so do we pray for healing?

so, we've been talking about healing recently.
why? 2 reasons. cause many of us and others around us have bodies that are broken, sick, failing. AND cause healing is something that happens when the Kingdom of God is at hand. Jesus healed not to prove that He was Divine (though He was), but to prove that the kingdom of God was beginning to be revealed on earth.
anyways, last sunday we dove into the difficult waters of faith and healing--how having enough faith isn't the only matter in healing. God's will is the ultimate matter in healing...
too many people have been weighted down with guilt because someone has told them that if only they had more faith they would have been healed, or their child would have lived, or whatever. when all the while, they had as much faith as they could muster and had prayed like crazy, and still they weren't healed, or their child didn't live. healing requires faith, but it is ultimately a matter that rests in the will of God.
and so we ended by talking about the need to come at prayer in a new way. instead of just prayer for our desires and tacking on "but not my will but yours be done, Jesus teaches and invites us to begin prayer with discernment (to begin by asking God what His will is, to ask God what He wants us to pray for...), and then to pray for that, to seek Him for His will. confident that what we seek is God's will.
the challenge of this is that discernment takes time. it isn't always just a matter of asking in the moment, hearing in the moment, and then praying. it takes time. time to listen. time to discern God's voice. time to have God search and sift our desires and reveal His. but in the end, it is a gift to come to God knowing that what we seek is truly His will, to know that we are seeking what God is seeking.
now as i said on sunday (repeatedly) this isn't the whole story on healing and prayer (and prayer for healing). there is so much more that could be said and that needs to be said.
and one of those things is what James says in James 5:14. but before i explain the verse (that most of us know), let me explain why i'm even bringing it up.
i guess i walk away from sunday concerned that any of us might now think that we shouldn't pray for healing, that we can't pray for healing, that we're only allowed to pray for healing, unless we've first heard God say that its His will to heal... cause its true, it isn't always God's will to heal... BUT it is always His heart (His desire).
and so, although i know that Jesus is calling us to learn to seek to know His will so that we might pray in faith for His will, He also invites us through James to ask for healing prayer. james 5:14, "Is anyone among you sick? Let them call the elders of the church to pray over them and anoint them with oil in the name of the Lord."
so what does this mean? does the Bible teach us to ask for prayer for healing when we're sick, or does it teach us to seek to know GOd's will and then pray for that? well, i'd say both.
God is not a slot machine. Christianity is not a system. we are children of a Living God who relates to us as a Living God. He has a will and desires (as we do). He is sovereign and all-knowing (unlike us). but that doesn't mean that He is impersonal. if anything, the Bible affirms to us that God is personal. we are invited into a living relationship with Him. to worship and trust and surrender to Him, but also to wrestle with him. sometimes God has even been known to change His will.
may God grant us humility as we wrestle with God and ourselves, and may His Kingdom and His will always win out... for His glory and our joy in Him.
your companion in the journey,
scott b. anderson