WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:03.680 So again, let me say welcome to all of you who are joining us, especially those who are 00:00:03.680 --> 00:00:04.719 joining for the first time. 00:00:04.780 --> 00:00:05.400 My name is Tommy. 00:00:06.140 --> 00:00:12.900 We've been in a series for the last couple of months in 2 Corinthians, which was written 00:00:12.900 --> 00:00:13.919 by the Apostle Paul. 00:00:14.160 --> 00:00:20.039 And the title of the series has been Power Through Weakness, Power Through Weakness. 00:00:20.080 --> 00:00:24.820 And the reason for that title is that oftentimes, in the eyes of the world and the surrounding 00:00:24.820 --> 00:00:28.039 culture, spiritual power looks like weakness. 00:00:28.039 --> 00:00:31.419 Spiritual power looks like failure. 00:00:32.519 --> 00:00:37.659 And that's especially true this week as we look at 2 Corinthians chapter 12, verses 1 00:00:37.659 --> 00:00:38.280 through 10. 00:00:38.460 --> 00:00:39.899 We just heard that read by Elizabeth. 00:00:40.719 --> 00:00:47.299 In this very well-known passage, we actually get a glimpse into Paul's personal life and 00:00:47.299 --> 00:00:48.500 his personal struggle. 00:00:49.039 --> 00:00:56.739 And we see how Paul thought about his own suffering and weakness, what he refers to as his thorn, 00:00:56.740 --> 00:00:59.359 the thorn in his flesh. 00:01:00.020 --> 00:01:06.439 This is one of the things that Paul's opponents most criticized about his ministry. 00:01:06.519 --> 00:01:10.719 It's one of the things they pointed to and said, see, this man cannot possibly be legitimate. 00:01:11.620 --> 00:01:12.700 Look at how much he suffers. 00:01:13.299 --> 00:01:14.599 Look at how weak he is. 00:01:14.599 --> 00:01:22.819 And yet, according to Paul, this thorn is one of his greatest sources of power. 00:01:23.899 --> 00:01:28.839 In fact, he says in this passage, when I am weak, then I am strong. 00:01:29.479 --> 00:01:33.039 And I don't know if that just never really struck me before because, you know, this is 00:01:33.039 --> 00:01:34.719 one of those verses that we hear a lot. 00:01:34.719 --> 00:01:39.780 But I've been marinating on this the last few weeks and just asking how. 00:01:41.000 --> 00:01:44.000 How can somebody actually say that and mean it? 00:01:44.079 --> 00:01:46.280 When I'm weak, then I'm strong. 00:01:46.379 --> 00:01:49.079 I mean, for me, when I'm weak, I'm weak, you know? 00:01:49.319 --> 00:01:51.259 When I'm weak, I'm not having a good day. 00:01:51.340 --> 00:01:53.859 When I'm weak, I've run out of hope. 00:01:54.700 --> 00:01:55.799 I'm struggling. 00:01:56.420 --> 00:01:57.859 I've got nothing to give. 00:01:58.700 --> 00:02:01.379 And yet, Paul says, when I'm weak, I've got more to give. 00:02:02.359 --> 00:02:03.719 I've got more to offer. 00:02:04.699 --> 00:02:06.839 I've got more foundation under me. 00:02:07.019 --> 00:02:10.500 I've got more energy and motivation to do what I'm called to do. 00:02:10.599 --> 00:02:11.939 And I just ask, how is that possible? 00:02:13.219 --> 00:02:16.799 So, this is what we're going to be thinking about and exploring together this morning. 00:02:17.039 --> 00:02:21.120 Where does Paul get this kind of resilience, and then where can we find it? 00:02:21.120 --> 00:02:22.939 We're going to look at this in two parts. 00:02:23.120 --> 00:02:25.099 First, the scandal of thorns. 00:02:25.979 --> 00:02:29.800 Most people see thorns as a scandal, a source of outrage and embarrassment. 00:02:29.800 --> 00:02:34.080 And then we're going to look at Paul's perspective, the gift of thorns. 00:02:34.660 --> 00:02:36.660 The scandal of thorns, the gift of thorns. 00:02:36.980 --> 00:02:37.580 Let's pray. 00:02:38.960 --> 00:02:43.280 Lord, we thank You for Your Word, and we thank You that every week we can come around it with 00:02:43.280 --> 00:02:50.580 our various distractions and struggles and uncertainties and doubts and hopes, and that 00:02:50.580 --> 00:02:54.800 because of the prayer that we just prayed a moment ago, because of this gospel reading 00:02:54.800 --> 00:02:57.939 that we've just heard, we know that Your Holy Spirit is with us. 00:02:58.719 --> 00:03:06.320 We know that Your Holy Spirit can take this ink and paper and can lift this truth off the 00:03:06.320 --> 00:03:07.360 page, so to speak. 00:03:07.860 --> 00:03:11.920 We're here not just to hear Your written Word, but to encounter Your living Word, Jesus Christ. 00:03:12.420 --> 00:03:17.560 And we pray that in the power of Your Spirit, You would bring us face to face with our Lord 00:03:17.560 --> 00:03:19.879 and Savior, Lord, through this text. 00:03:20.020 --> 00:03:21.560 We pray this in Your Son's holy name. 00:03:22.120 --> 00:03:22.400 Amen. 00:03:23.939 --> 00:03:26.240 So, first of all, the scandal of thorns. 00:03:26.699 --> 00:03:29.680 If you've been tracking with this series, you know a little of the context. 00:03:29.780 --> 00:03:34.319 For those of you who may be here for the first time or need a refresher, here's a little bit 00:03:34.319 --> 00:03:34.920 of the context. 00:03:35.360 --> 00:03:38.340 Paul had started this church years back. 00:03:38.900 --> 00:03:40.439 He had been preaching the gospel. 00:03:40.640 --> 00:03:41.759 A lot of people had come to faith. 