Through Weakness

I am taking a few weeks to give you eleven passages of Scripture that I believe have had the greatest impact on my life. We have talked about number 11 and number 10 and that brings us to number 9, and I cannot count the times this one has kept me going. It is 2 Cor. 12:9:

    But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me.

Some of us seem to be more in touch with our strengths and others of us are more in touch with our weaknesses. Most of my life I have been in the latter category. Just naturally wired this way, I then developed a chronic disease that can make even the most buoyant and self-confident fellow feel amazingly weak. I honestly believe that had it not been for this passage I likely would have lived a life characterized by doubting, withdrawing, pulling back and giving up.

Again and again I have been confronted with various feelings of weakness—that gut level emotion that says, “I just don’t think you have what it takes.” But if there is a reason that I am not known as one who retreats from the battle, it has to be found in the promise and the spirit of this verse.

I claimed this promise when walking into college dorms to lead Bible studies; when traveling across the country to speak or to take on the task of putting together a book.  But I also have clung to it when seeking to lead my family and be the husband and dad I did not seem to have the strength to be. In my flesh I prefer for God to work through my strengths, don’t you? But one of the greatest miracles is that he works through weakness.