I was asked a question. Why wasnt Paul healed.

[Daniel Marsh]

Did not Satan wreck physical injuries on Job?

[Paul James]

5 hours ago, Behold said:

I undersand what you are saying..

The issue is, its not really possible to reconcile the idea of "a messenger from Satan", as "Paul had a difficult life".

You are teaching .... "Paul said that a messenger from Satan was his difficult life".

This means that Paul was asking God to not allow him to have a difficult life.

He would never pray that Prayer 3X as he prayed it, because he would never pray it even once.

Paul understood better then any other Apostle that you carry your cross and you deny yourself and you face the hardships with the Grace of God as your comfort and as your strength.

What Paul went through exceeded anything that any missionary would expect to go through.   He experienced not only the ordinary difficulties that any man in ministry would have, or any difficulties in life, but the very intensity of what he went through was aggravated through direct demonic involvement through those who cruelly treated him, weather causing the shipwrecks, etc.  Paul wasn't asking for an easy life and ministry.  But he knew that what he was experiencing was well out of the ordinary - that it was continual demonic attacks on his flesh.  He also knew why - it was to keep him humble because otherwise the revelations that he had received might have puffed him in with pride.  But he found the demonic attacks were wearing him down, because, he was just a mortal man like all the rest of us.  So, in his weariness, distress, and depression, he pleaded with the Lord to remove the intense demonic attacks, but the Lord told him that His grace was sufficient for him.

This is how Paul can say: "We are hard pressed on all sides, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body" (2 Corinthians 4:8-10)

[Behold]

2 minutes ago, Paul James said:

What Paul went through exceeded anything that any missionary would expect to go through.     But he found the demonic attacks were wearing him down,   So, in his weariness, distress, and depression, he pleaded with the Lord to remove the intense demonic attacks, but the Lord told him that His grace was sufficient for him.

 

Paul was an Apostle.  This is not the same as a missionary.  So, to teach that He is an Apostle, as he defined himself would be correct.

To teach, as you are doing,  that he is only a missionary, is a problem, because one of the proof's that you are an Apostle, is that you have Apostolic SIGN GIFTS....."Signs of an Apostle",

 2nd Corinthians 12:12.

Missionaries don't have these signs, and that is why they are called Missionaries and not Apostles.

Also, you originally you said that Paul's LIFE was his Thorn...Now you have changed your story .  You now say it was the demonic attacks, and you are saying this NOW< because you read that i actually quoted a BIBLE that said.  "messengers of Satan".. and explained this to you.      So, im ok if you now teach what i told you... 

Thats fine.

 

[Paul James]

11 hours ago, Behold said:

Paul was an Apostle.  This is not the same as a missionary.  So, to teach that He is an Apostle, as he defined himself would be correct.

To teach, as you are doing,  that he is only a missionary, is a problem, because one of the proof's that you are an Apostle, is that you have Apostolic SIGN GIFTS....."Signs of an Apostle",

 2nd Corinthians 12:12.

Missionaries don't have these signs, and that is why they are called Missionaries and not Apostles.

Also, you originally you said that Paul's LIFE was his Thorn...Now you have changed your story .  You now say it was the demonic attacks, and you are saying this NOW< because you read that i actually quoted a BIBLE that said.  "messengers of Satan".. and explained this to you.      So, im ok if you now teach what i told you... 

Thats fine.

 

I just read the context contained in 2 Corinthians 11, which is part of the same passage as 1 Corinthians 12.  There is no division between the two, hence, Paul hasn't changed the subject, and so what he suffered in 2 Corinthians 11 is directly linked to his "thorn in the flesh".   It is not good hermeneutics to extract one verse out of its general context and make Paul say when he never said.  That's called adding to God's Word, and comes under the judgment of Proverbs 30:5-6.

[Behold]

3 hours ago, Paul James said:

I just read the context contained in 2 Corinthians 11, which is part of the same passage as 1 Corinthians 12.  

@Paul James....There is most certainly a division..... An Apostle has the "Signs of an Apostle".  That is how you KNOW they are an APOSTLE and not just a "sent one", or a missionary.

An Apostle is DEFINED by having the "Signs of an apostle".  And without ALL these, you are not an apostle, tho you can be a missionary.

 Listen.... In the Epistle "Acts" a lot of people don't realize that the entire epistle is the "ACTS of the APOSTLES", and they become ruined useless believers by thinking this epistle is the "Acts of the Christians'....   But its not.  Its the "ACTS OF THE APOSTLES"....... So, when you have a believer running around trying to be an Apostle, worrying about gifts and signs,  you have a messed up mess of a believer and there are millions of them.... Including quite a few denominations that are created by people who are trying to have the "signs of an APOSTLE" and do NOT....... and never will.

