I want to talk today about one particular verse of Scripture.
- It’s one that has appeared on bumper stickers, printed on posters, appears in those glossy books of encouraging verses and has been stamped on thousands of fridge magnets.
It’s a verse that is, on the surface, very clear and understandable but hides a wealth of meaning that I hope, by God’s grace, to be able to unpack for you this morning.
It’s a verse that applies to old and young alike,
- to people who have only just started out on their Christians journey and those who are seasoned travellers with the Lord.
- Many people will already know it off by heart and if you don’t I strongly suggest you commit it to memory. That will give the Holy Spirit the chance of bringing it back to you at moments when you most need it – when you’re under stress or facing pain or loss or disappointment.
[1]If you’ve ever have the chance of buying a solitaire diamond ring (it only ever happened to me once, when I got engaged to Ros) one of the things the jeweller may wax lyrical about is the setting of the stone. I need to tell you that didn’t happen to us because Rosi’s stone is so minuscule you can barely see it! My only excuse is that I’d only recently stopped being a student at the time. Ah well.
The setting is important because that’s how the grandeur of the stone is exposed.
- You can’t appreciate the magnificence of a diamond unless it’s mounted properly. If you were to just pull it out of your pocket and roll it in your hand it might appear to be just a fragment of glass.
- But set in in an engagement ring and everything changes.
- It’s seen for what it will for ever be associated with one particular, highly significant moment in life when everything changes, an engagement!
That’s like this verse. It’s only when you see it in its setting and attach it to some particular moments in life that you see it for all it’s worth.
I am going to end up unpacking this passage backwards
What’s the verse? 2 Corinthians 12:9
“My grace is sufficient for you because my power is made perfect in weakness”
These words of Paul were written to Christians in Corinth who were getting confused by some ‘super-apostles’ who claimed they were better, more God-anointed leaders than Paul.
Let’s begin by asking a few obvious questions about it
Who actually said it?
The whole verse reads like this
“But he said to me ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness’”
So who is it talking at this point?, v8 tells us
“Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me, but he said ..”
So this is God’s voice we’re hearing and he’s telling Paul that his grace is all Paul needs.
E.g. Christopher’s allowance – “What you’ve got is enough, you don’t need any more” >>>
cf salary sufficient? >>>
But there’s more here – Paul is asking the Lord to take something away from him.
- Ever been there? Is there something or someone in your life you just wish would go away! You’ve prayed about it so often it’s becoming like a cracked record
An awkward situation, a work colleague who’s difficult, a family problem that’s causing you grief
There are times when (if we’re honest) we pray and pray and the Lord seems to have an agenda all of his own that doesn’t correspond with ours.
That’s where Paul was here too – you’re in good company!
So what was it that Paul wanted the Lord to take away from him?
V7 has the answer
“there was given to me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me”
That word ‘torment’ has the idea of a wave buffeting the shoreline. It’s something that is constantly hitting him. It’s repeated, it’s relentless, it’s painful and it doesn’t go away
E.g. Eastbourne breakwaters – eventually they wear away and break down.
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- <ppt> However, look at the pier (click to enlarge) – it’s still standing! Its cast iron legs have taken the battering of the waves for 143 years
- Only the strongest structures are able to withstand the onslaught of the waves.
- And Paul was a man of strength, and it wasn’t strength that came naturally to him or as a reflex, he had to consciously rely on the power of God day in and day out to have this strength of character.
So what was Paul’s thorn? There has always been great debate over this
I consulted 2 of my gurus
- One said problem with the eyes – retroverted eyelids
- another reckoned it was the church leaders at Corinth (to whom he was writing) –
for my money it was something psycho-spiritual – because of the way he uses the Greek phrase “in the flesh” which he often used opposite “in the spirit”
- so I’ll go for a personal spiritual problem –
- the memory of a past trauma (maybe he couldn’t get out of his mind that he consented to Stephen’s death) – he’s now daily tortured by the fact that he’s got blood on his hands
- rage, (we know Paul could fly right off the handle)
- lust – a niggling desire to fantasise about women (and how many men here have an almost daily fight with lust in our sex-saturated society.) (I won’t ask you to put your hand up – not tonight!)
But the Holy Spirit stopped Paul from telling what it was as he was writing
- and I’m glad He did
- because if Paul had said “it’s my permanently twisted ankle” – that would let me off the hook!
