How familiar are you with the Apostle Paul’s “thorn in his flesh?
Something disturbed his life and for some reason, God did not remove it. The original word reflects more of a “tent stake”, rather than a small aggravating minor irritation of a thorn.
No one knows what the problem was, yet it was large enough for Paul to ask God to remove it more than once.
Paul said “In order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me.” (2 Corinthians 12:7 NIV) This was right after him speaking of seeing heaven that he called the “third heaven.”
The first heaven is the blue sky. The second heaven is the starry universe. And the third heaven is where God resides. No one knows how Paul saw this, yet he could have felt “so chosen”, unique and maybe too proud, it seems the thorn is tied to his third heaven experience when he said:
“So that I would not become too proud of the wonderful things that were shown to me, a painful thorn was given to me … “ (2 Corinthians 12:7 NCV)
This is similar to other Satanic afflictions that God allowed in Job, and other strong Christian Leaders. So why does God allow bad things to happen to what seems to be good and in many cases - Godly people?
Paul said “I begged the Lord three times to take this problem away from me. But he said to me, “My grace is enough for you. When you are weak, my power is made perfect in you.” (2 Corinthians 12:9 NCV) Somehow, in some mysterious way, God’s perfection manifests itself in our weakness.
It’s like my leukemia, I must ask God for help. He controls my the length of my life, my healing or maintenance of the disease and He controls if other cancers may surface in my life. Some things we simply cannot control.
So what did Paul say about his thorn in the flesh? He said:
“So I am very happy to brag about my weaknesses. Then Christ’s power can live in me.” (2 Corinthians 12:9 NCV)
The point is sometimes God gives us stronger shoulders to carry the burden instead of taking it away.
Can you and I still trust God in our burden(s)? Does our burden draw us closer to him? Does it cause us to share our closer relationship with God to others? God has a plan - trust me, he always does.
At the end of the day, I feel God sees our life and death far different than we see it. God knows it’s literally a blip - a light that blinks only once on His eternal radar screen. His timeline and goals are different than ours.
“The Lord says, “My thoughts are not like your thoughts. Your ways are not like my ways.” (Isaiah 55:8 NCV) One way or another, we will always learn this important lesson and God’s ways.
God’s way is best for us. It completes us. It heals us. It provides fullness and it always draws us close to him, Christ and The Holy Spirit - or it should. It’s crazy, but afflictions can be joyful.
GOD, in a crazy way, thank you for my leukemia. I bet if anyone with a terminal disease may say the same. The truth is, we grow closer to you as we suffer and experience pain. In a crazy way, the pain is good for us. As the Apostle James said “My brothers and sisters, when you have many kinds of troubles, you should be full of joy, because you know that these troubles test your faith, and this will give you patience. Let your patience show itself perfectly in what you do. Then you will be perfect and complete and will have everything you need.” (James 1:2-4 NCV) There is only one way to know these truths Lord - and that’s to experience it. So thank you for the experience. IJNIP amen ♥️
Comments