Stone or Flesh?

I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. Ezekiel36:26NIV

“Be careful what you wish for, you might just get it”. Then what? Allow me the liberty of taking my dad’s words and changing them a little to say, “Be careful what you pray for, you might just get it”. Our prayers can be shallow, and all about us, our needs, and wants. Much of the time we pray, and we know fine well it won’t be answered so we start to let doubt creep in.

It is out of our hands and control when we pray for the friend who has cancer. We kind of believe it, or more likely we hope for an answer that agrees with ours. The disease has to go. It must be healed or God isn’t listening to our petition prayed in tears. It’s out of our control and we don’t like that. But what about those prayers for our own spiritual well-being? Those prayers for an extra portion of kindness, patience,love, peace, joy that we need so much. An answer to those would mean a change in our own life. Are we ready for that?

I am on very close terms with a friend of many years who has been a Christian for as long as I can remember. He lost his wife to cancer at a relatively young age, and he changed. His heart became like stone. Lifeless and without feeling. You see he was angry with God, because He didn’t answer his many prayers through tears. Slowly, all too slowly, he started to recognise what was happening. His once soft heart had turned to stone, almost at the instant that God let him down (or so he thought). One day there was a turning point, because he prayed the prayer in this verse. He didn’t like carrying this heavy, stone heart around, so he simply prayed that it be replaced by a heart of flesh. Almost as fast as the words of the prayer had ended, he felt different. The stone was rolled away, and he felt lighter. The joy of his salvation had returned and that was the price. That’s the best way he could describe it.

So, be careful what you pray for. You may just be surprised by the answer.