During a recent personal struggle (a chronic one, but this time especially intense and bewildering), I was reminded of something I’d read in Elizabeth Skoglund’s book, Amma. She wrote about a child who was being led into the gas chamber at Belzec, one of Hitler’s concentration camps. When the confused little boy saw the darkened room, someone heard him say, “It’s so dark, and I was being so good.”
“Why?” We sometimes wonder, in rooms less tragic but still so bleak. “How can this be? I thought I was right where You put me, doing just what You said. It’s so dark, and I was being so good.”
We’re bewildered by what feels like punishment, though for what we do not know. We feel betrayed because we thought a close walk with the Lord would keep us out of these dark rooms of deep disappointment. We don’t like it that God hasn’t explained Himself to us and is willing to allow us to feel such pain.
“What kind of Father does that?” asked the late pastor Tim Keller in a recent sermon. His reply? “A Father who allowed His Son to go to the cross for you and I.” A Father who allowed Him to, apparently, feel similar bewilderment: “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” (Matt. 27:46). For our redemption, Jesus was allowed to experience, far beyond our experience, the excruciating tension of not understanding the Father He had lived to please.
A Thorny Problem
In 2 Cor. 12:7-10, we learn that God also allowed the apostle Paul to enter into a room of suffering. Paul had a thorn “in the flesh.” Whether it was in his physical flesh or his inner being, we don’t know, but we do know that a thorn can be excruciating. Although Paul pleaded three times for God to remove it, His answer was no.
God hadn’t sent the thorn; it was from Satan, intended to torment (v. 7), but God allowed it to remain for a specific purpose. Without the thorn, God told Paul, he was in grave danger of becoming “puffed up” (AMPC) and conceited because of the great revelations he had received from the Lord. So instead of removing the thorn, God pledged to Paul, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness” (v. 9).
A Peculiar Joy
What was Paul’s response to finding out the thorn was staying? Not disappointment. Not anger. Not despair.
“Therefore, I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses… in hardships… in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong” (vv. 9-10, emphasis mine).
Paul delights and joys in his weakness—not in the conquering of it, but in the thick of it—for the mind-boggling tradeoff: that the power of Christ may rest on him.
Certainly, Paul’s thorn would mean pain and suffering. But it didn’t have to mean doubt, insufficiency, disobedience, backsliding, or defeat. In fact, it was meant to protect against those things.
A Personal Invitation
This, then, was my struggle, the Lord showed me. I had a thorn which He’d allowed to remain. It could lead to temptation (not a sin) or to sin itself… or it could lead to joy, delight, and blessing. It was my choice.
Have you, too, been pierced with a thorn—perhaps an area of recurring temptation, a chronic physical ailment, or an inescapable situation? We know that sometimes God removes thorns and fully heals wounds. Have we asked Him? If so, and it remains, why has God allowed it to remain?
Why is it so dark when we were being so good?
Our Lord’s refusal to remove the thorn doesn’t mean He’s unsympathetic. “We do not have a High Priest Who is unable to understand and sympathize and have a shared feeling with our weaknesses and infirmities and liabilities to the assaults of temptation, but One Who has been tempted in every respect as we are, yet without sinning” (Heb. 4:15, AMPC, emphasis mine).
Jesus sympathizes with us. He enters into our feelings. He intercedes for us before the Father (Rom. 8:34). The Holy Spirit, too, pleads our need to Him (Rom. 8:26-27).
A Promised Help
We are also invited to come to the Father ourselves: “Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need” (Heb. 4:16).
We, as God’s children through faith in Jesus’ payment for our sins, can approach God our Father on Christ’s merit. We can come with confidence to His throne of grace, that grace which is as sufficient for us as it was for Paul. We can come just as we are—thorn-thrust, despairing, and utterly insufficient. And we can come with a very specific purpose: to receive mercy and find grace to help. For when? Right now, in our time of need.
In response, the Father promises to apply His sufficient grace (His enabling, His equipping for overcoming) to the site of our thorn. His grace may come through in-depth meditation on a particular Scripture, or through starting a new spiritual discipline, or through laying down new and practical, God-drawn boundaries; God’s creative options are unlimited.
Through these God lays down a protective barrier against bitterness and doubt, reapplying it over and over until that painful site begins to release blessing. And as He applies His balm, He opens our eyes to the reasons He has for this thorn, including freeing us from ourselves, purifying us, and perfecting His power in and upon us.
The Peculiar Joys of Thorns
As God leads me through this process these days, I’m realizing there really are some peculiar joys in thorns:
- The joy of protection from our wayward selves (Jas. 1:2-4).
- The joy of being called closer to Jesus (Matt. 11:28-30).
- The joy of knowing God is working our good and His purpose (Rom. 8:28).
- The joy of learning new and deeper truths about God through the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 2:9-12).
- The joy of feasting afresh on the Word (Ps. 23:5a).
- The joy of experiencing God’s sufficiency (Phil. 4:19).
- The joy of glorifying God in this struggle (2 Cor. 3:18).
In so many ways, our thorns become a means of grace to us.
The darkness becomes the shadow of His power.
The weakness blesses.
“Therefore, I will all the more gladly boast in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ [may completely enfold me and] may dwell in me” (2 Cor. 12:9, AMP).
The more deeply we experience Christ’s power on us, the more fully we accept—even welcome—our thorn. Not because we love pain, but because we love the Father and delight to know Him, His presence, and His power.
We don’t have to be delivered from our thorn, then. We don’t even have to understand why we’re not delivered. What we truly need is confidence that God’s grace is always enough, and that His power will overshadow our consecrated weakness.
The thorn… the power!
What joy!
For Further Study:
📖 Read:
💭 Reflect:
- How has God used a hardship to protect or grow you?
- What might it look like to boast in your weakness this week?
- What “thorn” has God allowed in your life, and how could you choose joy in the middle of it?
🙏 Pray:
Father, thank You that through Christ’s sacrifice and victory, I can come to You with every thorn I carry. Remind me that Your grace is enough, Your power is made perfect in my weakness, and that even the painful places in my life can be redeemed for Your glory. Help me to see my struggles through the lens of the cross—and live in the joy of Your triumph. Amen.
