Many questions arise when considering what Paul said in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10. What exactly that thorn was is one major discussion. So too the matter of who is ultimately behind suffering and evil. With two millennia of thought and debate on these matters, I will solve nothing here. But a brief summary of what most scholars have to say can be at least offered. Firstly, the actual text:
So to keep me from becoming conceited because of the surpassing greatness of the revelations, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to harass me, to keep me from becoming conceited. Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me. 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 of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
As to what the thorn in fact was, it often depends on one’s theological presuppositions. Those in the Pentecostal and charismatic world, and especially those promoting the health and wealth gospel, will insist that whatever it is, it can NOT be some physical illness of hardship.
As will be seen, most NT scholars do not hold that position. So we are at a bit of an impasse here, so to proceed, the totality of Scripture has to be considered here. As noted, the health and wealth gospellers are nearly unanimous in strongly denying that this is a physical infirmity or sickness.
Just two out of dozens of quotes will here suffice: “The thorn in the flesh was not a sickness as tradition teaches but a messenger from Satan as the Bible teaches” (Gloria Copeland). And this: “[This teaching] has held many people in bondage when they should be delivered. . . . The Bible does not say that this thorn in the flesh was a sickness” (Kenneth Hagin).
Instead of being a sickness, the faith healers tell us it was probably a person who opposed Paul. Even if the thorn was other than persecution, some faith gospellers claim that it was an unnecessary thorn. R.T. Kendall, in a popular exposition of the thorn in the flesh, cites one author (without giving a source) along these lines: “One famous ‘health and wealth’ preacher in America actually said publicly, ‘If the apostle Paul had had my faith, he wouldn’t have had his thorn in the flesh’.”
So this view is strongly held by many in this camp, although some are a bit more cautious. For example, Ken Blue, in his 1987 book Authority to Heal says this: “While it is impossible to state with certainty what Paul’s thorn was precisely, it is much more likely the painful opposition of personal enemies than personal affliction.”
However, not all Pentecostals see it this way. One first class NT scholar and Pentecostal, Gordon Fee admits that we cannot know with certainty what it was, yet it must have been “some form of physical infirmity” (God’s Empowering Presence 1994).
Fee realises that some contemporary Christians find it hard to reconcile life in the spirit with being plagued by a physical infirmity, yet that is what we seem to find here: “What needs to be emphasized is that for Paul the infirmity was not incompatible with life in the Spirit; indeed, to the contrary, in itself it had little or nothing to do with life in the Spirit, except as a means whereby Christ would gain the more glory to himself by being powerfully at work in Paul’s life despite all such forms of weakness.”
In his important commentary Ralph Martin notes that “the thorn was inherently evil. Nowhere does Paul infer that this thorn was good”. However, “the thorn served a good purpose as a gift from God. . . .Paul’s suffering is viewed within the context of divine grace which not only allowed the affliction but sustained the sufferer in it”.
The Disease of the Health and Wealth Gospelsby Gordon D. Fee (Author)
Paul Barnett offers this summarising comment:
There is every indication, therefore, that Paul’s sufferings were God’s will for him. Such a view is unacceptable to the healing theologians who insist that good health is the birthright of every believer in consequence of Christ’s atoning death. . . . Yet Paul prayed three times for the removal of the ‘thorn’, and it remained. Jesus prayed twice that the cup would be taken from him, but it was not (Mark 14:32-42). It is not always God’s purpose to relieve us of suffering. Some claim that Paul’s was a special case, but there is no evidence that it was.
For a brief overview of those modern commentators who do take it to be a sickness or physical infirmity of some kind (or at least see it as a real possibility) consider this list: Murray Harris, Margaret Thrall, Scott Hafemann, F. F. Bruce, Paul Barnett, John Stott, Linda Belleville, Ben Witherington, Gordon Fee, and Ralph Martin.
Of course some take the safe path of non-commitment on the issue, eg., James Scott, D. A. Carson, Philip Hughes, and C. K. Barrett. J. B. Lightfoot offers a useful summary up to the time of his writing (1865). Graham Twelftree summarises: “The majority of interpreters, from Tertullian onward, take the thorn to be some form of physical illness”.
