Why Do You Want To Be Healed?

"Why do you want to be healed? Why do you want to stay on this earth?" [Chan asked a man who requested the elders pray and anoint him with oil as he was dying from cancer] The man...seemed a bit surprised that I would ask such a blunt question. The reason I probed like this is because in the epistle of James, we are reminded that we often don't receive the answers to our prayers because we ask for the wrong reasons.
"³ When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures." James 4.3 (NIV  BibleGateway for different version click here)
Our desire to live should be for the sake and glory of the God who put us on this earth in the first place.
"Forgotten God", Francis Chan, David C Cook Publishing, Colorado USA, 2009, pg 84

This strikes hard. When I think of the times I have asked to be healed from RA...I have asked purely for myself. To be free of the pain, nausea and depression of RA. To enter the workforce as a nurse again, have the honor involved in being a nurse at all. To go and do things with my husband for dates, rather than our always sitting (me laying) on a couch watching an old release movie. To do things with my friends. To drive a car when and where I want. To have children when I want. To do what I want when I want.  Me, Me, Me. The Me god.

I do not recall a single time I asked God to heal me that I might go forth into the world in a manner of fully honoring Him. I will not deny that it was often a goal while I was in the working world to honor God with my work...but I still have not asked God to heal me in this manner. While He still may not provide healing, depending on His will...think of how Jesus prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane:

"Going a little farther, He fell with His face to the ground and prayed, "My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as You will."  Matt 26.39

He was willing, regardless of the cost, to do what God wished.

I have accepted, to the best of my abilities, that healing/remission of RA may not be in the plan of the Lord, much as the crucifixion of Christ still had to happen, Paul kept the thorn in his side, etc. Sometimes these hard, difficult, terrible things must happen. Harsh realities in life mature us, make our discipleship under Christ stand out to those lost---for who would remain loyal to Someone that was not an indescribably perfect, loving God while facing the worst of times? Logically, no one; thus our staying power when facing trials is a good witness for Him.

Regardless of what happens, healing or no, we can be assured of His love. I have found that even the hardest things I have faced have led to greater understanding of Him, a greater ability to face future trials...so even when things seem incredibly difficult, He does indeed know what is best, and does what is best for us. His love was enough to face the torture of His death that we might dwell in His presence evermore.