His Grace is Sufficient

There's nothing that will bring you to your knees faster than a serious illness, a sudden castastrophy, or some kind of tragedy. Most of us go along living our daily lives, comfortable in our routines, and for the most part undisturbed in our limitations. But then your worst nightmare suddenly becomes reality.

Or maybe you live in a state of wakeful attentiveness to God. You have always sought His will, trying to live by faith in obedience to His commands. Having been a faithful servant, having a real love for God, you are completely thrown off balance when something very scary looms before you. Something that will turn your world upside down.........

Was it like that when you were diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease (or whatever disease you battle, or heartbreak you are forced to endure)? Have you dared to ask God for a miracle? Have you asked Him the scariest question ever - to heal you, but you are still sick?

I read somewhere online (here's the link: http://www.liontracks.org/roarlion/healingnow.htm
"Why would God allow one of His children to remain or become sick? The clear answer of Scriptures is that He will be glorified by it! God uses illness sometimes to correct, to teach, and to give opportunity to other believers for service. Even when we cannot understand the why, it is undoubtedly part of God's plan for the greater good and unquestionably for even my own good. God is working "all things" for our good, even those things that we see as bad or negative."

" If God desires to grant {you} physical restoration immediately and temporarily before death, He can and will, but if He desires that {you} bear this burden for a time, even until death, both are for His honor and glory."

"Some claim a passage in James to guarantee immediate healing, so long as the elders of the church are involved.

James 5:14-16 Is any one of you sick? He should call the elders of the church to pray over him and anoint him with oil in the name of the Lord. 15 And the prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well; the Lord will raise him up. If he has sinned, he will be forgiven. 16 Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective. (NIV)

Those who turn this into a promise for immediate healing have missed a key portion of the text. It is "the Lord (who) will raise him up". This leaves the time and nature of the healing to our Lord and not to the person who is sick or even to the elders. Truly the "prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective" but the nature of all truly God-centered prayer is found in the prayer that Jesus taught:

Matthew 6:10b ... your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. (NIV)"

God is God, and He is love, and we must not lose sight of that. His ways are not our ways. We must have faith that He is who He says He is.

"Faith is resting on the character of God." quote from Malcomb Smith