See also Colin Brown’s study of the term in The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, vol. 1. For a lengthy discussion of the occurrence, identity and significance of the thorn, see John Wilkinson. He too opts for a physical ailment, probably malaria.
The truth is, the history of the church is a history of godly people glorifying God through their healings and glorifying God through their infirmities and sicknesses. Many examples could be produced. But my point is that we may not always be allowed to make such a surgical distinction between suffering in general on the one hand and illness, infirmities and sickness on the other.
Suffice it to say that sickness may be used by God for his purposes. Even if God does view sickness as evil, he may still be able to bring it into his sovereign purposes. As Joni Eareckson put it, “God permits what he hates to achieve what he loves”.
Ken Blue makes this same allowance: “Simply because God does not will illness nor predestine them does not mean that he no longer accomplishes his will despite them and even through them. God works through the sickness resulting from accident, sin and stupidity to accomplish his will”.
A related question that should be asked is why does God not heal everyone? The simple reply of some, that there was not enough faith present, has too many problems from the scriptural witness. To rephrase the question, why does God seem to heal selectively? Why are some healed and others not, in the same situation?
The classic example is the story of the healing at the pool of Bethesda as recorded in the fifth chapter of John’s gospel. In verse 3 we learn that there “a great number of disabled people used to lie–the blind, the lame, the paralyzed”. Yet Jesus, for some unexplained reason, reaches out and heals only one man.
John Wilkinson in The Bible and Healing comments, “What an opportunity missed if healing had been his primary purpose. The fact that he did not take advantage of the opportunity presented by the crowd of sick people at Bethesda shows clearly that physical healing was not the primary reason why he had come into the world. He always taught the people, but he did not always heal the sick of their disease.”
Or as John Woolmer remarks in Thinking Clearly About Healing and Deliverance, it is best to accept that “there is a mystery and to see healing as a ‘sign’ of God’s gracious activity in our world, rather than as our ‘right’.”
As to the second main question, about who is behind such things, that is a massive discussion. Just the briefest point can be raised here. This concept of evil and Satanic activity, and the evil choices of humans, as ultimately being under the purposes of God is seen in various places in Scripture.
Paul’s “a messenger of Satan” is seen as the source of his thorn in the flesh, yet it is ultimately God with whom Paul must deal. No resisting the devil here. Paul simply prays (three times) and God informs him that his grace is sufficient for him. Commenting on this thorn (Gk. skolops) Paul Barnett notes the same theme found in Job:
The juxtaposition of ‘was given [by God]’ and ‘messenger of Satan’ recalls the early chapters of Job, where God allows Satan to afflict Job’s household (Job 1:12), then his person (Job 2:6-7). This language suggests (1) that Satan was the immediate cause of Paul’s difficulty – symbolized by the word skolops; (2) that, because the skolops was given by God, Satan is subject to God, not his equal (as in dualism); and (3) that in a profoundly mysterious way God was the ultimate source of that skolops. Paradoxically, God is the invisible source of this suffering in the life of Paul, his child and minister.
As Sydney Page wrote, “Paul could ascribe unpleasant experiences to Satan, while at the same time subsuming them under the overarching sovereignty of God.” But as noted, this is a much bigger discussion that cannot even be discussed here in outline form.
This part of the discussion can be summarised this way:
To a large extent, the way we deal with suffering, or the way we cope with hardship, will depend on our view of the source of hardship, affliction and suffering. For believers, there is much room to move, and there is much disagreement.
For example, those coming from a Reformed perspective will tend to see all things as ultimately coming from the hand of a wise, loving and sovereign God. Those coming from an Arminian perspective will much more emphasise human responsibility as a major source of evil and suffering.
And as might be expected, much is made in the Word of Faith theology of the role of Satan. Next to a believer’s lack of faith, the opposing role of Satan is most often appealed to as the reason and the source of suffering and evil in the world. Satanic assault explains much of why God’s people do not enjoy health, wealth and prosperity. Satan, in other words, is seen as a major force opposing God’s will and rule on earth.
If all this debate seems to be much ado about nothing, perhaps we can take another route by running with the old joke about this: Paul’s thorn might simply have been his mother-in-law!