00:03:41.759 --> 00:03:46.500 He started the church, spent some time with them, discipling them, and then raised up some 00:03:46.500 --> 00:03:49.079 local leaders to take the helm. 00:03:49.439 --> 00:03:52.939 And then he went on because he was ultimately called to be a missionary and church planter 00:03:52.939 --> 00:03:54.419 in other places as well. 00:03:54.859 --> 00:04:01.359 And since Paul left, over the course of a few years, the church had started to drift theologically 00:04:01.359 --> 00:04:06.639 away from the gospel that Paul had preached, and they drifted more and more in the direction 00:04:06.639 --> 00:04:10.819 of what we might call triumphalism, Christian triumphalism. 00:04:10.819 --> 00:04:18.040 They began thinking of the Christian gospel as a vehicle for personal success and victory 00:04:18.040 --> 00:04:18.759 in life. 00:04:18.860 --> 00:04:24.819 They were all about living their best lives now, and Christianity started to become a 00:04:24.819 --> 00:04:28.719 promise of the best things in life coming to them. 00:04:29.079 --> 00:04:32.980 They were also fascinated with mystical experiences. 00:04:33.360 --> 00:04:39.039 They were fascinated with people who would say things like, last night, God lifted me up into 00:04:39.040 --> 00:04:42.060 the heavens and I saw the glory of the Lord face to face. 00:04:42.300 --> 00:04:47.480 I was praying and I heard the audible voice of God tell me that I should take this job 00:04:47.480 --> 00:04:48.800 or marry this person. 00:04:48.879 --> 00:04:53.800 And they would look at such people with awe, and they would say, well, you must have a special 00:04:53.800 --> 00:04:54.840 relationship with God. 00:04:55.100 --> 00:04:58.240 God must love you a little more than the rest. 00:04:58.240 --> 00:05:03.060 And so they flocked to religious leaders who boasted about their mystical experiences. 00:05:03.900 --> 00:05:10.780 They flocked to people who boasted about the private revelations that they received from 00:05:10.780 --> 00:05:11.079 God. 00:05:11.319 --> 00:05:16.759 Their assumption in all of this was spiritually mature people, you know, the kind of people 00:05:16.759 --> 00:05:20.120 that we want to put into leadership positions, the kind of people that we want to follow as 00:05:20.120 --> 00:05:25.460 pastors and elders, spiritually mature people are the kind of people who have incredible spiritual 00:05:25.459 --> 00:05:30.799 power and mystical experiences, where God gives them visions and speaks to them. 00:05:30.839 --> 00:05:36.159 And, you know, there are leaders like that today who very much lead out of this sense of 00:05:36.159 --> 00:05:38.479 God told me we needed to do this, all right? 00:05:38.519 --> 00:05:41.019 God showed me where we need to go, we need to go here. 00:05:41.359 --> 00:05:43.500 And so they very much respected that kind of leadership. 00:05:44.500 --> 00:05:49.719 Now, suffering for them, suffering was a whole different matter. 00:05:50.159 --> 00:05:52.359 Suffering meant that you were a failure. 00:05:52.360 --> 00:05:59.220 If you suffered, it meant that you didn't have enough faith, right? 00:05:59.300 --> 00:06:00.699 You didn't believe enough. 00:06:01.080 --> 00:06:05.040 Well, if you just believed more than God would answer your prayer, obviously you don't have 00:06:05.040 --> 00:06:05.560 enough faith. 00:06:05.800 --> 00:06:07.699 It meant God must not be with you. 00:06:07.800 --> 00:06:10.100 It might even mean that God is punishing you. 00:06:11.480 --> 00:06:15.220 Well, what did you do to deserve this calamity in your life? 00:06:15.960 --> 00:06:18.000 That was their mentality towards suffering. 00:06:18.480 --> 00:06:20.939 So in their minds, the Christian life was all about victory. 00:06:20.939 --> 00:06:21.879 It was all about success. 00:06:22.100 --> 00:06:23.040 It was all about power. 00:06:23.300 --> 00:06:24.420 It was all about overcoming. 00:06:25.879 --> 00:06:30.060 The point is, a suffering Christian was a scandal in their eyes. 00:06:30.939 --> 00:06:36.079 It's something to be embarrassed about, something that you definitely wouldn't tell other people 00:06:36.079 --> 00:06:36.899 if you were suffering. 00:06:38.339 --> 00:06:42.680 You'd at least want to put on a happy face and convince the people around you that things 00:06:42.680 --> 00:06:43.259 are going well. 00:06:43.459 --> 00:06:47.159 You should not be honest about what's going on because it means that somehow you have failed. 00:06:47.160 --> 00:06:49.320 It was a scandal. 00:06:50.480 --> 00:06:55.600 And I would say that the same is generally true for many Christians in the modern West 00:06:55.600 --> 00:06:56.160 today. 00:06:57.500 --> 00:07:02.160 You know, the sociologist Philip Reif refers to our culture as a therapeutic culture. 00:07:02.820 --> 00:07:08.300 He wrote that book a while ago, but it's just become more and more and more true, the triumph 00:07:08.300 --> 00:07:08.980 of the therapeutic. 00:07:08.980 --> 00:07:15.500 And essentially, he describes our culture as a therapeutic culture, which means it's a culture 00:07:15.500 --> 00:07:20.680 that is largely centered on the emotional well-being and happiness of the individual over everything 00:07:20.680 --> 00:07:21.060 else. 00:07:22.060 --> 00:07:22.280 Right? 