I always enjoy talking with my old college friend Tom and getting caught up on what the Lord has been teaching us since we last met.

One day Tom began with a sheepish grin, "You know, I can't believe how many years it has taken me to learn my latest lesson—and I'm a Bible teacher!" He went on to list some of the trials and testings he and his family had been facing and how unworthy he felt teaching an adult Sunday school class. "Week after week I felt I was a total failure," he confided, "and kept wondering if this might be my last Sunday before announcing my resignation."

Then one Sunday a young woman stayed after class to speak to Tom. She was a friend of his family, so she knew what they had been going through. "Tom," she said, "I hope you won't take this the wrong way, but you're a much better teacher when you're going through tough times."

Tom smiled as he told me, "Only then did I feel that I grasped the Lord's response to Paul's thorn in the flesh: 'My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness'" (2 Corinthians 12:9).

When we recognize how much we need God, He will strengthen us. That's the advantage of weakness.  — Joanie Yoder