Sufficient Grace
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“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. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Corinthians 12:9, 10).
Sometimes I don’t feel like I have enough; enough patience, enough energy, enough wisdom, enough time.
When God says His grace is sufficient for us, He means there is as much as is needed; it is enough. What wonderful rest, to realize that I don’t need to worry because God’s grace is sufficient.
Yet these verses go much further. Paul says he actually is glad for his weaknesses. He delights in weakness; he is happy when people insult him. He experiences joy in hardships, persecutions and difficulties.
How can this be true?
Paul had learned that the only way to experience God’s power is in our weakness.
If we think we can do something on our own, God lets us, but we will never know God’s transforming power in our lives until we acknowledge our inability.
When I cry out to God saying I can’t take one more step and ask Him to care for my sick parent, then I see His power at work. I can even be glad that I was weak because it made me cry out for His strength.
When my financial situation goes from tight to impossible, when there are no more pennies for me to pinch, I implore God to intervene, and His grace provides. I’m then delighted in the hardship, because through it I learn the sufficiency of God’s grace.
Holy God, I’m glad that Your grace is sufficient, but I still don’t want to be weak. Make me willing to delight in difficulties because through them You show Your power.
Questions: How has a weakness of yours shown God’s power in your life? How can you delight in weakness and difficulty?
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I used to feel weak but now I know I am weak. Usually when I feel strong there is trouble on the way and I fall. He is strong and He will carry me through.
He is so wonderful and I need His grace which is sufficient which means to me that I am empty and He is full. Thank you for your comments ladies, I find them very encouraging.
I don’t like to feel weak but the truth is, the Lord is always there whether I am strong or weak. This is a good reminder of how important I should rely on Him always.
That is so often the case Lynn, that we only see it after the fact that God’s grace has truly been sufficient! It’s like Corrie ten Boon said many years ago, that I only see the underside but God sees the overside as she held a beautiful tapestry that was only threads on the underside but on the overside it was a crown full of jewels. What a great reminder of that!
In the middle of the hardship or whatever I am going through it is hard to see or feel God’s grace, but as I look back I see the hand of God and His grace in the center of the situation. In my weakness God has shown me that He is control of all situations and His grace IS sufficient for me and you:)
This is a wonderful devotional. I was always afraid to show weakness, thinking it diminished me and made me less of a person, less of a woman. Now, in knowing that this is how Jesus shows His power in my life, it is such a relief! I do not have to walk around wearing a “mask of perfection,” trying to cover all of my mistakes and fearing I will be discovered as a fraud. I can be real and just be me, and that has removed so much stress from my life.
One area in which knowing that Christ is my sufficiency has helped me tremendously is that of uncontrolled anger. The pressure of thinking that I could not make a mistake, something I had falsely believed since I was a child, led me to carry so much shame. Learning that I did not have to be perfect, that I could lay my burdens down and let Him be my Sufficiency and my Strength was like having new breath breathed into me. In Truth, it was – the Breath of the Holy Spirit giving me New Life in Jesus, and I began to live Christ’s abundant life free from anger and shame of who I am for the first time! Praise be to God, and thank you so much for this post, Suzanne!