In order to really get a good grasp of the context in which Paul is speaking it’s good to visit 2 Corinthians 12:7-10.  In that passage he describes a thorn in his flesh.  You understand a thorn in the flesh because you’ve probably had to extricate a thorn or a splinter from your own flesh or from someone else’s.  Sometimes it isn’t bad, but other times that little thorn is debilitating.  A couple of years ago I was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis.  It’s a thorn.  I keeps me from doing the things that I want to do.  It makes even the things that I can do much more difficult.  It’s not fun.  It doesn’t go away.  Paul had a thorn too, he asked for it to be removed 3 times and God said “no”.

With that in mind, we can now better appreciate this popular verse.

Paul had been starving, and had to rely on God’s merciful deliverance.  He had been rich and had to rely on God’s loving guidance to keep him from being full of himself.  Isaiah 40 says, “He [God] gives power to the weary, …. those who wait for the Lord will gain new strength.”

One of the certainties of life (if you live long enough) is that we all will be faced with tough circumstances, physical, mental, emotional, and/or spiritual.  We will be in need.

We are having to live life on this earth with the world and a spiritual adversary that wants to wreck us.  But God’s grace is sufficient. In other words, because of God’s presence and work in our lives we can not only endure, but live, flourish, and be content.

You see, Paul is saying it doesn’t matter what the circumstances are.  We could be swaying on the last dried up old twig in the wetland, but  when we are confident in our power source,  we are completely content to cling to Him.