"This chronic pain is my 'thorn in the flesh'—God gave it to keep me humble."
How it sounds in your head: I've heard it preached a hundred times: Paul had his thorn, and God said 'My grace is sufficient.' Maybe this pain is mine, a gift from God to keep me dependent, and asking for healing is asking to be proud.
"Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour."
-- 1 Peter 5:8Religious misinterpretation of 2 Corinthians 12:7, weaponizing Scripture to make God the author of suffering instead of the enemy.
Pastors have used Paul's thorn to explain why she's still sick, and it sounds spiritual to say God is using pain to teach her. The theology gives her suffering meaning, even if it makes God sound cruel, and she's scared to challenge what she's been taught for decades.
Satan afflicted Job with boils, loss, agony—religious friends said it was God's punishment for sin and he should accept it humbly. God's ACTUAL response: He rebuked the religious friends, HEALED Job completely, and gave him DOUBLE everything he'd lost—because the suffering was NEVER from God.
I REFUSE the lie that God gave me this pain! IT IS WRITTEN that my adversary the DEVIL seeks to devour, not my Father. Paul's thorn was a messenger of SATAN, not a gift from God. Jesus came to DESTROY the works of the devil, and chronic pain is the devil's work, not the Father's curriculum. IT IS WRITTEN that Jesus bore my sicknesses and carried my pains—He didn't give them to me! Like Job, I reject the religious lie that God authors suffering. I declare: this pain is NOT from my Father, and I have authority to CAST IT OUT!
The Father didn't send sickness to teach you humility—He sent His Son to DESTROY sickness because He hates what it does to His daughter. Like Job's friends who blamed God for Satan's attack, religion has lied to you, but God's about to rebuke the lie, heal your body completely, and restore DOUBLE what pain stole—because that's who He's always been.