The Bungee Cord 7-5-21

Hello,

This week's Bungee Cord is my sermon from yesterday.....seemed like it would be good to Bungee it, too.

2 Cor. 12:2-10

I suspect that there isn’t a one of us here who hasn’t gone through, in some way, what the apostle Paul writes about in his letter to the Christians in Corinth.

“Therefore,” says Paul, “to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three times I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”

We never find out from Scripture what this “thorn in the flesh” was that tormented Paul. Lots of people have tried to guess, and guess is what they are doing. As for me, I don’t feel a need to guess, as a matter of fact, I think that is good that we don’t know what it was, that in knowing we might find ourselves thinking that the thorn we might have does not relate to the one that Paul had. All we know is that he had a thorn in the flesh, one so aggravating, one so life-sapping, one so painful that he appealed three times to the Lord to be rid of it. Now, three times may not seem like all that many to you or to me, but it is two more than once, and don’t we all hope that one appeal to God for help should be enough? How long would it take to get rid of this thorn? How many prayers would he need to say? If not three prayers….how many?

But apparently, after his third prayer, Paul heard an answer, “My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.”

Is it? Is God’s grace sufficient for you and me? Is God’s grace sufficient for you and me when the pain of a thorn gouges into your feet with every step that you take? Don’t we need more? Don’t we need God to take away that piercing thorn? A broken relationship that is stabbing at your heart? The taunts of those who delight in your dirty laundry? The loneliness of grief that jabs deep into your soul? The hopes and dreams that failure has popped like a balloon? Mental strife that has embedded itself under your skin? Is God’s grace sufficient enough for you and me when it comes to the thorns in the flesh that have taken their place in our lives? Don’t we need more?

Don’t we need more? Don’t we want to have the thorn removed? Don’t we want God to take the scalpel to the thing that is causing our pain and loneliness and remove it from our lives? Don’t we want God to use his divine tweezers and pull the thorns of failure and illness from under our skins? Haven’t every one of us joined Paul in appealing to God, “Lord take this away!” We certainly want more. Don’t we need more?

“No,” says God, “my grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.” Power is made perfect in weakness? Really? Yes, really. Ask anyone who has been afflicted with the thorn of alcoholism, and they will tell you that it’s true, because they have found out that the first step to living with the thorn of alcoholism is to acknowledge their complete weakness to alcohol and put themselves in the hands of a higher power for whom alcoholism does not even have the power of a small sliver to disrupt life. They will tell you that as long as they tried with their own power to carry the thorn of their lives, all it did was cause more pain. But when they hit rock bottom, when they were absolutely at their weakest, that is when they felt the power to conquer the pain of their thorn….the power that comes from God. And conquer it many have, maintaining sobriety of years and years. They will be the first to tell you that the thorn has not gone away. They will always be acoholics, but being held in the powerful hands of God, hands of grace, the alcohol doesn’t have the power to bring pain to their lives. God’s grace is sufficient, power is made perfect in weakness.

We’re not in heaven yet, and that means that until we get there things will not be perfect. This is thorny ground on which we live, and there is simply no way to walk through this life without stepping on some thorns…Paul lists some of them, “insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities”. But notice that Paul is not afraid of them, as a matter of fact he says that he is “content” with them…at peace with them, because he is no longer counting on his power to subdue them, power that he has seen fail him. Instead he is counting on God’s power to render them powerless, power that he has seen do just that. For Paul saw what happens to the thorns of life when God takes them on.

Remember what Jesus wore on his head when he hung on the cross? A crown of thorns. And remember that when he walked out of that Easter tomb, those thorns were gone. All their power to bring pain to life was crucified with Jesus….they died with Jesus on the cross….and they stayed there. Dead on the cross. Jesus showed that he, unlike us, has the power to render thorns powerless.

Is God’s grace sufficient for you and me? Don’t we need more? What more could we receive than that which takes the sting out of every thorn, even the thorn of death –

‘Where, O death, is your victory?

Where, O death, is your sting?’

If you and I are ever to be at peace in this thorny world, it is not going to found in the strength of our hands, in the might of our minds, or in the determination of our hearts. Those things might bring us temporary relief, but not peace. When you were Baptized, God took ahold of you with a death grip, a grip that not even death can loosen. When the waters splashed over you, and God named you as one of his own, he embraced you in his love….in his grace…jealously telling every other thorny power in the world, “You can’t have this one. This one is mine.” So when you find yourself tormented by the thorns of this world and your strength has been sapped dry, and all you have left is Jesus…..you will also find, that Jesus is enough.

My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.

Amen.

Have a great week.

God's grace and peace, (ggap)

Pastor Jerry Nuernberger