Was God good in giving Paul a thorn in the flesh and not taking it away?

God is always good and always loving. Paul’s thorn in the flesh was a gift to keep him from pride.

Pride is a deadly sin. Pride keeps God away. He knows the proud from afar and draws near to the humble.

God needed to show Paul great revelations so that he could teach the church, but God also had to ensure that Paul could handle receiving them.

I would rather not have the gift and not have pride because pride is a sin, but I don’t want to keep from receiving what God has for me, so I turn it over to Him to not only give the gift but make me ready to receive it in His grace.

God will take care of it all.

God’s grace is sufficient for all things. Even the thorn becomes a gift in Christ. Not only does it keep Paul, keep him from sin, but it keeps Paul in weakness.

We want to be weak. When we are strong, we rely on our strength. When we are weak, we need God. We need His strength. When we are weak, God’s strength becomes the strength in and through us.

What are Paul’s weaknesses? Insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. They are all the troubles that piled up in his life. They kept him relying on God. They kept him humble and needy. The perfect place for a Christian to be.

For the sake of Christ we spend and are spent. We love others. We do it by loving God, by giving everything to Him to do as He pleases.

Are you willing to give up your life in the pursuit of love?

You can make God rejoice or mourn. What will you do with your life? Will you accept the thorn with rejoicing? Can you rejoice in being weak?