Gideon: Strength Out of Weakness (2) - All The LORD is near Daily Devotionals for 2025

And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
2 Corinthians 12:9–10

Gideon: Strength Out of Weakness (2)
It is impossible to run the eye along the brilliant array of Christ’s workmen, and not see the truth of this need for brokenness: Moses, Joshua, David, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Daniel, in Old Testament times; and Peter, Paul, and John, in those of the New, all stand before us as vivid illustrations of the value of broken material. All those beloved and honored servants had to be broken in order to be made whole, to be emptied in order to be filled, to learn that, of themselves, they could do nothing in order to be ready, in Christ’s strength, for anything and everything.

Such is the law of the household, the law of the vineyard, the law of the kingdom. So Gideon found it in his day. His “alas!” was followed by Jehovah’s “Peace; fear not,” and then he was ready to begin. He had been brought face to face with the angel of God, and there he learned not only that his family was poor in Manasseh, and he the least in his father’s house, but that in himself he was perfectly powerless, and that all his springs must be found in the living God. This is a priceless lesson for the son of Joash, and for us all! A lesson not to be learned in the schools and colleges of this world, but only in the deep and holy retirement of the sanctuary of God.

C. H. Mackintosh

“We go” in faith, our own great weakness feeling,
And needing more each day Thy grace to know:

Yet from our hearts a song of triumph pealing;

“We rest on Thee, and in Thy name we go.”

E. G. Cherry