Symbolism in Weakness
WARNING: This post discusses Nine Lies Book 1: Weakness and includes some spoilers. If you haven’t read the book yet, please consider doing so before continuing.
The Nine Lies Series is the saga of Felix Black, a man who was kidnapped as a child and forced into a life he never wanted. He longs desperately to be free and struggles intensely to overcome what seem like insurmountable odds stacked against him.
I think there are a lot of important messages in Felix’s story, and I think that Felix is relatable even if his situation might be rare because we all feel trapped sometimes and yearn to find our freedom.
But there’s one aspect of Weakness, the first book in the series, that I’d like to talk about because I think it might not be as obvious as the others, but I think it’s one of the most important.
CO9 is a symbol of religion.
If you’ve read Weakness, you know that Felix hates CO9. Avery, Felix’s mentor in CO9, killed Felix’s parents when Felix was just eight years old, then kidnapped him and raised him as a criminal. CO9’s whole philosophy revolves around proving that you deserve to live. The mantra they repeat like clockwork is, “If you’re too weak to live, then you deserve to die.” Another saying that they live by is “The weak deserve to be punished.” If you die, it’s your own fault, because you didn’t deserve to live if you were weak enough that anything could kill you.
One of their main objectives is achieving a sort of twisted immortality. They try to earn life through proving that they are stronger and better than death. They live brutal and austere lives filled with self-inflicted suffering and deprivation because “luxuries are for the weak” and if you’re not spending every moment of every day fighting for the right to live you’ve already proven that you don’t deserve to live.
This is exactly what religion does.
If you’re blinking in consternation at me, here are some parallels.
Religion tries to earn eternal life.
Eternal life is something that no one can ever earn because it is impossible to earn, and something no one needs to earn because Jesus offers it to us freely.
Religion is works-based.
It’s not about how good God is. It’s about how good you are. How worthy you have made yourself through your own efforts. God hates religion because it constantly tries to negate the sacrifice of Jesus, which is the only way to true life and salvation.
In religion, nothing is ever good enough.
I’ve gone to legalistic, works-based churches in the past. You feel like you’re barely surviving trying to keep up with all the weighty requirements thrust on you, and when you finally manage to do everything as perfectly as they expect you to, the reward is not “good job” or “finally now you can rest,” but “So what? Now you graduate to bearing even more soul-crushing burdens.”
Religion is about judgment.
Some churches are really just thinly-veiled dictatorships. People constantly look down on you, expect the worst of you, and enjoy pointing out the sin in your life (which is understandable, because if they can find a way that you’re a bigger sinner than they are, then they can finally feel some slight relief about the fact that they themselves aren’t perfect, either). Family members are turned against each other and close friendship is impossible because loyalty is not allowed. Everyone is watching for your weaknesses instead of building up your strengths. You’re forced to be together all the time because church attendance is obligatory in religious churches, but no one likes one another because no one can be trusted. Everyone is ultimately speaking with the voice of the accuser - and that is not God’s voice. Satan is referred to as the accuser of believers, but God wants us to live in love. He solves the problem of sin with love and mercy, not with judgment. The more time we spend in God’s presence, the more we become like Him. The more we become like Him, the more we love and the less we judge.
The Apostle John says in 1 John 3:14:
If we love our brothers and sisters who are believers, it proves that we have passed from death to life. But a person who has no love is still dead.
Let me say that last part again.
A Person Who Has No Love Is Still Dead
The Apostle Paul put it very well in the introduction to his famous chapter about love:
If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. If I had the gift of prophecy, and if I understood all of God’s secret plans and possessed all knowledge, and if I had such faith that I could move mountains, but didn’t love others, I would be nothing. If I gave everything I have to the poor and even sacrificed my body, I could boast about it; but if I didn’t love others, I would have gained nothing.
Don’t fall for the trap of religion. Fall in love with God instead. After all, God made you lovingly because He made you to be loved.
Religion fills your head with lies about your true identity and who you really are.
Just like Felix was raised to believe he was weak and worthless, religion insists that shame is righteous, strips us of our inherent value, and declares we have no purpose and no destiny other than the one we make for ourselves. It’s sneaky, though, because it acts like God approves of how it’s robbed you of your life and hope. I won’t mince words here - God does not approve. He HATES that stuff. God made you with inherent worth and He has wonderful, mind-blowing, excellent plans for you. He wants you to succeed and He is on your side. He does not want you to hate your life. Jesus came to give you life and life abundantly.
Religion is the enemy of God.
If you doubt me here, ask yourself: Who advocated the most aggressively for the death of Jesus Christ, the Son of God? If you read the Bible and found out it was the religious, you’d be right.
But Jesus isn’t the only one who suffered because of the influence of religion. In John 11:53-54 it says,
…the Jewish leaders began to plot Jesus’ death. As a result, Jesus stopped his public ministry among the people and left Jerusalem.
Up until that point, Jesus had been performing tons of miracles. People who had been desperate for a cure for their whole lives were finally getting healed. But when religion reared its ugly head, not only did it attack Jesus, it also resulted in His public ministry to the people being shut down. What a shame for the people whose entire lives would be transformed by just one healing touch of Jesus!
Religion will do everything it can to shut down the move of God.
God wants to set you free. Religion wants to make you a slave. God wants to give you life. Religion wants to kill your soul.
Religion disparages and strives to annihilate anything that disagrees with it.
CO9 says happy people are weak. Religion says joyful people must be sinning. It’s true that there is more to life than chasing pleasure and we don’t honor God or ourselves when all we do is live as slaves to our own whims (I think I’ll write a whole post on that later, since it’s such a tricky issue). But God didn’t make us to be miserable. He didn’t create us so we could be sorry, worthless doormats. He created us for glory and we are meant to be like Him. He can’t wait to see us realize just how much He loves us so we’ll stop fretting over our own worth and finally start relishing His love for us!
It’s Time to Break Away
Just like Felix knew deep down that the lies of CO9 were killing him, some of you have been suffering for far too long under oppression masquerading as the truth, but not without your reservations.
I want you to know that God didn’t make you to be a slave. He didn’t make you for the purpose of suffering and striving to prove your worthiness.
Galatians 5:1 says:
It is for freedom that Christ has set us free. Stand firm, then, and do not let yourselves be burdened again by a yoke of slavery.
I want to say that line again.
It is for FREEDOM that Christ has set us free!
The Bible says that when God releases His Word, it does not return to Him without accomplishing the purpose He sent it to accomplish. You can rest assured that God intended for you to be here now, reading this, because He wants you to be free and His Word is powerful enough to do it! After all, the True and Living Word of God is none other than our Savior, Jesus Christ, and He will not fail to keep you in His precious love.
And I am certain that God, who began the good work within you, will continue his work until it is finally finished on the day when Christ Jesus returns. (Philippians 1:6 (NLT))
Stay strong.