00:07:22.279 --> 00:07:28.819 So, for most people in our culture, individual happiness is the sort of central highest value. 00:07:29.399 --> 00:07:32.479 Everything else kind of stacks up under that. 00:07:32.619 --> 00:07:37.279 So, most of us, and I think most of us probably aren't even really aware of this, but most people 00:07:37.279 --> 00:07:44.219 carry around a certain set of baseline expectations for the quality of life that they assume they're 00:07:44.219 --> 00:07:45.000 going to have. 00:07:45.000 --> 00:07:50.379 So, most of us assume that we will generally be safe and healthy and that we will generally 00:07:50.379 --> 00:07:51.719 live long lives. 00:07:52.920 --> 00:07:58.719 Most of us assume that sickness and pain, if they do happen, they should be brief and 00:07:58.719 --> 00:08:01.939 they should be infrequent and they should be treatable. 00:08:02.439 --> 00:08:06.439 And so, the moment we begin to experience something like that, as fast as we can, we want to go 00:08:06.439 --> 00:08:11.759 to the local corner pharmacy, some of which are open 24 hours and give us access to all kinds 00:08:11.759 --> 00:08:15.259 of medicines and treatments to alleviate suffering as quickly as possible. 00:08:15.259 --> 00:08:21.579 We assume that we will be generally free from things like anxiety or depression or more serious 00:08:21.579 --> 00:08:22.639 forms of mental illness. 00:08:22.740 --> 00:08:25.599 Those will immediately drive us into treatment. 00:08:26.459 --> 00:08:30.500 We generally assume that we're going to have careers that not only meet our needs financially, 00:08:30.719 --> 00:08:34.360 but also provide some sense of meaning and purpose and fulfillment. 00:08:34.539 --> 00:08:36.860 We assume that everybody should be able to have that. 00:08:37.539 --> 00:08:41.840 We generally assume that we should be able to be sexually self-expressive and satisfied. 00:08:41.840 --> 00:08:46.780 We generally assume that we should be able to marry someone who meets our needs, emotionally 00:08:46.780 --> 00:08:48.080 and socially and sexually. 00:08:48.560 --> 00:08:53.060 We generally assume that if we are in a marriage where our needs are not met, that we should 00:08:53.060 --> 00:08:55.960 be able to get out of that marriage fairly easily. 00:08:56.800 --> 00:09:00.379 We generally assume that if we want to be able to have children, that we should be able 00:09:00.379 --> 00:09:01.200 to have children. 00:09:01.340 --> 00:09:05.139 We generally assume that if we don't want children, we should be able to prevent or terminate 00:09:05.139 --> 00:09:06.019 the pregnancy. 00:09:06.139 --> 00:09:10.700 We generally assume that as long as we don't hurt anyone, we should be able to live however 00:09:10.700 --> 00:09:16.000 we want in the pursuit of our own happiness, and that we should reasonably expect that nobody's 00:09:16.000 --> 00:09:22.140 going to interfere with that. We tend to treat these not as just baseline assumptions, but I 00:09:22.140 --> 00:09:28.759 would go so far as to say I think we treat these as almost rights that we feel entitled to. And we 00:09:28.759 --> 00:09:33.000 get very angry, we get very upset as a culture when anybody tries to stand in the way of that 00:09:33.000 --> 00:09:39.080 for anyone else, so any institutions or values or religions that would encourage people to forego 00:09:39.080 --> 00:09:45.960 these things for any reason, right? So, for instance, encouraging someone to stay in a hard 00:09:45.960 --> 00:09:51.280 marriage because of the vow they made, or encouraging someone to live a life of singleness and celibacy 00:09:51.280 --> 00:09:57.139 because of their faith, or encouraging someone to carry an unwanted pregnancy to term, those are 00:09:57.139 --> 00:10:04.960 things that would be considered to many people as oppressive and evil. So, not surprisingly, in the 00:10:04.960 --> 00:10:12.060 therapeutic West, we've drifted toward a therapeutic Christianity. It doesn't take long in a culture 00:10:12.060 --> 00:10:18.840 like that for the religions to start to follow suit. So, two sociologists, Christian Smith and 00:10:18.840 --> 00:10:23.980 Melinda Denton, published a study back in 2005. This has since become a book, and all kinds of stuff has 00:10:23.980 --> 00:10:29.220 been written about it, but they surveyed a whole bunch of mainline Protestants and Evangelicals 00:10:29.220 --> 00:10:35.019 and Catholics, and they determined that the dominant religion among all of these groups is actually 00:10:35.019 --> 00:10:39.580 something they called moralistic therapeutic deism. So, people who thought they were faithful 00:10:39.580 --> 00:10:44.399 Catholics or faithful evangelicals actually turns out they believe in something called moralistic 00:10:44.399 --> 00:10:50.220 therapeutic deism, which is a term coined by these two researchers. And this revolves around the idea 00:10:50.220 --> 00:10:55.980 that the central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about ourselves, right? Just like the 00:10:55.980 --> 00:11:02.399 broader culture would say. And so, the view of God has shifted, right? God's job in this approach to 00:11:02.399 --> 00:11:07.519 the Christian faith, God's job is to help us get there, is to help us live that kind of life that 00:11:07.519 --> 00:11:13.200 we want to live