Lord, If You Are Willing...

And it happened that while He was in one of the cities, behold, there was a man covered with leprosy; and when he saw Jesus, he fell on his face and begged Him, saying, “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean.” And He stretched out His hand and touched him, saying, “I am willing; be cleansed.” And immediately the leprosy left him. - Luke 5:12-13 LSB

Like most, if not all of you reading this, I love those two verses above. I love the leper’s humility, plea, and faith: “Lord, if You are willing, You can make me clean.” He humbly called Him, “Lord,” he professed faith that if Jesus was willing, He was able to cure him of his leprosy and make him clean. What heart cannot be moved by Jesus’ response as He stretched out His hand and touched Him (something no one did to lepers because their leprosy made them unclean) and said, “I am willing; be cleansed.”

I have prayed prayers of, “Lord, if You are willing, You can...” and He was not willing. He had other plans and those plans were to glorify Himself and were for the good of others, but they also included my trial enduring. His plan included my suffering and to deliver me from that prematurely would have been to abandon His good plan. It’s okay to go before Him in tears and plead, “Lord, if You are willing...” but may our hearts take hope and comfort even if His answer is, “My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is perfected in weakness.”

Do you see the beauty in that? God’s grace is sufficient for us in our sufferings and trials and His power is glorified not in spite of our weakness but because of our weakness. Our weakness, inability, and insufficiency is the perfect opportunity for His perfection to be glorified. This is why Paul’s response to this was:

“Most gladly, therefore, I will rather boast in my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am well content with weaknesses, with insults, with distresses, with persecutions and hardships, for the sake of Christ, for when I am weak, then I am strong.” - from 2 Corinthians 12:9-10 LSB

Should not all of Christ’s followers have the same mindset as Paul in 2 Corinthians 12:9-10? I don’t deny the difficulty of this for our flesh would far prefer the healing and deliverance of Luke 5:13. But the truth is that He is not always willing. His plan is being worked out in this broken world and He is weaving His perfect plan through our trials and sufferings.

Please open your Bible and read 2 Corinthians 1:1-7.

These verses loudly proclaim the good and holy purpose that God can bring from our afflictions.

You are being guarded by God’s power through faith for a salvation that is ready to be revealed in the last time. You rejoice in this, even though now for a short time, if necessary, you suffer grief in various trials so that the proven character of your faith — more valuable than gold which, though perishable, is refined by fire — may result in praise, glory, and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. - 1 Peter 1:5-7 CSB

As God’s children we can rejoice even as we suffer grief from various trials in this life. Like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego we can boldly proclaim that our God is able to deliver us “but if not” we will still love and obey Him. I want to challenge you to personalize this to your own specific trial, write it down, and read it out loud.

“Father, _________________________________________________________________________________ but if not __________________________________________.”

We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God, who are called according to his purpose. - Romans 8:28 CSB