PAUL: LIVING AND LEADING WITH LIMITATIONS

Although the Apostle Paul accomplished much in his life he experienced numerous limitations.

• Having to support himself in his missionary endeavours at times by making tents (Acts 18:3)

• Having no place to preach because he had been kicked out of synagogues as a trouble-maker (Acts 13:50; 18:6)

• Opposition from false teachers, legalists, and Jewish and Christian leaders who belittled his work and authority (Acts 13:50)

• Desertion by fellowworkers (2 Timothy 1:15)

• Physical suffering— weariness, pain, hunger, thirst, cold, nakedness, beatings, imprisonments, stoning, and shipwrecks (2 Corinthians 11:23–27)

• Confinement at the end of his life limited his movement (Acts 28:16, 20, 30)

• His “thorn in the flesh” (2 Corinthians 12:7)

Having a limitation does not necessarily mean a liability. Paul illustrates five attitudes required for transforming limitations into assets and living and leading victoriously.

1. Acceptance

He accepted the measure of God’s grace in his life and thereby accepted himself. “But by the grace of God I am what I am” (1 Corinthians 15:10 NIV). Once we realize everything this side of hell comes to us by God’s grace there is no room to complain about who we are or are not, or what we have or don’t have.

2. Humility

Accepting the measure of God’s grace produced humility because Paul recognized His place in God’s economy. “By God’s grace and mighty power, I have been given the privilege of serving him by spreading this Good News. Though I am the least deserving of all God’s people” (Ephesians 3:7–8). This humility put him in a mindset to further lay hold of God’s grace to handle the limitations because “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble” (James 4:6).

3. Consecration

Paul was completely surrendered to God’s will, glory, and call on his life right from the start (Galatians 1:15–16). He said, “For to me, living means living for Christ” (Philippians 1:21). And as unpleasant as his circumstances sometimes were, he could affirm “that everything that has happened to me here has helped to spread the Good News” (Philippians 1:12). Spreading the Gospel was more important than his limitations.

4. Reframing

Paul called his greatest limitation his “thorn in the flesh,” the exact nature of which is unknown. He handled this by first praying for its removal (2 Corinthians 12:8)—always a good initial response to limitations.

Realizing that God wasn’t going to remove it he then understood God had another purpose in mind which was to keep him from becoming proud of his accomplishments. In response Paul reframed his adversity into an advantage.

Instead of a cure for his thorn God gave him grace to bear it patiently. This was and still is His means to superseding limitations and turning them into an advantage. Grace is God’s way to display His strength and power in us. Paul’s weaknesses then became a vehicle through which he would be refined to be more like Christ and by which the power of Christ could more readily work through a humble Paul. By reframing Paul transformed limitations into strengths.

5. Rejoicing

Having understood how God’s grace works in view of limitations and reframing his limitations and weaknesses Paul then chooses a positive attitude toward them. He chooses to actively glory in them instead of just passively enduring them. He valued them as instruments of humbling and channels of grace to Him which God made available (2 Corinthians 12:9). He chooses to boast about them and to take pleasure in them because of what God accomplished not in spite of them but because of them.

Our limitations may not be like Paul’s but none of them need defeat us. We too may transform them using the template Paul gives us. By understanding and trusting that God has His purposes in them, we too can be victorious and fruitful and, even because of our limitations, be strong.

Steve Johnson is the executive director at Insight for Living Canada.