… but the very fact that it’s unspecified means that when we experience our thorns – our buffeting from Satan,
or my thing that I’ve 3 times asked God to take away (or 300 times!) – and he hasn’t (whatever that is) I realise that my thorn might just be the same a Paul’s
- and therefore God’s word to him the remedy for him might be the same as the remedy of me might just be the same as God’s word to me
- and that throws me back on the Lord
- it gets me hearing the Holy Spirit’s whisper “My Grace is sufficient for you, Ian White, because my strength is made perfect in weakness”
and saying “God you’ve got to make me strong in this – cos I ain’t got what it takes!”
how did Paul get this thorn?
Where did it come from?
- Was it that he had made a mistake in his ministry and this was God’s pay-back time?
- Was it God’s punishment for some sin he’d committed? And this was the Lord bringing him back into line?
- No (to both options)
Here’s a principle: Paul had not earned his thorn. He had not done something to deserve it.
- Our gracious, loving heavenly father had given it to him.
- In fact our gracious, loving heavenly father had given it to him as an act of grace
You’ll often hear me talk about God’s grace, his giving nature and I want to correct a potential misinterpretation here. It’s the false assumption that God always gives us nice stuff, pleasant stuff, comfortable stuff. Stuff that makes us feel happy and content and at ease.
It simply isn’t the case that you were saved from your spiritual darkness in order for God to make your life ‘nice’, or ‘comfortable’ and especially ‘middle class’!
- Sometimes God gives us (‘gives’ in the sense that he consciously allows into our lives) some things or people that frustrate, hurt and challenge us.
- Our gracious, loving heavenly father sometimes gives us thorns as an act of grace
And how do I know it’s an act of grace? – because that’s how the Lord himself describes it! “My grace is sufficient for you” “That which I’ve already given you is all you need”
Now this is a rather uncomfortable message for some of us.
- You mean to say that the person who winds me up in the office is a gift of God’s grace? Possibly yes!
- Are you telling me that the pain of loss that I’m feeling at this moment is a gift of God’s grace? Quite likely
So why should the Lord behave to me in this way? Is he being vindictive or brutal? No! Very often it’s because he loves me enough to want to stretch my faith and deepen my character so I will end up being more like Jesus Christ.
Did Jesus have thorns in his flesh – you bet.
- They were 6” nails at one point!
- Did Jesus feel the pain of loss – you bet! – and he wept abjectly because he’d lost his dear friend Lazarus.
- Did Jesus feel the pain of disappointment – definitely – he trusted Judas Iscariot (and other disciples in the Gospels) who let him down terribly.
Jesus knew pain all right –
- Isaiah prophesied that he’d be “He was a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief” – he knew what grieving was like.
Why did the Lord send this thorn?
Answer is in v7
“To keep me from becoming conceited”
It was a preventative measure!
How many times have you been to a meeting where someone has given their testimony, or told a story about God’s work in their lives, and it’s been so extraordinary or their transformation was so dramatic or their healing was so remarkable that it’s left you feeling “I’m a pretty ropey Christian” or “my story isn’t anywhere near that dramatic, I can’t be worth much to God”?
Paul could have become like one of these speakers – conceited, stuck up, self-important! And why?
v7 “because of these surpassingly great revelations”
The first few verses of the chapter Paul talks about a fantastic experience he’d had.
It was an experience that was so profound and moving that it changed Paul’s life
- People who have near death experiences talk about their life-changing impact in the same way
- But this was no NDE, it was a genuine encounter with God the Holy Spirit that consciously caused Paul to feel he’d been transported to heaven itself.
- he doesn’t even know whether this experience happened in the body or was some out-of-the-body experience.
Several things we need to remember here
First – this was an intensely real experience
although the intensity of it left Paul wondering whether he’d been transported out of his body Paul had doubt that something real and tangible happened.
It eclipsed all other conscious feelings at the time and he heard words, sounds or ideas that were so deep he did not want to repeat them
Second this was an extremely rare experience
This happened 14 years previously
- It didn’t happen to him in his quiet time every day!
Thirdly – this was a very private experience
v 4 [this man, Paul] heard inexpressible things, things that man is not permitted to tell.
God did not give this revelation (whatever it was) to Paul with the purpose of him sharing it with others (in his teaching or preaching for example) – it was intended for Paul’s benefit alone!
Fourthly – it is the kind of thing Paul would otherwise be tempted to boast about
I’m sure you’ve heard people talking about wonderful experiences they’ve had and very often they are a stimulus to us to keep close to the Lord and walk with God
recap & pray >>>
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