Stop praying for me to be healed

There are many many many people out there in this world praying for Kendra and I. You're praying for my healing, for our family, for our emotional and physical well being, and many other prayer requests.


Stop praying that God would heal me, only.


It's okay for us to make our requests known to God. He actually commands it. Jesus prays for relief from His burden in the Garden of Gethsemane. However we're missing something entirely.


When someone we know or love has a crisis enter their life we instantly begin praying for them. Most of the time our prayer is one of "remove this obstacle". Whether it is health, or job uncertainty, or relationship problems. Whatever the  issue, "Lord please take this out of their lives. Heal them. Provide a job. Make the problems stop!"


Let's think a moment about why those trials enter into our lives.


Proverbs 17:3


The crucible for silver, and the refining pot for Gold, but the Lord tests hearts.


Isaiah 48:10


Behold I have refined you, but not as silver; I have tested you in the furnace of affliction.


What's more valuable than pure gold? For ages, for centuries it is the measure of wealth and prestige. However in order to attain pure gold there's a process.


It's grueling, intense, and radical. Fire which destroys everything it touches is the very thing you use to eliminate waste and imperfection.


Not a match.


Not a candle.


Not a campfire.


A melting pot in a forge heated to almost 2000 degrees.


This is not a light or easy test for the gold. It requires that it radically change its complexion. It must physically change states before it can become the end product.


You can not pull it out of the fire early and get the same result. The only way to purify it is to let it sit in the fire until it is completely devoid of foreign material.


So how many times are we trying to pray our friends and family out of the fire prematurely? Is it because we feel sorry for them, or it's hard to watch them struggle? What if you knew that what they're going through is the process that God has told us MUST happen in order to become pure?


Have you ever sang the song "Refiner's Fire"? Did you really mean the words you sang?


As Christians in the western world we judge our maturity in Christ by how comfortable we are. Is life going well? Well then God must be pleased with me. Am I comfortable? Must mean I'm doing something right.


Are there trials and struggles in my life? Oh no, something's wrong. I just want to get back to the place where things were easy, under control, and going the way I like it.


The opposite is true. You will be pressed, and crushed, like a grape in a wine press. In order to yield the wine. Or crushed over and over like an olive in an olive press, however you'll produce the olive oil.


Do not avoid pain, trial, tribulation. As a matter of fact, you're actually called to rejoice in it.


Romans 5:3 - Not only so, but we also rejoice in our suffering....


Are you thanking God for the suffering He has placed or allowed in your life right now? How about in my life?


It goes even further though.


James 1:2-4 Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.


Not only do you have to rejoice, you have to consider "pure joy" when you face trials. And you must let perseverance finish its work. You can't shortcircuit the process. However, when you do finish you'll be mature, complete, and lacking in nothing.


So my dear friends and family. Please pray for God to heal me. I pray that every day. Let us also pray that God would use this test to refine my character and my person to pure gold, that I would be obedient to the lessons He's calling me to. Pray that His will would be done.


Pure gold does not fear the fire.