Also, you previously asked me something about "Kenneth Copeland", and i will go and find the exact Q?. and respond later today...

 

talk to you then,

 

-B

Edited May 5, 2020 by Behold

[Daniel Marsh]

"

2 Corinthians 12:7

And that I should not be exalted overmuch, through the exceeding greatness of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me.

What do you say? He that counted not the kingdom to be anything; no, nor yet hell in respect of his longing after Christ; did he deem honor from the many to be anything, so as both to be lifted up and to need that curb continually? For he did not say, 'that he might buffet me,' but that he may buffet me. Yet who is there would say this? What then is the meaning of what is said? When we have explained what is meant at all by the thorn, and who is this messenger of Satan, then will we declare this also. There are some then who have said that he means a kind of pain in the head which was inflicted of the devil; but God forbid! For the body of Paul never could have been given over to the hands of the devil, seeing that the devil himself submitted to the same Paul at his mere bidding; and he set him laws and bounds, when he delivered over the fornicator for the destruction of the flesh, and he dared not to transgress them. 

...

That is to say, 'It is sufficient for you that you raise the dead, that you cure the blind, that you cleanse lepers, that you work those other miracles; seek not also exemption from danger and fear and to preach without annoyances. But are you pained and dejected lest it should seem to be owing to My weakness, that there are many who plot against and beat you and harass and scourge you? Why this very thing does show My power. For My power, He says, is made perfect in weakness, when being persecuted ye overcome your persecutors; when being harassed ye get the better of them that harass you; when being put in bonds ye convert them that put you in bonds. Seek not then more than is needed.' Do you see how he himself assigns one reason, and God another? For he himself says, Lest I should be exalted overmuch, there was given to me a thorn; but he says that God said He permitted it in order to show His power. 'You seek therefore a thing which is not only not needed, but which also obscures the glory of My power.' For by the words, is sufficient for you, He would signify this, that nothing else need be added, but the whole was complete. So that from this also it is plain that he does not intend pains in the head; for in truth they did not preach when they were sick, for they could not preach when ill; but that harassed and persecuted, they overcame all. 'After having heard this then,' he says,

...

https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/220226.htm

[Daniel Marsh]

"

2 Corinthians 12:7

And that I should not be exalted overmuch, through the exceeding greatness of the revelations, there was given to me a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan, to buffet me.

What do you say? He that counted not the kingdom to be anything; no, nor yet hell in respect of his longing after Christ; did he deem honor from the many to be anything, so as both to be lifted up and to need that curb continually? For he did not say, 'that he might buffet me,' but that he may buffet me. Yet who is there would say this? What then is the meaning of what is said? When we have explained what is meant at all by the thorn, and who is this messenger of Satan, then will we declare this also. There are some then who have said that he means a kind of pain in the head which was inflicted of the devil; but God forbid! For the body of Paul never could have been given over to the hands of the devil, seeing that the devil himself submitted to the same Paul at his mere bidding; and he set him laws and bounds, when he delivered over the fornicator for the destruction of the flesh, and he dared not to transgress them. 

...

That is to say, 'It is sufficient for you that you raise the dead, that you cure the blind, that you cleanse lepers, that you work those other miracles; seek not also exemption from danger and fear and to preach without annoyances. But are you pained and dejected lest it should seem to be owing to My weakness, that there are many who plot against and beat you and harass and scourge you? Why this very thing does show My power. For My power, He says, is made perfect in weakness, when being persecuted ye overcome your persecutors; when being harassed ye get the better of them that harass you; when being put in bonds ye convert them that put you in bonds. Seek not then more than is needed.' Do you see how he himself assigns one reason, and God another? For he himself says, Lest I should be exalted overmuch, there was given to me a thorn; but he says that God said He permitted it in order to show His power. 'You seek therefore a thing which is not only not needed, but which also obscures the glory of My power.' For by the words, is sufficient for you, He would signify this, that nothing else need be added, but the whole was complete. So that from this also it is plain that he does not intend pains in the head; for in truth they did not preach when they were sick, for they could not preach when ill; but that harassed and persecuted, they overcame all. 'After having heard this then,' he says,

...

https://www.newadvent.org/fathers/220226.htm

[Daniel Marsh]

7 But I must not be too proud of the wonderful things that were shown to me. So a painful problem  was given to me—an angel from Satan, sent to make me suffer, so that I would not think that I am better than anyone else. 8 I begged the Lord three times to take this problem away from me. 9 But the Lord said, “My grace is all you need. Only when you are weak can everything be done completely by my power.” So I will gladly boast about my weaknesses. Then Christ’s power can stay in me. 10 Yes, I am glad to have weaknesses if they are for Christ. I am glad to be insulted and have hard times. I am glad when I am persecuted and have problems, because it is when I am weak that I am really strong.

