Ever wondered why God chooses to not deliver us from certain agonies or memories? What about this pain or experience that He has willed to remain within us, causing us to be triggered into uncomfortable memories and unsettling feelings that we must continuously fight through? The pain that has us crying out to Him for it to all come to an end, to forget them, or at least grant us the mercy of having an end in sight? In 2 Corinthians 12:7-10, Paul infamously declared:

“So to keep me from becoming proud, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger from Satan to torment me and keep me from becoming proud. Three different times I begged the Lord to take it away. Each time He said, ‘My grace is all you need. My power works best in weakness.’ So now I am glad to boast about my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ can work through me. That’s why I take pleasure in my weaknesses, and in the insults, hardships, persecutions, and troubles that I suffer for Christ. For when I am weak, then I am strong.”

As I was praying for my own healing and deliverance one day, I found myself asking God, “Why aren’t you ridding this from me? Why are you allowing this to constantly cause me guilt and pain?” He answered, “Because there is My goodness to be found in it.” I asked Him to reveal to me His goodness in this pain. I had to know what it is He saw that I was missing, as I was being swallowed up by guilt and condemnation, which I knew was not of Him. God brought me to the above verse (one may I add I never quite understood to its depth).

My perspective of this thorn was skewed by my pain. My perspective was all about the pain, agony and condemnation, blinding me from the grace that is God’s goodness that was also present. During this time, God was teaching me about consulting so that He can reveal His goodness in all things, good or bad.

If God authored it, it is good; if He allowed it, there is good.

Thorns are meant to humble us. Through His grace, that is good, He will allow things to keep us from boasting. Through His grace, He will humble us. There is very limited mobility when there is something piercing your side, your ability to stand up straight (a proudful stance) is one. We are reminded of our flesh’s weakness and forced to keep a humble stance (to remain lowly in position).

Thorns are meant to keep us in need of God’s grace that is sufficient to sustain us. Despite our lowly position, through the strength of His grace, we are still able to accomplish everything He has called and purposed us to; with an additional component of doing so from a stance and heart posture that honors Him.

These painful memories are no longer purposed to keep us in self-defeating thoughts that stump our spiritual growth and relationship with God, they have been re-purposed, re-defined, given a new life that is meant to remind us to draw nearer to The Lord. God challenges us stop aligning ourselves with the enemy and his purpose of the thorn (pain, resentment, bitterness, unforgiveness, despair, guilt, condemnation, hopelessness) and align ourselves with His purpose of these memories and revelations. He commands us to remove the yoke that comes with thoughtful captivity and take up His yoke that is light and filled with new hope and purpose.

Thorns are meant to point us back to His grace. His grace is strong and sufficient to uphold us and carry us. His grace will empower us and keep us going through hard times and painful memories. He does not want us to forget, so that prayer of deliverance is not about forgetting. He wants us to remember because He wants us to always be pointed back to His unconditional love and revelation of His strength. Our idea of healing and deliverance can look very different from God’s, so we must request He show us what healing and deliverance looks like to Him and align ourselves with His word, what He says. Through the guidance of The Holy Spirit, He will walk us out in His grace and into the healing and deliverance, but in accordance with His will and purpose.

I will close with my personal experience and encounter with this revelation, in hopes that it may encourage you. Since I have realized that I needed a serious perspective check on the pain brought on by my own thorn, the severity of the pain has significantly reduced. God’s grace has in some way, served as an anesthesia. Whenever the enemy brings it forth in my mind, I am instantly reminded of God’s redeeming and restoring grace and I find myself… smiling. The thoughts of unworthiness are replaced with the cost of the blood of Christ, feelings of inadequacy are emasculated with the sovereignty and relentless reign of the Lord, and guilt/condemnation is swallowed up by God’s forgiveness. What power does the enemy have over my thorn? None. What the enemy meant for evil, God uses for good. Now I can rejoice in my thorn because I know who has allowed it to remain there and why. There is hope with the thorn and a reminder of God’s love for me and His desire for my love and need for Him.

Now I can tell Paul, “I get it now.”

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