Thorns, Helpers

             But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me. (I Corinthians 12:9)

            The context of this verse was that God had sent Paul great visions, but also a “thorn in the flesh” designed to keep him from exalting himself. It’s never revealed what that thorn is, and I sometimes think that’s because if we knew, then people with similar thorns would consider themselves as being equal with Paul, and people who think their own thorns are worse would say, in effect, “Hold my beer.” Paul asked God to take this thorn away three times, and God finally answered as is quoted above.

            But the real focus today is the often-asked question of “Why would a good God allow bad things to happen to good/innocent people?” Paul hadn’t done anything wrong. He had done what God had called him to do but had been “repaid” with bad. The ultimate result was for Paul’s benefit and the benefit of the Kingdom, but that doesn’t mean that, all other things being equal, we would think what happened to Paul was good. God saw it as having a good effect. Paul learned to see it that way, but it was a learning process.

            Connected with the idea of bad things having good results is the challenge presented by “Not Good Enough.” We tend to think that if things were what we considered good, that more good would result. Our failures are almost seen as crimes for which we are being punished or for which God should be punished. He’s already handled that, but we continue in our opinion. The problem is the same as was faced by Adam and Eve in Eden.

The serpent pointed out the obvious “problem” that Adam and Eve weren’t like God. Of course, they couldn’t be like God. They were created. They were physical. They were limited. The idea of being like God was ludicrous. But the serpent chose a quality that was a little less obvious. Why couldn’t they at least know good and evil? It wasn’t that much. Similarly, we tend to think we can handle being more “like God” than we can. Limitations are seen either as attacks or failures, even if they ultimately make us better people.

We cannot be as good as we think we should be unless we set our sights quite low. And we tend to set our sights far lower than godlikeness because we recognize that’s impossible. But we think God expects us to accomplish it, and do so on our own. And we tend to end up blaming God for giving us whatever we think caused the problem, and thinking of it as a bad thing, whether it’s a thorn in the flesh or a helper. But that’s not how God sees it or us.