 

Robertson's Word Pictures in the New Testament

By reason of the exceeding greatness (τηι υπερβοληι — tēi huperbolēi). Instrumental case, “by the excess.”

That I should not be exalted overmuch (ινα μη υπεραιρωμαι — hina mē huperairōmai). Present passive subjunctive in final clause of υπεραιρω — huperairō old verb to lift up beyond, only here in N.T. This clause is repeated at the end of the sentence.

 

A thorn in the flesh (σκολοπς τηι σαρκι — skolops tēi sarki). This old word is used for splinter, stake, thorn. In the papyri and inscriptions examples occur both for splinter and thorn as the meaning. In the lxx it is usually thorn. The case of τηι σαρκι — tēi sarki can be either locative (in) or dative (for). What was it? Certainly it was some physical malady that persisted. All sorts of theories are held (malaria, eye-trouble, epilepsy, insomnia, migraine or sick-headache, etc.). It is a blessing to the rest of us that we do not know the particular affliction that so beset Paul. Each of us has some such splinter or thorn in the flesh, perhaps several at once.

 

Messenger of Satan (αγγελος Σατανα — aggelos Satana). Angel of Satan, the affliction personified.

 

Buffet (κολαπιζηι — kolaphizēi). See Matthew 26:67; 1 Corinthians 4:11 for this late and rare word from κολαπος — kolaphos fist. The messenger of Satan kept slapping Paul in the face and Paul now sees that it was God‘s will for it to be so.

 

https://www.studylight.org/commentary/2-corinthians/12-7.html

 

 

Vincent's Word Studies

Abundance ( ὑπερβολῇ )

Rev., more correctly, the exceeding greatness.

Thorn ( σκόλοψ )

Only here in the New Testament. Frequent in classical Greek in the sense of a pale or stake. It occurs once in Euripides, meaning a stump (“Bacchae,” 983). It is a stake for a palisade, or for impaling; a surgical instrument; the point of a fish-hook. In the Septuagint it occurs three times, translated thorn in Hosea 2:6, where, however, it is distinguished from ἀκάνθαις thornsbrier in Ezekiel 28:24, and prick in Numbers 33:55. Nine different Hebrew words are rendered by thorn, for which, in the great majority of cases, Septuagint gives ἄκανθα . The rendering thorn for σκόλοψ has no support. The figure is that of the impaling stake. Herodotus, alluding to this punishment, uses ἀνασκολοπίζειν (i., 128; 3,132). In the ninth book of his history, Lampon says to Pausanias: “When Leonidas was slain at Thermopylae, Xerxes and Mardonius beheaded and crucified ( ἀνεσταύρωσαν ) him. Do thou the like by Mardonius … . for by crucifying ( ἀνασκολοπίσας ) thou wilt avenge Leonidas” (ix., 78). The verb seems, therefore, to have been used interchangeably with crucify; and clear instances of this occur in Philo and Lucian. At least one text of the Septuagint gives ἀνασκολοπίζω in Esther 7:10, of Haman's being hanged. See further, on Galatians 2:20. The explanations of the peculiar nature of this affliction are numerous. Opinions are divided, generally, between mental or spiritual and bodily trials. Under the former head are sensual desires, faint-heartedness, doubts, temptations to despair, and blasphemous suggestions from the devil. Under the latter, persecution, mean personal appearance, headache, epilepsy, earache, stone, ophthalmia. It was probably a bodily malady, in the flesh; but its nature must remain a matter of conjecture. Very plausible reasons are given in favor of both epilepsy and ophthalmia. Bishop Lightfoot inclines to the former, and Archdeacon Farrar thinks that it was almost certainly the latter.

Messenger of Satan ( ἄγγελος Σατᾶν )

The torment is thus personified. Messenger is the word commonly rendered angel in the New Testament, though sometimes used of human messengers, as Luke 7:24, Luke 7:27; Luke 9:52; James 2:25; see also on the angels of the churches, Revelation 1:20. Messenger and Satan are not to be taken in apposition - a messenger who was Satan - because Satan is never called ἄγγελος in the New Testament. Messenger is figurative, in the sense of agent. Satan is conceived in the New Testament as the originator of bodily evil. Thus, in the gospel narrative, demoniac possession is often accompanied with some form of disease. Compare Luke 13:16; Acts 10:38, and see on 1 Corinthians 5:5.

