Last Minute Post #2: Please pray for Paul

My other last minute post prior to my December blogging silence is a request for prayer…

For several years now I’ve read the blog The Rest of the Old, Old Story, written by a chap named Paul, in which he discusses Church history and Sacred Scripture. I haven’t always agreed with his positions, but our debates in the Comment Box have always been warm and good-natured.

Paul had previously been diagnosed Leukemia, but now it appears he has lymphoma. In his most recent post, he wrote the following:

I have readers that are Protestant, ex-Protestant, Catholic, ex-Catholic, and Orthodox. I have loners and standard church people reading this blog.

Nonetheless, I plead for one reaction among this “family” of readers.

Those who have given themselves to Jesus, bowing their knee to him as King, are his chosen. God takes over their lives, monitoring everything that comes their way, and moving them by the Holy Spirit to respond as they should. He leads, he guides, he disciplines, he protects.

He works all things together for good for people like us. We do not reject his word, we love and long for it. When trials come, even if they are leukemia and lymphoma, we consider it joy. We do a little dance, and we rejoice that we are being molded by God into someone patient. Patience works in a person, producing character and resulting in a maturing work that produces a completed saint, lacking nothing (Rom. 5:2-4; Jam. 1:2-4).

So I’m asking you, my readers, to pray for me to honor God by my obedience to his promises and by joy, which proves my belief in his words to us. You can pray for healing if you want. A miraculous healing would glorify God as well.

However, I’m not among those convinced that God always wants physical healing. Sometimes the healing of our characters and self-will is more important than the healing of our bodies. Pain and suffering are routes to eternal joy, opportunities to clear our souls of self so that the glory of God can be revealed through us.

Please, my dear readers and those who know me in person, join me in rejecting the cares of this world, casting those on Jesus, who cares for us, and praying for one another that our lives would glorify God in the midst of everything. Let’s be the overcomers, testifying to the world and to the devil himself that “though he slay us, yet will we praise him with joyful shouts and singing.”

I’ll sign off now with a few words of Scripture and a request that you pray for my friend:

If one member [of the Body] suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. – 1 Corinthians 12:24-26