Everybody has a thorn (1)
‘A thorn in the flesh was given to me’ 2 Corinthians 12:7 NKJV
Paul writes: ‘A thorn in the flesh was given to me, a messenger of Satan to buffet me, lest I be exalted above measure. Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me. And He said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me… For when I am weak, then I am strong.’ (2 Corinthians 12:7–10 NKJV) Paul had such great faith that when he prayed, the sick were healed and the dead were raised. Yet, he prayed repeatedly that God would remove his ‘thorn in the flesh’, and God said no. Why? To keep him humble and make him totally dependent on God.
We don’t know what Paul’s thorn in the flesh was, but we know why he had it: ‘And lest I should be exalted above measure by the abundance of the revelations.’ (2 Corinthians 12:7 NKJV) When God blesses you greatly, with it comes the risk of pride. And with God, that’s a disqualifier. If you have ever had a splinter in your finger, you know it throbs with pain and constantly irritates you. Can you live with it? Yes. Would you rather not? Yes. Note what Paul says: ‘A thorn in the flesh was given to me.’ Not only does he come to see his thorn as a grace developer, but a gift that does two things:
(1) Humbles us and makes us more dependent on God.
(2) Makes us more tolerant and gracious since everybody has a weakness.
SoulFood: Num 6:1–21, Matt 4:1–17, Mark 2:18–22
The Word for Today is authored by Bob and Debby Gass and published under licence from UCB International Copyright © 2026
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Hi there
If you live in Australia, New Zealand, the UK, or the USA you have access to a great Christian radio station, and a daily devotional.
Our mission is to make sure that everyone living in the Asia Pacific region also has that same blessing. And why shouldn’t they?
Today’s technology can be used to do a lot of the work, but there is still a need for people and money to make it happen. Our aim is to get our Life FM branded radio station on air locally, as well as making them available online for everyone anytime. Plus we print The Word for Today daily devotional (Renungan Hari Ini in Indonesian) and give away tens of thousands of copies into the region every year.
We hope this dream excites you and that you’ll join us in praying we can get more stations on air, and more copies of The Word for Today printed.
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Plus you can read The Word for Today, your Bible and heaps more Click Here to find out moreWhat we do
Radio
Helping local Christian people harness the incredible power of radio to have a positive impact in their communities is the mainstay of our ministry.
Radio gets behind closed doors to bring the light, hope and encouragement of the Gospel message to people right where they are.
We broadcast our youth focussed Life fm, (Laif FM, Laef FM) in Vanuatu, Cook Islands, Solomon Islands, Papua New Guinea, and soon Fiji and Nauru. You can hear what that station sounds like right now with this link or by using the “Listen Now” button at the top of our website.
But these broadcasts aren’t without challenges. In today’s COVID crazy world we struggle to get expert technical support to our stations when they need it. It is hard enough just to ship replacement equipment when something breaks.
Please pray for our ministry and our local teams. We need God’s wisdom and provision as we seek to serve the beautiful people throughout the Asia Pacific region with the best Christian radio. And ‘the best’ is what they deserve!
The Word for Today
In 2020, thanks to your donations, we were able to launch a special 200 page, 12 month edition of The Word for Today in Papua New Guinea, Vanuatu, Solomon Islands, Cook Islands, Fiji, Samoa and Timor-Leste.
We did it all again in 2021 and added Nauru and an Indonesian language edition called Renungan Hari Ini. And we’ve continued to do it every year since.
And not to forget our team in Nepal have been faithfully producing the Nepali edition for many years.
If you are in one the nations listed above and you’d like a copy of the current edition, contact your local UCB team – you’ll find their contact details when you choose the nation from the Projects in the menu above. Or use our contact form and well pass it on.
The Word for Today is loved around the world for its simple Biblical truths and relevant teaching. A quarterly edition is also available in Australia (from Vision Christian Media) and NZ (from Rhema Media).
Online & Social
Even in the remotest island nearly everyone has a mobile phone. And while their village might not have running water or grid electricity, they do have YouTube and Facebook!
So if we are to reach people with ‘Christian media’, guess where we have to be.
Thanks to support from people like you we are able to build websites, develop a mobile App and help our local team develop Social Media strategies so they can effectively interact with their community.
Our App is free and customised for each nation. It has a custom radio stream and relevant content for that nation’s people including The Word for Today, the Bible in local languages, podcasts and a lot more.
Ideally we would like a Telecommunications partner so local people can use our app unmetered (without having to use paid data). Something we’d love you to join us in prayer about.
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You are enabling God to do great things in the lives of people all across the Asia Pacific region.
Here are just three examples of the impact you are having:
James
I am from Eastern Part of Nepal called Khotang. Currently I am doing ministry at Kathmandu. I am very much thankful to Message of Hope for providing The Word for Today. I got to know about this from one of my Facebook friends. Since that day I am a regular listener of daily devotion of “The Word for Today“. I am very much blessed by this post, which is very short and sweet to understand and share to others friends. From this devotion post, I learned so many new things, which became very useful for my ministry. Similarly, the weekly quiz has developed my reading habit of Bible. I am very much thankful to Message of Hope Nepal.
The Word for Today reader
Nepal
Mrs A
…you have no idea, how much impact God has wrought in my life through those anointed messages.
Those messages are sent straight from the throne room of the Almighty down to his chosen. I truly owe it to you all and I believe nothing in this physical world could match the wealth of heaven that is distributed every day through the programs that are aired.
I count myself most privileged person to reap its benefits just by tuning every morning. My daily routine was dependant on those power packed messages.
Laif FM listener & The Word for Today reader
Papua New Guinea
Debby
Over Christmas, we had a big Franklin Graham event and 50,000 attended. At this event they showed our video which we made in three days about former addicts who had been set free by Jesus. Many were touched and encouraged by it.
When we put our same video online, it got 700,000 views. I learned that you don’t have to be a specialist. You can be a mom and learn how to use these tools and you can make media and send messages out to share the Gospel with people all over the world. We post one new little video each day. On my website, most of our videos get 200,000 views.
Medialight course graduate
Thailand
Our Team
Ian Worby
CEO
The big cheese or ‘sir’! He’s the ideas man, dreaming big, coming up with “what if we…” and gathering the right people around him to make it happen.
Grant Kennedy
Projects Manager
Actually he’s more like: photographer, designer, administrator, builder, plumber, maker of things unheard of and fixer of things broken.
Steve Monro
Broadcast Development Manager
Fancy title, but really he’s a top bloke and tech whizz/geek who knows how to make the radio, studio, computers and stuff work really well.
Henry Peterson
Digital Content Specialist
Another fancy title, but if you want to talk websites and social media then this is your guy, also samoan muscles available for hire.
Rudy Oei
Liaison Officer
Part technician, part Mr Fixit, but
all nice guy. And it really helps he’s fluent in Indonesian when it comes to communicating with our teams in Indonesia and Timor-Leste
If I had to define ‘Trusted Christian Media’ and sum up what we do in a few words I would say…
We preach the Word and make disciples.
How? We use media.