✌🏼When God Doesn’t Answer
I have a daily prayer list with dozens of people listed. Part of it I call my harvest list. For some time now, my phone alerts me at 10:02 am to pray for the harvest as a Luke 10:2 reminder.
Luke 10:2 (NET) He said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest.
There’s also a monthly calendar with an individual name for each day. Those trigger reminders throughout the day to pray for my “person of the day.”
Most of the people I know very well. But if I meet someone and there’s a disciple-making opportunity they go on the list too. Sometimes with a name if I can remember and sometimes just a description. The latest addition for instance is, “Guy pushing carts at Walmart.”
There are some pretty amazing stories about answered prayers from that list. There are also people I’ve prayed for a long time and have seen no results.
It’s impossible to pray for everyone. If someone moves, purposely disconnects or I no longer feel led to focus on them, from time to time, I’ll go through and clean up the list. If I don’t really know someone and an opportunity to connect doesn’t happen, usually after about six months I’ll archive the name.
Several years ago, I met this young man while he was incarcerated. The conversation was pretty much one f-bomb after another. But there was something about this kid that I couldn’t shake. Such potential being wasted.
I got a Bible to him and put him on my prayer list. Months later he was released and I didn’t hear from him again. But each time I did a list cleanup… he stayed on the list. Off and on I heard things that seemed like he was in trouble again. There wasn’t much I could do but pray though.
This month, on the 21st as always, he was my person of prayer for the day. Honestly, several of those months I thought… maybe it’s time to pray for someone else.
But this time, a couple of days later, I got a message that he wanted to be baptized. On his own, he decided it was time to follow Jesus. And this Sunday, on our back porch in a portable hot tub, it was my privilege to baptize this young man.
To see him begin to follow Jesus was an incredible experience. That’s why I don’t give up. That’s why we do what we do.
While God gets all the credit, He does choose to somehow work through our prayers. Jesus said to ask, seek, and knock. In the original Greek, the language implies a continued process, not a one-time thing.
Ask and keep on asking. Seek and keep on seeking. Knock and keep on knocking. God does hear and answer prayer, but His calendar isn’t like our calendar! He has an eternal plan. Our job is to just keep praying.
There are a lot of things on my prayer list. Not just people. The last few years my wife and I have faced much adversity. In fact, we don’t even have transportation right now. And on this miraculous baptism Sunday, after church we needed to give back the car we’d been able to borrow for a week.
I’m writing this with an empty driveway, and a bank account that’s not much better. My spreadsheet for the next few days just doesn’t add up. And yet, I’m rich beyond imagination. Days like today remind me that God will answer. He will provide. We are going to be okay.
How do I know that? Because it’s been on my prayer list for some time now. And now is a good time to ask, seek, and knock again!
Don’t give up. Just keep praying.
Matthew 7:7-11 (NET)
7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. 9 Is there anyone among you who, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you then, although you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!