by solving our problems and meeting our needs, right? If we get sick or we know somebody 00:11:13.200 --> 00:11:18.000 who's sick or we're financially struggling or we want to get married or we want to have kids, then we're 00:11:18.000 --> 00:11:22.779 praying to God. Our expectation is God needs to show up and do this thing for me, and then otherwise we kind 00:11:22.779 --> 00:11:26.819 of want God to stay out of our business, right? Once the need has been met, once the prayer has been 00:11:26.819 --> 00:11:31.299 answered, we kind of say, okay, God, thanks. We'll let you know if we need you. Get back in the lamp, 00:11:31.799 --> 00:11:38.620 and then we sort of want to live our lives. And so, there are some major implications as we think 00:11:38.620 --> 00:11:44.399 about suffering, right? What's the problem with that kind of view? What's the problem with that kind 00:11:44.399 --> 00:11:53.299 of faith? Well, here's one issue I see. If you live your life with a worldview or, worse, a religion 00:11:53.299 --> 00:12:01.059 that assumes that all suffering is bad, that all suffering is scandal, and that life is about 00:12:01.059 --> 00:12:07.559 personal happiness, if that's kind of your perspective on life, you're going to be completely 00:12:07.559 --> 00:12:13.100 unprepared for the real world. You're going to be completely unprepared for real life, 00:12:13.100 --> 00:12:22.000 because real life for most people is extraordinarily hard. Some people know this more because they 00:12:22.000 --> 00:12:28.120 work, you're therapists or you're doctors or you're in ministry, and so you know because you're around 00:12:28.120 --> 00:12:32.460 a lot of human suffering. But for a lot of other people, it's easy to assume that whatever suffering 00:12:32.460 --> 00:12:36.720 you experience is sort of unique to your life, and everybody else has it pretty well, because most of 00:12:36.720 --> 00:12:40.840 us do a good job of projecting an image to the world that things are great. 00:12:43.100 --> 00:12:49.240 Right? But real life for most people is actually extraordinarily hard. Suffering is an unavoidable, 00:12:49.519 --> 00:12:56.940 massive part of being alive. It just is. You know, and if we think that life is all about being happy, 00:12:57.379 --> 00:13:03.420 and we have no category for suffering other than outrage and embarrassment, then life is really not 00:13:03.420 --> 00:13:09.740 going to make much sense. It's really not going to make much sense. You know, there have been many 00:13:09.740 --> 00:13:14.159 articles and statistics published about the numbers of people leaving Christianity behind, 00:13:14.259 --> 00:13:19.259 and this is kind of true across the board regardless of denomination. I think this is partly 00:13:19.259 --> 00:13:23.919 explained by the fact that most Christians leaving the faith grew up with therapeutic Christianity. 00:13:24.779 --> 00:13:29.860 They were sold a bill of goods. They bought into promises that have not been fulfilled. 00:13:31.159 --> 00:13:34.980 Right? They bought into an idea of Christianity that God is going to come in and answer my prayers 00:13:34.980 --> 00:13:39.000 and take away all my suffering and give me my best life now, and then they go out and they live a few 00:13:39.000 --> 00:13:45.080 years, and they realize that life is kicking the absolute crap out of me. And they pray, and it 00:13:45.080 --> 00:13:51.200 doesn't seem to line up with anything that they have been sold. And so, you know, in these days with 00:13:51.200 --> 00:13:56.519 the internet, we're so much more aware of how much suffering there is all around the world all the time. 00:13:56.519 --> 00:14:03.240 And so, I think people with a faith like that, their faith just falls apart. It feels completely disconnected 00:14:03.240 --> 00:14:13.419 from real life. Right? So, Paul, when we look at Paul, gives us a completely different perspective on 00:14:13.419 --> 00:14:21.379 suffering. He wouldn't say, it's just a scandal, it's an outrage, be embarrassed by it, means you failed. He has a 00:14:21.379 --> 00:14:28.000 far more nuanced view of his own suffering. So, let's look at Paul's view where he would see thorns as a 00:14:28.000 --> 00:14:36.100 gift. Not a scandal, but a gift. As we said, the Corinthians assumed that mystical experiences 00:14:36.100 --> 00:14:42.200 meant that you were spiritually mature. They mean that you're uniquely blessed by God. 00:14:42.679 --> 00:14:47.200 They believe that suffering means that you're a failure, your faith is weak, or that God is punishing 00:14:47.200 --> 00:14:53.759 you. Paul turns this completely upside down. So, he addresses first in this passage mystical 00:14:53.759 --> 00:15:01.379 experiences. And he basically says, you know, mystical experiences do happen. And he reluctantly 00:15:01.379 --> 00:15:05.920 shares about an experience that he had had 14 years earlier. He talks about himself in the third 00:15:05.920 --> 00:15:10.920 person, and it's a kind of first century way of him indicating, I'm really embarrassed to talk about 00:15:10.920 --> 00:15:16.900 this, because it's not the kind of thing that one should talk about. Right? Have you ever been around 00:15:16.899 --> 00:15:23.100 somebody, have you ever been around somebody, I hope not, who talked openly about the intimacy 00:15:23.100 --> 00:15:28.459 that they share with their spouse? I hope you've never had that experience. But how would you feel 00:15:28.459 --> 00:15:31.919 if you were sitting there and somebody said, oh, let me tell you about what happened the other night? 