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Christians who follow God do not want to be strong and courageous to testify and serve God, but Christians who feel weak in body and mind can testify to God’s mercy and grace in “not breaking the wounded reed, and not blowing out the broken lamp.”

Corrie Ten Boom, a Dutch missionary, wrote that in a Nazi concentration camp in Germany, she heard the wails of her fellow prisoners who were sick and in fear of death. Although she herself was dying, she walked to them with a heart of love for the Lord and loved others, told them that the Lord Jesus was here, and invited them to open the door of their hearts to accept Him as their Savior.

Penkelly said she experienced that even though her flesh was weak, the Holy Spirit within her spoke through her words of comfort, encouragement, and building when she was willing to speak. And because she proclaimed God’s truth, she became strong even in her weakness.
Serving in weakness motivates one another

Recently, God brought two sisters to the church to confide in me, and I happened to be in a state of heartbroken and persecuted for righteousness, sick and weak in my body. I said to them angrily, “I don’t know what to say to you, but I know that the Lord Jesus can comfort us, so let’s worship the Lord and listen to the comfort He gives us, shall we?”

So we used the Moms In Prayer prayer leaflet to pray in four steps: pray to read the Bible to praise God’s character, ask the Holy Spirit to enlighten us to confess our sins and repent, thank God for prayers that are heard or believed, and intercede for one another with the promised verses of the Bible.

As a result, we are all anointed with the Holy Spirit to heal our weak hearts as if we had come to a spiritual feast prepared by God. One of the sisters prayed and finished her long-struggling master’s thesis and received an unexpected award from the school, while the other was more committed to prayer and renewal.

I am encouraged to reach out to the saints who are in pain or need, to support each other in our time of weakness, and to experience the Lord’s love and comfort. When we hear God’s precious promises proclaimed from one another’s mouths, God’s truth rains down from heaven to cleanse our sins, entangle our hearts, nourish our thirsty hearts, and give us the strength and hope to continue facing adversity and challenges.

Listening to the old lies, leading to fear of small letters

But sometimes our weakness can come from listening to the lies of our old self or Satan, and thus losing our first love, or from believing out of fear.

For example, last year I started online to participate in a Bible Study Fellowship in Japan Xi I can speak very little Japanese, but I am very happy to get to know Japanese sisters. Although I was not familiar with the Japanese Bible and did not know much about what the Japanese sisters were sharing online, I found that the Holy Spirit still illuminated me with Bible truths that enabled me to receive spiritual meanings beyond what my mind could comprehend.

However, some time ago, I didn’t participate three times because I was unwell, and I began to worry a lot about my poor Japanese, and I felt that it didn’t matter if I was in the group or not, and I seemed to have completely forgotten the joy I had at the beginning of the class. However, I knew that the group leader had been praying for my health, so I prayed to God after I recovered and that the Lord would restore my original joy and courage to participate.

Studying the Lamentations of Jeremiah on the day of the meeting, I sensed for the first time that the prophet Jeremiah seemed to treat God as a close friend so that he could pour out all the pain in his heart to the Lord. So now that I am moved and convinced that God is always listening to me, I will briefly share this feeling with you.

Before class, when the group leader prayed for the sisters, she thanked God for allowing me to participate in the group and encouraging them. I think God encouraged me to use what I saw as inadequate, and that He could manifest His wisdom and power through my tiny instrument if I had the heart to do it.
God wants to use tiny vessels to manifest power

When you are sad, why not open your mouth and cry out to the Lord as a close friend, trusting that the loving and gentle Lord is watching you and listening to your lovely voice?

The comfort of the Holy Spirit will flow out of your mouth and into the ears of your heart, and you will hear yourself begin to praise the victorious name of the Lord Jesus.

This is the name of your work of destroying the devil and saving you from darkness, and all knees shall bow down and worship, which has been given to you through your faith, so that all the accusations of the dark forces have been dissipated, and your heart will be at peace and security by the intercession of the Holy Spirit, and you may wait silently for Him to open the way for your battle.

Pray:
Father God, I praise You for being my strength, my refuge, and my help in times of trouble. Thank you for interceding for me through the Holy Spirit in my weakness and for strengthening me Yourself, so that I can experience “when I am weak, I am strengthened by the Lord” [cf. 2 Corinthians 12:10]. I thank You for the work in me that I have a desire in my heart, and You have given me the power to act and do the commandments and good works that are pleasing to You [cf. Philippians 2:13].

Give me your eyes, that I may see me as you see me, because the blood of Jesus has cleared my conscience, because of the truth of Jesus to align my heart and mind with you, and by the power of the Holy Spirit, I am all bright like you.

Give me the strength to focus on Your promises of light, so that I can turn away from darkness or failure. The powers of darkness cannot cover You, and because I confess that the Lord Jesus is Lord, You see my darkness as light and make my night shine like day [cf. Psalm 139:12]. In the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.