EPHword

Recently, I had a sobering realization in a small group setting. It started when we were going around the room asking if anyone had any prayer requests. Someone shared a need—asking for healing for a person dealing with serious health issues. At first, I quietly judged. I knew this person was struggling largely due to their own lifestyle choices—poor eating habits, no exercise, years of ignoring warning signs. I thought to myself, Why are we praying for something they could have prevented?

Then, almost immediately, I felt conviction.

Because not long before that, I had asked the group to pray for me. I’m going through a divorce. I haven’t seen my kids in what feels like forever. I asked for restoration—for my marriage, my family, my life.

But here’s the truth: I’m in this situation because of my own actions. I hid an addiction. I lied. I relapsed. I lied again. I broke trust. I created the mess I’m pleading for God to fix.

And that’s when it hit me. Asking for prayer for healing from a preventable disease is no different than asking for restoration after a self-inflicted disaster. In both cases, the suffering is real. In both cases, the need is desperate. And in both cases, grace is available.

This is the hard but beautiful truth of following Jesus: Even when the pain is your fault—even when the consequences are the direct result of your own decisions—The punishment is still not your spiritual burden to bear. He still carries it to the cross.

He doesn’t wait for you to clean yourself up first. He doesn’t weigh your suffering to see if it’s “deserved.” He just takes it. Freely. Willingly. Completely.

It’s a humbling thing to realize. And it changed how I see prayer.

Are there still physical consequences to bear? Of course there is. I’m paying for them. We all pay for them in time and flesh.

But never underestimate the power—or the appropriateness—of praying for someone, even if their situation is the result of poor choices. Jesus died for that one too. Nothing uttered in prayer is in vain, not one idle word. For me. For you. For all of us who’ve made messes we can’t fix on our own.

Grace doesn’t ask how we got here.
It just says, “Here I AM.”