Saint Paul writes in 2 Corinthians 12:7-10
...because of these surpassingly great revelations. Therefore, in order to keep me from becoming conceited, I was given a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. 8 Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. 9 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. 10 That is why, for Christ’s sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong.
This verse seems to be a contradiction. How can one be strong when they are weak. Why would God give Paul a "thorn in the flesh" that would seem to make his work more difficult.
To illustrate why this is so, I'm going to use two famous quarterbacks in the NFL: Tom Brady and Aaron Rodgers. When Tom Brady first auditioned for the NFL his statistics were not very good. The people at the combine noted that Tom was slow, didn't throw a good tight spiral, didn't look like he had ever been in a weight room, and didn't have a strong arm. By contrast, Aaron Rodgers got very good remarks at his first combine after college. On paper Aaron Rodgers is a much better quarterback than Tom Brady. He is quick and can use his legs to get out of a jam. He can really zip the ball and can throw it very far down the field if needed. Yet it's Tom Brady who has seven Lombardi trophies Aaron he has one. Why is that? I think the answer is that Tom Brady's weakness is his strength. He knows that he can't do it on his own and needs to rely on others on the team. He works his hardest to improve those areas he is not good at, but in the end he knows that can carry him only so far. He works hard to be the best team leader he can be both on the field and off the field. Aaron Rodgers on the other hand does not do those things. He relies on his own capabilities (his speed, his throwing ability, his agility) to carry his team on the field. While this has worked for him at times in the past, it has become his downfall as of late. For example, this last spring he decided to sit training camp out and not spend time working with his teammates. He clearly thinks he doesn't have to train with them and doesn't appreciate what his team does for him. He has become puffed up and arrogant, to the detriment of his team (shown in their 38-3 pounding by the New Orleans Saints on 9/12/21).
So you might say Tom Brady's weakness is his strength and Aaron Rodgers' strength is his weakness.
So also it is with us Christians and our relationship to Jesus Christ. When we recognize our weakness and that we are incapable doing it ourselves, we see that we need to rely on him more and less on our own abilities. Our weakness becomes our strength. God gives us these thorns for a reason. As with Paul, to remind us that we are weak and to prevent us, like Paul, from becoming "puffed up". He doesn't want our "strength" to take our focus off the need for HIS strength.
