Hi Spark,
I would say in reference to the OP that suffering as our spiritual act of worship is incomplete. Our spiritual act of worship can include suffering, but in and of itself, it isn’t our act of worship. So what is our spiritual act of worship?
Romans 12:1-2
Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.
It’s what Jesus said in Matthew 16.
Then Jesus said to His disciples, “If anyone wishes to come after Me, he must deny himself, and take up his cross and follow Me. For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it; but whoever loses his life for My sake will find it. For what will it profit a man if he gains the whole world and forfeits his soul? Or what will a man give in exchange for his soul?
We are a living and holy sacrifice unto the Lord. Each day we reconfirm this by giving our lives over to the Lord to do as He will.
When I was first saved, we had beautiful, loving and kind mentors who were Charismatic and even probably WOF.
I was saved in December, one month later I was having pain in my gall bladder region. I was prayed for and in March my gall bladder was so diseased that it had to come out. Within 6 months I got FM and have had it for almost 40 years.
With all the love, care, concern and prayer from so many lovely believers in Christ with all the faith there is to believe that I‘d be healed, I’m not. But I believe in healing and God does heal, just not everyone.
My husband was prayed for a problem he had and he was healed. It was a genuine healing and we praise God for his healing all the time.
God decides who will be healed and who won’t. And He gives us all the grace to endure whatever comes upon us. I have other health issues now and so far I’m not healed of them. God can heal me and if He chooses to heal me that would be more than I could ever dream for. To live a life without pain and suffering would be so wonderful. No one who suffers in pain like this wouldn’t want healing. But when we pray for it and God says no, well that is His call.
Jesus only healed one person at the pool. Many were there waiting to jump in, but only one man was healed by Jesus.
There are others that were not healed. Timothy had stomach problems and frequent illnesses. He wasn’t healed. Paul tole him to take some wine for his frequent illnesses.
I know a lot of this has been discussed in other threads and I know I’ve said it before in the past. I could mention others, but if we find only one believer in the Scriptures and they weren’t healed, that shows that healing in not in the atonement. Timothy and Paul were great men of God. If anyone could or would be healed if all it took was faith, it would be them.
So anyway, we as living sacrifices will suffer in numerous ways. And one of them is health.
So those who teach healing is in the atonement, please keep it to yourselves. All you do is reap a whole pile of condemnation of those of us who are sick. We already deal with enough.
I had a friend who told me about a month ago that I needed to pray by pleading the blood. Oh so now that’s why I’m not healed. When does the condemnation ever stop.