The source of triumphant living is not the adamantine will that refuses to bend or budge, but is the will that yields itself to higher power. Only when one finds that a feeling of weakness is creeping over him, and realizes that, in his own strength alone, he is inadequate for the task, does he possess true conquering power. One of the best hours of a man’s life is when, through sickness, toil, or persecution, he feels his physical powers giving way, and his soul rises to claim the occasion for God and his humanity. Knowing that while he himself is weak, the needed power is within easy reach, a man is strong. In such a crisis, to become self-confident is to be like the hunted partridge which, seeking escape, confidently enters the trap set for his destruction. Strength comes when, overwhelmed with a sense of unutterable weakness, one flings himself at the feet of Christ, and prays as did the sinking disciple, “Lord, save me.” How very true this is in the hours of our severe temptation! No man ever sought refuge from temptation in self-confidence who, in the strain of battle, did not find his fortress crumbling into dust, while he himself suffered humiliating defeat. Simon Peter learned this truth. Strong and boastful in his self-assertiveness, he stood amid the gathering shadows of the world’s darkest and most tragic night, and smiled as one who gladly greets the dawning of his wedding day. He was confident, beyond question, that he was equal to any emergency that might arise. It was easy for him to boast and proclaim loudly what he would do. Beholding the same fast-deepening shadows, Christ fell to his knees in prayer, and with broken voice and heavy, blood-stained sweat, pleaded for his Father to remove this cup of suffering. Christ, the everlasting Conqueror, prays for escape from trial, while Peter, filled with self-assurance, bids the coming of the worst with defiant spirit, saying, “Though all men should forsake the Master, yet will not I.” He boasted bravely that he was ready to die for Christ. There was a marked contrast between the ways these two met the same struggle, but the whole world knows the outcome. In the presence of trial Peter’s strength was scattered like heaps of withered autumn leaves. When he was strong then was he weak. Without the passing of the cup Christ walked forth strong enough to win a world from sin, while Peter sank in shame. But when, a few hours later, we find the defeated disciple, all alone, in midnight darkness, weeping like a little child over his weakness, we rejoice, for we know now that Pentecost has found its preacher, and the world has found a mighty champion for God.