<p>This study aimed to assess the resilience, empowerment, and benefit finding of colorectal cancer patients in China and to examine the mediating role of resilience in the relationship between empowerment and benefit finding. Three hundred and eleven colorectal cancer patients were recruited from January to July 2023. The questionnaire included a general information questionnaire, a resilience scale (CD-RISC-10), a Chinese cancer empowerment questionnaire (CEQ), and a patient benefit finding scale (BFS). Structural equation models were used to evaluate whether resilience was a mediator between empowerment and benefit finding. Our research found that colorectal cancer patients’ resilience score was 19.408 ± 9.011, their empowerment score was 117.453 ± 32.995, and their benefit finding score was 65.752 ± 18.756. Empowerment was positively correlated with resilience (<i>r</i> = 0.116, <i>p</i> &lt; 0.05), resilience was positively correlated with benefit finding (<i>r</i> = 0.187, <i>p</i> &lt; 0.01), and empowerment was positively correlated with benefit finding (<i>r</i> = 0.22, <i>p</i> &lt; 0.01). The fitness indices of the structural models were satisfactory. The indirect effect (a*b) of this pathway (empowerment &gt; resilience &gt; benefit finding) was 0.011 (95% CI 0.003 ~ 0.054). The total effect (c) of empowerment on benefit finding was 0.125 (0.063–0.187), and resilience plays a partial mediating role between empowerment and benefit finding, with the mediating effect (a*b/c) constituting 8.8%. Our research results show that most patients with colorectal cancer exhibit moderate levels of resilience. Resilience plays a partial mediating role in empowerment and benefit finding. Enhancing patients’ resilience is one way to increase benefit finding.</p>