The Thorn in the Flesh.
I. The first lesson which is suggested by these words is this: that the thorn in the flesh comes for a specific end. Of course it does not come by chance; nothing does. It comes by God's appointment or permission. But more than this, God does not send it out of mere wilfulness or caprice; He sends it for a certain purpose, and a purpose which we may in many cases find out. Let us look at St. Paul's case. I believe that to many an earnest-minded man the thorn in the flesh or the crook in the lot never comes in a form so painful as the form in which it came to Paul: the form of something which diminishes or destroys his usefulness, that keeps him from serving as he would his generation and his Saviour, that constrains noble powers or the makings of noble powers to rust sadly and uselessly away. St. Paul's thorn was given lest he should be exalted above measure.
II. It is beautiful, it is touching, it brings the tear to the eye, to hear St. Paul telling himself about his thorn in the flesh, and how much he needed it to keep him down, and how humbly he desired to submit to God's heavy hand. But think how differently we should have felt if anybody else had said the same things about Paul. There is all the difference in the world between talking as Paul does in the text about ourselves and about any one else. When trial comes to ourselves let us humbly try to find out the lesson God is teaching us by it; but let us not presume to say why the trial has come to any other man.
III. See what the Apostle did about his thorn in the flesh. See what God did. Every day, I doubt not, when the thorn was first sent would the earnest supplication go up from his heart that this heavy burden might be taken from him; and who shall say that his prayer was not answered, nobly, fully, sublimely answered? There are two ways of helping a man burdened with what he has to do or bear. The one is to give him less to do or bear, to take the burden off the back; the other way is to strengthen him to do or bear all that is sent to him, to strengthen the back to bear the burden. In brief, you may give less work, or you may give more strength. And it was in this way, which even we can see is the better and nobler way, that the wise and almighty Saviour thought it best to answer His servant's prayer. "My grace is sufficient for thee, for My strength is made perfect in weakness." And we do not need to go far for proof how completely each promise was fulfilled. How thoroughly resigned Paul was; how sanctified to him must that thorn have been; how strengthened his heart must have been with an unearthly strength when he could honestly write such words as follow his account of his Redeemer's promise. The thorn was there, piercing as deep as ever, marring his usefulness, making him seem weak and contemptible to the stranger; but he liked to have to feel from hour to hour that he must be always going anew to God for help, and so he wrote, not perhaps without a natural tear, "Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me."
A. K. H. B., The Graver Thoughts of a Country Parson,p. 34.
References: 2 Corinthians 12:7-9. Spurgeon, Sermons,vol. xviii., No. 1084; E. J. Hardy, Faint yet Pursuing,p. 39; Homilist,2nd series, vol. iv., p. 149; Homiletic Quarterly,vol. ii., p. 234.