Welcome to today's encouragement from Our Daily Bread.

I'm Lisa Morgan, and I titled our reading, Gathering Strength in God.

Granger McCoy is an artist who studies and sculpts birds capturing their grace and vulnerability and power.

One of his pieces is titled Recovery. It shows the single right wing of a pentailed duck

stretched high in a vertical position. Below, a plaque describes the bird's recovery stroke

as the moment of the bird's greatest

weakness in flight, yet also the moment when it gathers strength for the journey ahead.

Granger includes this verse from 2 Corinthians chapter 12, My grace is sufficient for you,

for my power is made perfect in weakness.

The Apostle Paul wrote these words to the church at Corinth, and during a season when he was

overwhelmed with personal struggle, Paul begged God to remove what he described as a thorn in my flesh.

His affliction might have been a physical ailment or spiritual opposition. Like Jesus in the

garden the night before his crucifixion, Paul repeatedly asked God to remove his suffering. The Holy Spirit

responded by assuring him that he'd provide the strength needed. Paul learned, when I am weak, then I'm strong. Oh, the thorns we experience

in this life, like a bird gathering its strength for the journey ahead, we can gather up God's

strength for what we're facing. In his strength, we find our own.

Today's Our Daily Bread Devotional Scripture reading is from 2 Corinthians chapter 12, verses 2 through 10.

I know a man in Christ who 14 years ago was caught up to the third heaven. Whether it was in the body or out of the

body, I do not know. God knows. And I know that this man, whether in the body or apart from the body,

I do not know. But God knows. Was caught up to paradise and heard inexpressible things, things that no one is permitted to tell.

I will boast about a man like that, but I will not boast about myself, except about my weaknesses.

Even if I should choose to boast, I would not be a fool because I would be speaking the truth.

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