I was just always glad to have a random Monday off school. However, as I grew into my faith and leaned into the command to keep Sabbath, I began to have a new appreciation for this holiday. We live in a culture built on capitalism and the Protestant work ethic. Driven by competition, we’re always striving to be the best, to work the hardest, to make it to the top of the corporate ladder. This didn’t just start overnight, though.

During the Industrial Revolution, Americans couldn’t produce fast enough! Hours were long, conditions were deadly, and many more children worked than got an education. Laborers gave their lives to making America what it is, yet they reaped none of the benefits of the few who owned the industry. Riots and strikes broke out in the final decades of the 1800s. From that time on unions would form, working conditions improved, and laws began being signed that prohibited discrimination, gave us 8 hour days and 40 hour weeks, and set a minimum wage. While this was a start, the work has never been over; we still have a long way to go.

In our economy based on the notion of unlimited growth, the year of jubilee we hear about in the book of Leviticus sounds ludicrous! Rest every 7^th year and every 50 years rejoice in a complete reset!? Are you crazy?! This is unfathomable in our society. Such a practice of jubilee and sabbath rest for owners, workers, livestock, and the earth would require a great deal of vulnerability. Instead of trusting in the belief that if we work hard enough we can gain control of our lives and ensure we will have our needs met, God is asking that we admit we have no control, that we cannot own the land, and that we must put our trust in the belief that God will provide for all our needs – that there is enough for all. Furthermore we must be willing to also admit that WE are all immigrants, that we are ALL guests on God’s green Earth.

OOF! That’s not an easy pill to swallow. That goes against everything we have been taught, everything we’ve been forced to participate in. Brene Brown says that vulnerability is the opposite of control and predictability. Vulnerability requires surrender and uncertainty. We have been taught that we are in control of our lives and who we become – or at least my generation was taught that if we worked hard enough we could be anything we wanted to be, even the president of the United States. This provides the illusion of control that we crave. This provides a certain numbing of the reality that we are vulnerable to many factors outside of our control in this life! This sets us up for the constant striving for worthiness, for love and belonging. But because this worthiness is built on an illusion from the get go, we become people riddled with shame, guilt, and disconnection. We find ways to numb our vulnerability with addiction, making all uncertainties certain (religion & black/white thinking), perfectionism, or pretending to be who we are not.

I think we can all agree that this is not what God ever wanted for us. God sees the way our human nature drives us away from vulnerability, from mystery, from trusting in God alone, from connection with God, self, one another, and the Earth. So God constantly tries to restructure. To the Hebrew people, God uses Moses to command Sabbath rest and years of Jubilee. God knows our need to reconnect to what matters. God knows our need to remember that we do not have the right to own anything or anyone, rather we owe one another our lives. God says, ‘rest. Trust me. Stop striving. Redistribute resources so that all may have life’s essentials. Life is more than endless toil and control over others.’

We also hear Jesus this morning, at his Sabbath dinner, say that “all who lift themselves up will be brought low and all who make themselves low will be lifted up.” Which sounds an awful lot like when Isaiah says that God will lift up every valley and bring low every mountain. God is the great equalizer, leveling the playing field with the intent to restructure our manmade hierarchies with God ordained common ground.

Jesus witnessed at the Sabbath dinner the ways in which everyone sought out the best seats at the table. He pointed out that each guest was seeking worthiness. Everyone wants to feel as though they are worthy, they are loved, they belong. However, Jesus reminds them that their worth does not come from their seat at the table. If they were to live grounded in the truth that they were born with inherent worth, unconditionally loved by their Creator, belonging to God first and foremost – they wouldn’t need to seek the best seat at the table. They wouldn’t need to invite guests who are rich and can return the favor. They would instead open their doors to all, leveling the societal playing field, feeding those who can give nothing in return but their presence. Which God knows is more than enough, for the wealth we share when we show up as our authentic selves is worth far more than gold.

When the world says rise and grind, earn your place in society, I pray the voice of God is louder, reminding you that there is nothing you can do to EARN your place in God’s kin-dom. You were born already belonging to it, already contributing to it by just being yourself. Regardless of what your resume, your paycheck, or your timesheet looks like – you are worthy of love, respect, and community. As we give thanks this weekend for those who came before us, who bit by bit restored respect and dignity to humanity and the environment, may we pray for the work to continue until God’s dream is realized – until the world rings out in jubilee that rest is sacred, that life is sacred, that our trust is in God alone and our duty is to one another, not to the GDP. Amen.