The apostle Paul spoke of his thorn and why God gave it to him in the following verses: 2 Corinthians 12:7 So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. 8Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. 9But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.”
The following are highlights of J. R. Miller’s 5 minute devotional:
- Paul’s thorn was given him to keep him humble and to save him from spiritual peril
- We don’t know how many of Paul’s blessings can be attributed to this thorn
- He was hindered by it; detained in the valley of humility by it; it made him constantly aware of his own weakness and insufficiency, keeping him close to Christ who dwells with the humble
- Few people don’t have some type of thorn in the flesh, for example: an infirmity of speech, sight, hearing, lameness, illness, excessive anxiety, a health condition that hinders interactions, a disfiguring bodily deformity, a cold and unloving home, a moral failure…
- In one sense, our thorn is a messenger of Satan; he desires it to harm us, to break our communion with Christ
- In another sense, Christ would have our thorn keep us humble, save us from becoming vain, soften our hearts, and make us gentle…
- He would have the difficult aspects in our environment discipline us into heavenly mindedness, give us greater self-control, keep our hearts loving and sweet amid the harshness and unlovingness of the world
- He would have our pain teach us endurance and patience; and our sorrow and loss teach us faith
- Thus, our thorn may be a choice blessing to us or do us irreparable harm
- If we allow it to fret us, if we resist and complain; if we lose faith and heart, then it will spoil our life
- But if we accept it in faith; if we believe that God has sent us a blessing via our acceptance of this thorn; if we endure patiently and submissively, without murmuring; and if we seek the grace we need to keep our heart gentle and true amid all the trial, temptation and suffering it causes, it will work good for us
Study Recommendations:
***Read Hebrews 12
***See posts in the category of Spiritual Disciplines, posts on Puritan Jeremiah Burroughs’ book, The Rare Jewel of Christian Contentment, part 1 – a quicker way to get to that post would be Archives 28 December 2020. But that category has posts that relate to Miller’s above discussion, but they give more specifics. Burroughs’ book goes into great depth regarding trials and the various ways one fails to receive them rightly, for example. Post 1 on Burroughs has links to various kindle and Audible.