When You Don’t Want the Gift You’ve Been Given

“Let’s move on,” wrote Paul in his second letter to the Corinthian church. “Let’s go on to visions and revelations of the Lord.” And he revealed, probably for the first time ever, an out-of-the-body experience in which he was “caught up to the third heaven.” Did it happen when he was pelted with stones and left for dead outside the city gates of Lystra?

Paul was light on details, but quick to share that God had provided a weighty counterbalance to this stunning glimpse of glory:

“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.” (2 Corinthians 12:9)

Again, Paul was light on details as to the nature of his “thorn.” Yet we know that it was sufficiently painful, inconvenient, debilitating, or annoying that Paul pleaded with the Lord three times to remove it.

The Gift Paul Didn’t Ask For

Paul described his thorn in the flesh as “a messenger of Satan.” As he did with Job in the Old Testament, God allowed Satan to take a swipe at a much-loved child and servant. “The gift of a handicap” (as it is described in The Message) came from Satan, and yet God allowed it.

The thorn was given. It was not a random act of chance or an accident. The thorn was God’s assignment to Paul.

When difficult assignments are handed out to biblical characters, we have a tendency to take note and then read on without realizing the impact of the loss or the suffering. After all, it’s tempting to think of Paul as a “varsity-level” Christian, able to absorb disappointment and take a hit for the team without flinching.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Paul admitted that his “handicap,” his “thorn” (whatever it was) served the purpose of keeping him in touch with his limitations. It was given to him for a purpose.

May I ask what God has seen fit to have given to you?

Submission to God’s sovereign assignment did not change Paul’s circumstances. The affliction remained. Like Paul, you may have been given a challenge you’d rather not have, and also, like Paul, you may have prayed for its removal and received a “no.”

The Second Gift

However, with the “no,” Paul was given something else:

Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:8-9)

God didn’t remove the thorn, but he gave Paul grace. And Paul was wise enough to take it.

God extends grace to you and me as well, even in our hardest challenges, but often we miss the gift because we’re so busy looking for something else. Something different. Something besides what we’ve been given.

In our frenzy to change our circumstances, we fail to remember that God is purposeful in his assignments. Whatever we’ve been given has been given with a reason. This was abundantly true of Paul’s given-grace and it is true of us today:

Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10)

Focusing on the thorn keeps us from appreciating the gift.

Seeing God’s strength come into its own may come at the price of seeing my own strength diminished.

My limitations may cut me down to size so that God is exalted for his ability to work through one so small.

What limitations are you struggling to take in stride today?
Have you lifted your eyes from the thorn to look for God’s grace, given to you because of the thorn?
Have you begun to see ways that God’s power is being put on display in your weakness?

My Prayer for You

Our God, who is the Giver of all things, we thank you for the grace that comes to us in the midst of our wanting. Give us eyes to see you at work in the very places where we thought you had abandoned us so that we may join Paul in rejoicing that when we are weak, we are at our strongest.
Amen