00:15:32.600 --> 00:15:39.799 You would sort of say, no, I don't, this is, or that's what you should say. I don't want to hear 00:15:39.799 --> 00:15:44.220 about that. That's not appropriate. You know, make you angry. This is not appropriate to share. 00:15:44.779 --> 00:15:50.000 That's kind of how Paul feels about this. Right? I don't kiss and tell, basically, is what he's 00:15:50.000 --> 00:15:53.720 saying. Like, listen, you have this kind of intimacy with God. This is not something that you just talk 00:15:53.720 --> 00:15:59.040 about. It's not something that you brag about. Clearly, it means that it wasn't real intimacy, 00:15:59.240 --> 00:16:04.600 right? So Paul says, let me reluctantly, he says, I know about a guy. He had an experience 14 years. 00:16:04.680 --> 00:16:09.019 He got brought up to the third heaven. He was in the presence of God. He heard and saw things that 00:16:09.019 --> 00:16:13.059 can't be uttered. And he says, you know, I could boast about that, but it's pointless. 00:16:13.779 --> 00:16:17.299 There's no value in it. It's not leading anywhere. It's not going to edify you. It's not going to 00:16:17.299 --> 00:16:24.100 edify me. It actually cheapens the whole thing. And he goes on to indicate in verse 7, there's 00:16:24.100 --> 00:16:29.740 actually a danger when we talk about that. Oh, God said this to me. God gave me this vision. There's 00:16:29.740 --> 00:16:34.480 a real danger when we talk like that. And that is that we start to become haughty. We start to become 00:16:34.480 --> 00:16:39.920 arrogant. We start to become self-aggrandizing because it's very hard to say something like that 00:16:39.920 --> 00:16:47.600 without elevating yourself in status above other Christians around you. Because the immediate 00:16:47.600 --> 00:16:52.659 thought is, oh, well, God speaks to you audibly? Well, you must have a special relationship with 00:16:52.659 --> 00:16:56.820 God that I don't have. So Paul says it's really dangerous. And when you have an experience like 00:16:56.820 --> 00:17:02.860 this, which they do happen, lots of experiences like this have been recorded by Christians throughout 00:17:02.860 --> 00:17:06.620 the centuries, they do happen. But when you have an experience like this and you boast about it, 00:17:07.620 --> 00:17:11.640 there's a real danger that you become conceited. You start to think of yourself as, well, God must 00:17:11.640 --> 00:17:20.980 really have a special place in His heart for me. And so Paul says, in order to keep me from becoming 00:17:20.980 --> 00:17:27.779 conceited, God has given me this thorn in my flesh. Right? Over-focusing on mystical experiences is 00:17:27.779 --> 00:17:33.759 actually a sign of spiritual immaturity. And the kind of theme of this whole section is God's aim 00:17:33.759 --> 00:17:37.639 isn't to make us happy. If you think God's job is just to make you happy, your life's not going to 00:17:37.639 --> 00:17:45.420 make sense. Your faith's going to be irrelevant. God's aim is to make us holy. It's to make us holy. 00:17:47.119 --> 00:17:53.859 Now, that means that ultimately we're on the road to total satisfaction and fulfillment. That's the end of 00:17:53.859 --> 00:17:59.099 that road. But the road is hard, and the road is long. And it's filled with obstacles, and it's 00:17:59.099 --> 00:18:05.459 filled with suffering and hardship. It is a long, hard journey to holiness. He says in verse 7, 00:18:05.519 --> 00:18:09.579 so to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, 00:18:09.959 --> 00:18:16.319 a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me. Now, people have debated for 00:18:16.319 --> 00:18:22.879 centuries what the thorn might be. Some people have suggested that it's an emotional struggle or a 00:18:22.880 --> 00:18:28.780 spiritual struggle. Others have suggested that it was some kind of physical ailment. The problem is 00:18:28.780 --> 00:18:34.360 the word thorn isn't really used enough for us to know, and the word flesh can mean any number of 00:18:34.360 --> 00:18:40.660 things. And so, I actually think it's helpful that it doesn't specify because what that means is it kind 00:18:40.660 --> 00:18:46.400 of gives us the freedom to project whatever suffering we might be experiencing into this, 00:18:46.400 --> 00:18:55.900 right? It's sort of a more of a blank canvas. So, here's what we do know. The word thorn can just as 00:18:55.900 --> 00:19:02.360 accurately be translated as spear. Okay, so when you read thorn, you think of a minor kind of annoyance. 