June 25, 2020
“’For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,’ declares the Lord.” Isaiah 55:8
Every now and then someone will ask me a deep theological question about God. The question I get asked most often sounds a little like this: “Why does God seem to answer some people’s prayers, but not other prayers?” My best answer to that question is “I do not know the mind of God.”
Now maybe you think that is a cop out, but honestly I do not know God’s mind. How is it that after a devastating storm some people lose their houses or have major devastation and others living right next door haven’t been hurt at all? Both groups of people that God would protect their homes and property. Yet one is damaged and the other is left alone.
How about when two people get the diagnoses of cancer? Both parties pray that God would cure them. Yet one gets sicker and dies and the other responds positively to the treatment and lives a long life. This happens in Christian homes and non-believers homes.
What about the Moms who prays that God will protect their teenager as they go out in the car. One child gets home safely and the other gets a visit from a police office to tell them about a fatal accident. Was God only listening to one Mom and not the other?
These questions haunt me because I do not have a definitive answer. Yet here is what I believe. Isaiah says, “God’s ways are not my ways!” (Isaiah 55:8, paraphrased.) So here is what I believe. I must not trust in what happens to me and the answers to my prayers. I must trust in the one who controls what happens to me. Whether good or bad, God is God! When I learn to completely trust in the God who is in control then I can better cope with whatever happens when I pray.
Dear Lord, help me to just trust in you no matter the circumstances. Help me to trust even when I can’t control the circumstances. Help me to pray and believe. And when things do not turn out the way I want help me to be assured that how things did turn out are in your plans. It is hard sometimes just to believe no matter the circumstance, but it is the best way to understand that you are God!! In Jesus name I pray, Amen.
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