Daily Devotions

2 Corinthians 12:10 — A Radical Strength in Weakness

In 2 Corinthians 12:10, Paul writes with piercing honesty and clarity:

“For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”
— 2 Corinthians 12:10 (ESV)

The Greek word translated as content can also mean to take delight in, to be well pleased with, or even to resolve toward. This isn’t passive resignation—it’s a purposeful act of trust, a spiritual posture shaped by surrender.

Paul is showing us that his deepest well-being doesn’t come from ease or success, but from union with Christ. His strength is not self-generated; it flows from complete dependence on God. This kind of contentment turns the values of the world upside down.

Paul’s words didn’t just echo in his own time—they’ve resonated through the centuries. In 1527, the Reformer Martin Luther endured a year marked by deep suffering. On April 22, while preaching in Wittenberg, he collapsed. For months afterward, he battled severe illness and debilitating depression. In a letter to his friend Philip Melanchthon, he confessed:

"I spent more than a week in death and hell. My entire body was in pain, and I still tremble... Completely abandoned by Christ, I laboured under the vacillations and storms of desperation and blasphemy against God. But through the prayers of the saints, God began to have mercy on me and pulled my soul from the inferno below."

Just as he began to recover, the plague struck Wittenberg. Despite his wife's pregnancy, Luther opened their home as a makeshift hospital. He watched friends die. His own young son nearly did. And yet, in the midst of all this darkness, he wrote his most enduring hymn: A Mighty Fortress Is Our God.

Two stanzas powerfully echo Paul’s message:

A mighty fortress is our God,
a bulwark never failing;
our helper he, amid the flood
of mortal ills prevailing...

Did we in our own strength confide,
our striving would be losing,
were not the right Man on our side,
the Man of God's own choosing.
You ask who that may be?
Christ Jesus, it is he...

Like Paul, Luther learned a hard and holy truth: when we are weak, we are strong—because Christ is our strength. True contentment isn’t about escaping trials but encountering Jesus within them.

Prayer
Lord Jesus, when we are weak, be our strength. Teach us to find our contentment not in comfort, but in Your presence. Help us to delight in You—even in hardship, insult, and uncertainty—trusting that You are working all things together for good. May our lives, like Paul’s and Luther’s, reflect the power of Your grace in our weakness. Amen.