00:19:02.420 --> 00:19:07.080 There's kind of a thorn kind of stuck, and it's just kind of bothering me. But imagine a spear, 00:19:07.880 --> 00:19:13.740 right? The idea here is something that is lodged in your body that is causing ongoing, 00:19:13.740 --> 00:19:19.200 unrelenting pain. You're aware of it every day, every minute of the day. And because it's lodged 00:19:19.200 --> 00:19:24.440 in there, the wound can't heal. So, every time you move, every time you start to forget it's there, 00:19:24.599 --> 00:19:30.099 the wound reopens, and it hurts even more. That's the image that he wants to convey here. 00:19:30.519 --> 00:19:36.960 So, it's an ongoing, unrelenting, unwanted source of suffering that doesn't seem to ever go away. 00:19:38.039 --> 00:19:42.519 Now, that could be any number of things. For some people, this might be chronic pain. 00:19:42.519 --> 00:19:47.500 It might be some sort of a chronic illness that doesn't get better. We've had people in our church 00:19:47.500 --> 00:19:51.859 who struggled with chronic pain to the point that they were bedridden at times, and that's awful, 00:19:52.039 --> 00:19:59.460 right? It could be some other form of disability. It could be some form of mild or severe mental 00:19:59.460 --> 00:20:08.819 illness. For others, it might be unwanted singleness. It might be infertility. It might be addiction. 00:20:08.819 --> 00:20:14.919 Wesley Hill numerous times writes about his same-sex attraction as his thorn in the flesh. 00:20:16.059 --> 00:20:22.059 Whatever thorns we might call to mind as we consider this passage, however we might think 00:20:22.059 --> 00:20:27.939 about this as we think about our own lives, Paul actually offers us some principles that help us 00:20:27.939 --> 00:20:33.259 deal with the thorns in our lives. He sort of models this as someone who's going through it himself. 00:20:33.399 --> 00:20:37.799 So, he's not somebody handing down from high and mighty, here's what the Lord told me that you 00:20:37.799 --> 00:20:42.019 should do. He's saying, this is what I've done. This is how I get through my day. 00:20:43.700 --> 00:20:52.759 The first thing that we see is this. God allows thorns. God allows thorns, but he takes no pleasure 00:20:52.759 --> 00:21:00.099 in it. And this is a very nuanced idea that we need to really spend some time with. Paul says this, 00:21:00.099 --> 00:21:07.879 a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan. Satan wants us to suffer. Satan wants us to 00:21:07.879 --> 00:21:14.959 give up and abandon all hope. But God, on the other hand, sometimes allows suffering, but it brings him 00:21:14.959 --> 00:21:20.439 no joy. It brings him no pleasure. You get the sense that he almost does it reluctantly. There's a…it 00:21:20.440 --> 00:21:28.820 says in Lamentations chapter 3 verse 32 and 33, it says, but though he cause grief, he will have 00:21:28.820 --> 00:21:34.519 compassion according to the abundance of his steadfast love, for he does not afflict from his heart 00:21:34.519 --> 00:21:41.600 or grieve the children of men. He allows it to happen, but he doesn't do it from his heart. 00:21:41.599 --> 00:21:53.719 It grieves him to do it. He does what's necessary in us. It brings him no joy to do it. You know, 00:21:53.759 --> 00:21:59.859 there are so many times as parents when we have to allow a certain amount of suffering into the lives 00:21:59.859 --> 00:22:07.179 of our children. We have to say no to things that they really, really want, and they cannot understand 00:22:07.180 --> 00:22:16.600 why we would say no to this thing. There are times when we have to allow them to try and to fail, 00:22:17.360 --> 00:22:22.220 and it's so hard to watch them do it, but we know that in the long run they will benefit from that 00:22:22.220 --> 00:22:29.140 experience more than if we hover around them and ensure only their success, right? There are times 00:22:29.140 --> 00:22:34.600 when we have to give them consequences that to them seem completely unfair and unjust. They're in 00:22:34.599 --> 00:22:40.699 outrage. They're beside themselves that they've been given this consequence. 00:22:42.459 --> 00:22:47.659 And the old adage really is true. There are times when it does hurt us worse than it hurts 00:22:47.659 --> 00:22:54.319 them, although they hate to hear that. But we do these things. Why? Ask any parent. Ask any good 00:22:54.319 --> 00:22:58.219 parent. Because you love them. Because you would do anything for them. Because you would lay down in 00:22:58.219 --> 00:23:04.579 traffic for them. And because you love them more than they can fathom, and because you know more 00:23:04.579 --> 00:23:09.960 than they could possibly imagine about what they ultimately need, you know that sometimes allowing 00:23:09.960 --> 00:23:14.879 some suffering to enter their lives, it's part of the journey toward maturity. It's part of the 00:23:14.879 --> 00:23:20.639 journey toward the kind of man or woman that you're trying to form them into. And, you know, it's hard 00:23:20.639 --> 00:23:25.879 enough explaining to a four-year-old why this present suffering will ultimately be good for them. 00:23:25.919 --> 00:23:32.319 There's no way most four-year-olds could fathom that. But imagine God trying to explain our thorns to us. 00:23:32.319 --> 00:23:36.359 Right? That's like trying to explain it to an ant. 00:23:39.339 --> 00:23:42.500 So, God sometimes allows thorns, but He takes no pleasure in it. 00:23:44.220 --> 00:23:49.599 The second thing we see in Paul's response is this. It's okay to ask God, even to beg God, 00:23:49.700 --> 00:23:55.879 to remove our thorns. Right? Paul says that he prayed three times that God would take away this 00:23:55.880 --> 00:24:03.300 unwanted suffering. Christianity is not masochism. Okay? We're not enthroning suffering in some sort 00:24:03.300 --> 00:24:08.040 of idealistic sense, nor is this pure stoicism, where we say, well, it's good. It builds your 00:24:08.040 --> 00:24:13.500 character. That's not what we're saying here. We actually believe that God created a world free 00:24:13.500 --> 00:24:19.540 from suffering, that God hates suffering actually more than we do. We'll come back to that. And that 00:24:19.540 --> 00:24:22.900 suffering exists because of sin and brokenness. If God doesn't enjoy suffering, 00:24:22.900 --> 00:24:27.880 we shouldn't enjoy suffering. We're right to be angry at the reality of suffering in the world. 