My Grace is Sufficient for You

But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong. ~ 2 Corinthians 12:9-10

From the start of the trip God was going to keep reminding me that it is only in His strength that we would be able to do anything for His kingdom.  To start off with, we were a small team of 6.  I usually travel with 14-16 people...that number is "perfect" because there's always someone to cover each of the responsibilities, and if when someone gets sick there's always a backup.  But this year we only had 6.  How in the world were we going to manage when someone got sick?  I wondered in the days leading up to the trip. No, we just can't get sick.  Everyone needs to pray for good health.  So I did, daily.
God answered my prayer, but not in the way I expected.  He said, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Tuesday night I had a severe asthma attack while playing soccer.  Shortly after that Libby got sick.  Then on Saturday I woke up with severe abdominal pains...kidney stone, the doctor said.  That kidney stone put me out of commission for three days (but God was in control, two of those days were the weekend, and on Monday I suffered through it).  Then Sarah got sick. 
Half of the team was sick, but God was still showing His power.  During that second week the six of us put on a club for nearly 60 kids in grades K-6 (which by the way is nearly 50 more kids than the church expected) and then played games and shared testimonies with nearly 20 teens.  Was it by our power that these things were accomplished?  Absolutely not!  It was only by God's grace that we were able to do anything.  It was by His grace that so many kids were brought into the club.  (On Monday as the team was setting up the Hall while I was in the hospital they named the first kid who would walk through the door Faith...it didn't matter if it was a boy or girl...and they were praying that Faith would bring all of his/her friends.  It turns out that there actually was a girl in the older group named Faith.) 
We were weak, but He was strong.  His grace is always sufficient.