Thorn In The Flesh

The Apos­tle Paul had to do his min­istry with some sort of health prob­lem con­stantly annoy­ing him. There have been all sorts of spec­u­la­tions as to what that prob­lem was. He had an inter­est­ing way of deal­ing with it. He con­sid­ered it a bal­ance to some of his euphoric visions. It was there to keep his ego in check. It was also there to remind him that it was God at work in his min­istry — and that God’s ways are more mys­te­ri­ous than ours.

As a min­is­ter, pas­toral coun­selor, and col­lege teacher, I am reminded of Paul’s dilemma con­stantly. Every­one has some sort of “thorn in the flesh.” Every­one car­ries some sort of cross. The peo­ple that you think have their act totally together have pri­vate demons, regrets, and sor­rows beyond imag­i­na­tion. In one sense or another, most peo­ple really do “live lives of quiet des­per­a­tion.” Still, the world turns. Enough of the bills get paid to put food on the table — no mat­ter how mod­est — at least for most of humanity.

Some suf­fer in silence; some turn their “thorns” into dra­mas for all to see. We each have unique styles of suf­fer­ing and grief. If we are spir­i­tu­ally smart, we let those weak­nesses bring us together. If we viewed our lim­i­ta­tions as avenues for God’s grace, we could be more accept­ing and less com­pet­i­tive. We have been duped into a “sur­vival of the fittest” par­a­digm — pre­fer­ring our need to eat to our more noble need to be sacrificial.

The great­est med­ical sys­tem in the world can­not grant us immor­tal­ity. The multi-billion dol­lar counseling/self-help indus­try, can­not change the real­i­ties of anyone’s emo­tional past. In the end, we need tran­scen­dence more than we need com­fort. We need what we neglect most — a phi­los­o­phy that “spins” our unchange­able prob­lems into eter­nal opportunities.