Buffet ( κολαφίζῃ )

Connect with messenger, which better suits depart; not with thorn, which would be a confusion of metaphor, a stake buffeting. For the verb, meaning to strike with the fist, see Matthew 26:67; Mark 14:65; 1 Peter 2:20. Compare Job 2:5, Job 2:7, where the Septuagint has ἅψαι touchand ἔπαισε smotei0.

 

Robertson's Word Pictures in the New Testament
Concerning this thing (υπερ τουτου — huper toutou). More likely, “concerning this messenger of Satan.”

That it might depart from me (ινα αποστηι απ εμου — hina apostēi aph' emou). Second aorist active (intransitive) subjunctive of απιστημι — aphistēmi in final clause, “that he stand off from me for good.”

https://www.studylight.org/commentary/2-corinthians/12-8.html#rwp

 

Robertson's Word Pictures in the New Testament

He hath said (ειρηκεν — eirēken). Perfect active indicative, as if a final word. Paul probably still has the thorn in his flesh and needs this word of Christ.

Is sufficient (αρκει — arkei). Old word of rich meaning, perhaps kin to Latin arceo, to ward off against danger. Christ‘s grace suffices and abides.

 

Is perfected (τελειται — teleitai). Present passive indicative of τελεω — teleō to finish. It is linear in idea. Power is continually increased as the weakness grows. See note on Philemon 4:13 for this same noble conception. The human weakness opens the way for more of Christ‘s power and grace.

 

Most gladly rather (ηδιστα μαλλον — hēdista mallon). Two adverbs, one superlative (ηδιστα — hēdista), one comparative (μαλλον — mallon). “Rather” than ask any more (thrice already) for the removal of the thorn or splinter “most gladly will I glory in my weaknesses.” Slowly Paul had learned this supreme lesson, but it will never leave him (Romans 5:2; 2 Timothy 4:6-8).

 

May rest upon me (επισκηνωσηι επ εμε — episkēnōsēi ep' eme). Late and rare verb in first aorist active subjunctive with ινα — hina (final clause), to fix a tent upon, here upon Paul himself by a bold metaphor, as if the Shechinah of the Lord was overshadowing him (cf. Luke 9:34), the power (δυναμις — dunamis) of the Lord Jesus.

 

Vincent's Word Studies

He said ( εἴρηκεν )

Rev., correctly, He hath said. The force of the perfect tense is to be insisted on. It shows that the affliction was still clinging to Paul, and that there was lying in his mind when he wrote, not only the memory of the incident, but the sense of the still abiding power and value of Christ's grace; so that because the Lord hath said “my grace,” etc., Paul can now say, under the continued affliction, wherefore I take pleasure, etc., for Christ's sake; for when I am weak, then am I strong. A more beautiful use of the perfect it would be difficult to find in the New Testament.

My strength

The best texts omit my, thus turning the answer into a general proposition: strength is perfected in weakness; but besides the preeminent frigidity of replying to a passionate appeal with an aphorism, the reference to the special power of Christ is clear from the words power of Christ, which almost immediately follow. Compare 1 Corinthians 2:3, 1 Corinthians 2:4; 2 Corinthians 4:7; Hebrews 11:34. Rev., rightly, retains my italicized.

May rest upon ( ἐπισκηνώσῃ )

Only here in the New Testament. The simple verb σκηνόω todwell in a tent is used by John, especially in Revelation. See on John 1:14. The compound verb here means to fix a tent or a habitation upon; and the figure is that of Christ abiding upon him as a tent spread over him, during his temporary stay on earth.

For Christ's sake

This may be taken with all the preceding details, weaknesses, etc., endured for Christ's sake, or with I take pleasure, assigning the specific motive of his rejoicing: I take pleasure for Christ's sake.

[Daniel Marsh]

Robertson's Word Pictures in the New Testament

Wherefore I take pleasure (διο ευδοκω — dio eudokō). For this noble word see note on Matthew 3:17 and note on 2 Corinthians 5:8. The enemies of Paul will have a hard time now in making Paul unhappy by persecutions even unto death (Philemon 1:20-26). He is not courting martyrdom, but he does not fear it or anything that is “for Christ‘s sake” (υπερ Χριστου — huper Christou).

For when (οταν γαρ — hotan gar). “For whenever,” indefinite time.

 

Then I am strong (τοτε δυνατος ειμι — tote dunatos eimi). At that very time, but not in myself, but in the fresh access of power from Christ for the emergency.

https://www.studylight.org/commentary/2-corinthians/12-10.html#jumpList

[Daniel Marsh]

https://questions.org/attq/what-was-pauls-“thorn”/

There are basic positions.