When I am Weak, then am I Strong
by C. H. Spurgeon

When I am weak, then am I strong (2 Corinthians 12:10).

A preacher who was mighty in the pulpit was C. H. Spurgeon. "We are not strong when we compliment ourselves upon our ability; and we are strong when, under a sense of absolute inability, we depend wholly upon God." Every God-called man has experienced that strength in our weakness. "Creature strength brings forth nothing which has life in it: only the seed which the Creator puts into the hand of our weakness will produce a harvest. It is well to be nothing: it is better still to be 'less than nothing,'" he said.

"Lord help me!"--you shall bear up triumphantly, and come out of the furnace refined, to the praise and the glory of your God. . . .

When we are growing weak, when we become weaker and weaker, when we seem to faint into a deeper swoon than ever as to our own strength, till death is written upon every power that we once thought we had, and we feel that we can do absolutely nothing apart from the Holy Spirit, then we are strong indeed.

. . . . Let me persuade you to make a full confession of weakness to the Lord. Say, "Lord, I cannot do what I ought to do: I cannot do what I want to do: I cannot do what I used to do: I cannot do what other people do: I cannot do what I feel impelled to do; and over this sinful weakness I mourn." Then add, "Lord, I long to serve Thee perfectly, yet I cannot do it. Unless Thou help me I can do nothing aright. There will be no good in my actions, my words, my feelings, or my desires, unless Thou continue to fill me with Thine own holy energy. Lord, help me! Lord, help me! brother, you are strong while you plead in that fashion. You can do all things through Christ who strengthens you; and He will strengthen you, now that you are emptied of self. How true it is, "When I am weak, then am I strong!"

. . . . If I am called to preach I will preach, and nobody shall stop me; for the Lord will be with my mouth. But, you see, until the man is conscious of his own weakness, he will run without being sent; and there is nobody so weak at that man. No one so weak as the man who has no commission from God, and no promise of help from Him. . . Could we once see him consciously weak we should hear him say, "Here am I, send me!" in answer to the question, "Whom shall I send?" Then he would not go a warfare at his own charges, but he would draw upon the all-sufficiency of God, and find himself equal to every emergency.

. . . . When a man is weak, then is he strong, because he is sure to pray, and prayer is power. The man who laments his weakness is sure to cry to the strong for strength. The more his weakness presses on him, the more will he pray. While he can do without his God he will do without his God; but when his own weakness becomes utter and entire, and he is ready to perish, then he turns unto his Lord, and is made strong. The utterly weak cry out unto God as nobody else does. He is too weak to play at praying; he groans, he sighs, he weeps.

God helps us most when we most need His help (Sermons Preached in 1888, Vol. XIX,, pp. 381-89).

For indeed He was crucified because of weakness, yet He lives because of the power of God. For we also are weak in Him, yet we will live with Him because of the power of God directed toward you (2 Corinthians 13:4).