When God Doesn’t Answer Your Prayers
“And my tongue shall speak of thy righteousness and of thy praise all the day long.” Psalm 35:38
“Thank you Lord for not answering my prayers,” I praised the Lord aloud as I led paralyzed dog Miss Mercy back inside from a little walk in her wheelchair. “You know what’s best.”
I could not have been more surprised at my outspoken praise, nor could I have been more thankful for the delight and joy in my heart after a long period of discouragement, frustration, and disappointment, stress, complaining, self-pity and pride, not to mention fear and worry, distrust and unbelief all emanating from my throwing my two-year-old temper tantrum fists up in the air at God for not answering my cries – not answering them the way I wanted anyway. See, for so incredibly long it seemed, I wanted God to relieve me of having to care for so many dogs with virtually no help. I wanted long hoped-for and prayed-for adoptions, physical help, anything at all that would relieve me of the feelings that had built up after 20 years of dog rescue not to mention six years of not having one single day off from the dogs that in recent years included paralyzed dogs and other special needs dogs requiring much more work than the typical dog. God had not answered my cries!
But oh, what sweet surrender the morning I praised Him for not answering my prayers! For that morning my heart was so filled with His Spirit that I found I had returned to the truth that God indeed does always know what’s best. He has His reasons, His plan, His purpose, in everything, most importantly to teach His children to love and worship Him forever as He prepares His followers for eternity with Him by conforming us to Christ’s image which I have come to discover so often happens in mighty ways amid life’s greatest trials.
In these sweet, gentle, lullaby-like in the sense of God’s love moments of reflecting on all this, knowing well my trials were not over, I was given a Holy Spirit’s eye view of what God had been doing through various trials. He had been trying my faith, teaching me patience, growing me in His image, teaching me what true love for Him and trust in Him really are, helping me see I really belong to Him through faith in Christ rather than belonging to myself. I have devoted myself to the Lord which means through the good, bad, ugly, hard, trying, through it all, I am utterly His, His for Him to work in and through me, His to refine me to teach me to walk in His ways – to spend forever with Him.
If He is not answering your prayers, trust He knows what’s best! Yield your heart and life to Him! Praise Him! Praise the Lord!