00:24:27.980 --> 00:24:32.519 We are right to ask God to beg God. You know, three times, you do something three times in the Bible, 00:24:32.580 --> 00:24:35.980 that could mean many, many, many times. It could be that Paul was praying for months and months and 00:24:35.980 --> 00:24:46.540 months, every night, on his knees. And sometimes God does answer those prayers. Sometimes God does heal 00:24:46.539 --> 00:24:54.039 people miraculously. Sometimes God can, in a moment, change your life circumstances. God can do the 00:24:54.039 --> 00:25:03.319 impossible. So, we don't just pray as an exercise of futility. We pray because God might. But what if 00:25:03.319 --> 00:25:12.480 God doesn't? What if God's answer is no to that prayer? The third thing we see in Paul's response is this. 00:25:12.480 --> 00:25:17.660 If God doesn't remove a thorn, if God doesn't take away unwanted suffering from your life, 00:25:17.799 --> 00:25:23.480 it is because He intends to use it. It is not because He's forgotten about you. It's not because 00:25:23.480 --> 00:25:27.559 you don't have enough faith. It's not because God has got other things on His mind. It's not because 00:25:27.559 --> 00:25:34.559 He doesn't love you. He intends to use it in your life. There's the only two options. Either He takes it 00:25:34.559 --> 00:25:41.319 away, or it is serving a purpose. There's no other explanation. He either takes it away, 00:25:41.319 --> 00:25:47.599 or it is serving a purpose. And, you know, Paul says there's one way that we can interpret suffering 00:25:47.599 --> 00:25:51.720 that comes from Satan. You know, it's interesting that he refers to the suffering as a messenger 00:25:51.720 --> 00:25:56.439 from Satan. The suffering comes into your life, and there's a message inside it, 00:25:57.539 --> 00:26:03.879 handwritten by Satan, just for you. And these messages can be anything. This suffering means that 00:26:03.879 --> 00:26:09.500 God has abandoned you. This suffering means that God doesn't care about you. When's the last time 00:26:09.500 --> 00:26:14.799 you prayed to Him? And now that you have this thing in your life, now you pray to God? You haven't 00:26:14.799 --> 00:26:21.059 been to church in five years. You think God's going to do this for you? God is punishing you. God knows 00:26:21.059 --> 00:26:25.700 what you think about that person. God knows what you did the other night. God knows the truth about you. 00:26:26.920 --> 00:26:33.079 This is your just desserts. This is what God is doing because you deserve it. Or God is capricious. 00:26:33.079 --> 00:26:40.359 I can't ultimately trust God because God has no idea what God's going to do. God might bless me. God 00:26:40.359 --> 00:26:45.480 might smite me into the ground. Who knows? There's no rhyme or reason to what God does. 00:26:46.879 --> 00:26:50.559 There's no point in praying because God, He's just going to do what He's going to do, 00:26:51.119 --> 00:26:59.659 and it might as well be a roll of the dice. Or, don't you see, there is no God. 00:26:59.660 --> 00:27:07.680 All of this is meaningless. You just got dealt a bad hand. There's no one up there guiding any of 00:27:07.680 --> 00:27:13.680 this. Right? So, you pull that little message out of your suffering, and you unroll it, and there it is. 00:27:14.320 --> 00:27:22.580 This is what this means. But God also speaks to us in our suffering. Right? He says, as He says to Paul, 00:27:22.700 --> 00:27:27.779 in response to Paul's prayers, He says, no, I'm not going to remove this. Why? Because my grace is 00:27:27.779 --> 00:27:36.259 sufficient for you. My power is made perfect in weakness. Thorns can become places where God's 00:27:36.259 --> 00:27:43.399 grace starts to become real in our lives. Places where we begin to learn what it means to actually 00:27:43.399 --> 00:27:50.339 depend on God, not just in a theoretical on Sunday sense, but in a day-to-day sense, maybe in an hour-to-hour 00:27:50.339 --> 00:27:56.639 sense. Places where grace becomes real and tangible. You know, I've known people who were struggling and 00:27:56.640 --> 00:28:01.600 fighting their way out of addiction. A number of them in our church over the years. And you see how, 00:28:01.820 --> 00:28:07.660 especially in those early days, that journey out of addiction is praying sometimes every minute, 00:28:07.980 --> 00:28:13.540 God, give me the grace, give me the ability to get through the next 10 minutes without taking a drink. 00:28:15.080 --> 00:28:19.820 Give me grace for 10 more minutes. Give me grace for 10 more minutes. And that's how the road often 00:28:19.819 --> 00:28:25.279 starts for people. Right? Those people know something about grace that most of us don't. 00:28:26.240 --> 00:28:30.399 They know what grace feels like when it's the only thing keeping you above water. 