Afterword 2
If this piece seems a bit sketchy, it is, and for this reason: I was just asked on the social media what I thought about those claiming the thorn is not any sort of physical ailment. I thought I had already penned a piece on this, but did not – at least not directly. So I went to a 180,000-word unfinished PhD thesis on this issue that I did some years ago, and hastily put this article together.
The Word tells us clearly what the thorn in flesh was ,,, “a messenger from Satan to buffet me,,,”.. an opposing demon, like being buffetted by a headwind.
There is no mention of any infirmity or sickness.
Incorrect David. The Word does NOT tell us what the thorn was. It DOES tell us that God sovereignly used whatever it was via the instrumentality of Satan. We are NOT told what the thorn actually was, so we can only in humility and Christian charity offer our own guestimates, based on the totality to Scripture. To insist on what it was – or was not – is not careful biblical exegesis but reckless isogesis. But do not take my word for it: consider what this world-renowned Pentecostal scholar and ordained minister with the Assemblies of God has said about it:
After suffering from a kidney stone, and finding out how the hard way painful it was, I surmised that since Paul lived in an environment conducive to kidney stones that maybe he had one as a thorn in his “side,” It will certainly knock you to your knees when it tries to pass.
Yes, it might have been James!
Bill, my two cents worth is: re Galations 6:11 ‘Ye see how large a letter I have written unto you with mine own hand.’ – my Bible reference of Galatians 6:11 says “The apostle was, it appears from many considerations, afflicted with ophthalmia, a common disease in the East, to the point almost of total blindness. Ordinarily, therefore, he dictated his letter. But now, having no amanuensis at hand, but urged by the spiritual danger of his dear Galatians, he writes, we cannot know with what pain and difficulty, with his own hand, in the “large letters” his darkened vision compelled him to use.”
But later on another evangelist discussing it said he thought the thorn in the flesh was from all the injuries like being beaten 5 times with 39 lashes, 3 times beaten with rods, stoned once, three times shipwrecked and in the ocean for a night and day plus all the other perils and stress, weariness, painfulness, hungry and thirsty, naked and cold – I’d be a nervous wreck with painful arthritis if I was Paul.
The Word tells us clearly what the thorn in flesh was ,,, “a messenger from Satan to buffet me,,,”.. an opposing demon, like being buffetted by a headwind.
There is no mention of any infirmity or sickness.
Incorrect David. The Word does NOT tell us what the thorn was. It DOES tell us that God sovereignly used whatever it was via the instrumentality of Satan. We are NOT told what the thorn actually was, so we can only in humility and Christian charity offer our own guestimates, based on the totality to Scripture. To insist on what it was – or was not – is not careful biblical exegesis but reckless isogesis. But do not take my word for it: consider what this world-renowned Pentecostal scholar and ordained minister with the Assemblies of God has said about it:
https://billmuehlenberg.com/2025/12/08/gordan-fee-on-the-health-and-wealth-gospel/
After suffering from a kidney stone, and finding out how the hard way painful it was, I surmised that since Paul lived in an environment conducive to kidney stones that maybe he had one as a thorn in his “side,” It will certainly knock you to your knees when it tries to pass.
Yes, it might have been James!
Bill, my two cents worth is: re Galations 6:11 ‘Ye see how large a letter I have written unto you with mine own hand.’ – my Bible reference of Galatians 6:11 says “The apostle was, it appears from many considerations, afflicted with ophthalmia, a common disease in the East, to the point almost of total blindness. Ordinarily, therefore, he dictated his letter. But now, having no amanuensis at hand, but urged by the spiritual danger of his dear Galatians, he writes, we cannot know with what pain and difficulty, with his own hand, in the “large letters” his darkened vision compelled him to use.”
But later on another evangelist discussing it said he thought the thorn in the flesh was from all the injuries like being beaten 5 times with 39 lashes, 3 times beaten with rods, stoned once, three times shipwrecked and in the ocean for a night and day plus all the other perils and stress, weariness, painfulness, hungry and thirsty, naked and cold – I’d be a nervous wreck with painful arthritis if I was Paul.
Thanks Lynette.