00:28:33.220 --> 00:28:37.039 And you ask, well, how can grace become real ultimately in these moments? I mean, 00:28:37.059 --> 00:28:41.579 what does that actually change? And here's the thing. Here's how I've experienced it. 00:28:41.579 --> 00:28:49.099 In our moments of greatest suffering, when we cannot understand why God is allowing this thing 00:28:49.099 --> 00:28:55.579 to happen to us, we are actually faced with the most fundamental question of all. When I don't know 00:28:55.579 --> 00:29:05.740 why God is doing something, I'm left with only one question. Do I trust Him? Do I trust His character? 00:29:05.740 --> 00:29:15.240 Can we trust that God is good? Can we trust that God loves us even when our lives do not seem like it, 00:29:15.299 --> 00:29:21.299 even when there is no evidence to support that idea? And you say, well, how do we know we can? 00:29:22.920 --> 00:29:29.019 And the answer comes from the Garden of Gethsemane. You know, in those final hours, 00:29:29.019 --> 00:29:38.400 Jesus knew that He was going to face unimaginable suffering. Just like Paul, Matthew tells us that 00:29:38.400 --> 00:29:47.160 Jesus prayed three times that the suffering would be taken away. Lord, please let this cup pass from 00:29:47.160 --> 00:29:58.660 my lips. And just like Paul, the Father said no. But while Paul only had to endure a thorn, 00:29:59.019 --> 00:30:10.920 Jesus wore a crown of thorns. Jesus suffered more than we can possibly imagine, more than we will 00:30:10.920 --> 00:30:17.859 ever fully understand this side of the new creation. And the reason that He was willing to do it, the 00:30:17.859 --> 00:30:26.200 reason that He was willing to put on that crown, to go to the cross, was to deal with sin and death 00:30:26.200 --> 00:30:34.319 once and for all, so that He would be able to guarantee to us whenever we pray for our own suffering, 00:30:34.600 --> 00:30:42.860 that He would be able to guarantee one day this suffering will end. One day there will be no more 00:30:42.860 --> 00:30:49.019 suffering. One day I will personally wipe away every tear that you have ever shed. 00:30:49.019 --> 00:30:57.819 You know, most religions do have an explanation for suffering. Buddhism says that your suffering is 00:30:57.819 --> 00:31:05.660 ultimately an illusion. Hinduism says your suffering is punishment for sins in a past life. Islam says 00:31:05.660 --> 00:31:12.879 your suffering is punishment for sins in this life. Secular humanism says your suffering is ultimately 00:31:12.880 --> 00:31:20.740 random and meaningless. But only the gospel says that God cares about suffering so much, He hates 00:31:20.740 --> 00:31:28.020 suffering so much, that He was willing to suffer. That He was actually willing to suffer more than us, 00:31:28.820 --> 00:31:36.360 so that He could bring an end to all suffering. And so what the cross means is this. The cross means 00:31:36.359 --> 00:31:43.839 that even when we cannot understand God's motives, we can always trust His character. 00:31:45.159 --> 00:31:51.359 Even when you cannot understand God's motives for why He allows you to experience what you're 00:31:51.359 --> 00:31:58.119 experiencing right now in this moment, even if you can't understand why, you can trust His character. 00:31:58.219 --> 00:32:05.000 That's what this means. So no matter what thorns we might be facing now, and I know enough to know 00:32:05.000 --> 00:32:12.440 that there's a lot of thorns in this room, a lot of thorns in our flesh, instead of listening to those 00:32:12.440 --> 00:32:20.059 messages from Satan, listen to the voice of God speaking quietly and clearly in your heart. 00:32:21.359 --> 00:32:27.420 Seek the sufficiency of His grace in prayer. And over time, what that does is it begins to make you 00:32:27.420 --> 00:32:34.819 incredibly resilient in the face of whatever suffering might come. Because no matter how many times 00:32:34.819 --> 00:32:42.720 Satan might knock you off your feet, you will always land on your knees. And that is where Christians 00:32:42.720 --> 00:32:51.519 are at our strongest. Let's pray. Lord, we thank You for Your Word, and we thank You for Your Spirit. 00:32:53.220 --> 00:32:58.220 And Lord, we know that there is much struggle and grief in this room. 00:32:58.220 --> 00:33:08.539 Far be it from us to try and fathom or understand the why, Lord. But I pray that whatever doubts, 00:33:08.860 --> 00:33:14.120 whatever resentment, anger, bitterness we might carry as a result of our suffering, I pray that 00:33:14.120 --> 00:33:20.140 in the face of Your love, that would melt away. Lord, what we need now more than anything else is to 00:33:20.140 --> 00:33:27.800 feel Your embrace, that Your grace would become real for us, that we would sense and feel and 00:33:27.800 --> 00:33:34.180 experience its sufficiency, that as You provided manna for Your children in the wilderness, so You 00:33:34.180 --> 00:33:40.820 would provide Your grace in Your Son, Jesus Christ, to us now. Lord, that if we came hungry and empty, 00:33:40.820 --> 00:33:44.480 that we would leave full. We pray this in Your Son's holy name. Amen.