Welcome back again to another podcast of Struggling Well. We're glad that you've joined us again this week, and we continue just talking about life. So Suzi,
I wish you all could be a fly on the wall. Not just here, not while we're in studio A, aka our kitchen table. but I feel like as a wife, I've been really I don't know what the word is. Blessed sounds like if you don't have this, you're not blessed. That I don't mean it that way. But God knowing how I design how I am designed and how much I like to talk, he gave me a husband who also likes to converse. And so every day since the kids were little, we'd do like a debrief. when they were little, we would go into our bedroom, shut the door, and just talk about the day, just find out, kind of catch up on things. It got to a point where they would be on the other side of the door just screaming, "Let us in, let us in." And our rule was unless you are bleeding from every orphice of your body, you cannot come in. And but Then it got to the place where they began to respect that we would just take those minutes to find out about each other and what was stirring. And now we have no children in our home. We have grandchildren. They're not in our home. Everyone's growing up, but we still do it every day. So this podcast is really we're just asking you to come and sit on the couch with us. And our thoughts are not necessarily inspired, but we pray that they will in some way encourage you as they have encouraged us. So, and once again, our dearly beloved dog is right at the table just breathing heavily and needing attention. but we're going to carry on.
Yes, we are.
So, where were we?
We're talking about the conversations we have, and this is going to be another one of those conversations is you have something that's been on your mind and on your heart, and we're going to talk about it.
I'm guessing that all of you pray at some point. point. maybe you pray you know that you'll get a parking space at work. maybe you'll pray that God will give you wisdom about whether to take a job or whether to date someone or what to do with your kids. maybe you're praying for your finances. I don't know. But we all and even people that say that they don't believe in God. It's odd how people will reach out for help. Some co IC God I guess I don't know but I've been thinking a lot about the concept of unanswered prayer and it has been something that has been on my mind a lot especially in light of the loss of my brother but then other people in our lives that we've watched and experienced the what feels like silence of God. we would love for our dog to be silent right now but for some reason babe what's the deal? Does he just go?
I will go. Do you think he needs to eat or does he have something to say?
No, he has nothing to say.
Okay. he is awfully cute though. Now Jimmy's trying to push him away, but he'll go right under his arm to get his attention. So, kind of like Gus who is wanting to get our attention and wanting us to say something. we're like that with God. We want him to respond to what we are asking him. And recently I came across a book and I want you to know my process when I read an author and that is that I get their name and then I look up their background so that I can see if they are theologically sound what they believe. I want to know their statement of belief. I just don't read because it's a popular book. I don't do that and Jimmy doesn't either. So we've told you before that we do oftentimes an online thing called Leio 365 which we really like a ton. And it's a guided prayer. and it's really good. And the main impetus of Electio is a man named Pete Greg and he's from the UK and we enjoy him a ton. Anyway, this last week, I guess it was, I was listening to one of the one of the episodes of Leo and I scrolled all the way down and at the bottom was a picture of a book. by Pete Greg called God Unmute and the front cover says Engaging the Silence of Unanswered Prayer. And that completely captivated me because I think about I have a list of prayers and I could go back through my journal and see prayers that have been answered, but there's also an equal amount, if not more, prayers that I have prayed to God that have been unanswered. So, I thought we would talk about that a little bit.
Oh. I think that everybody has experienced I say everybody I would think the majority of people have experienced unanswered prayers that God has in their minds not heard. And yet I do believe that God is a God who listens and hears our prayers. How we how he responds or the timetable he responds to those or the ways in which he responds to those is not ours to dictate. And yet we want to dictate that.
And it's th those times of silence that I think cause the greatest confusion for people as to whether God is listening or whether he hears. And we've said this in one of our past podcasts. It's in the 116th Psalm. It's one of the things that we you and I love about the picture that's there of he says he bends down to listen
and because he does I will pray. And so God is a God who does listen to our prayers and he responds to them. And yet we also, if we're going to go to the Psalms, there's the 88th Psalm, which is a hard one. And we've probably talked about this before. Let me get there, that it's not a psalm where as the psalmist is calling out to God. He says, "Oh Lord, God of my salvation, I cry out day and night before you. Let my prayer come before you. Incline your ear to my cry." Well, if you read that whole psalm, it doesn't end well. It doesn't end like
No, it's the only psalm of lament and there's many psalms of lament in scripture. It's the only psalm of lament that doesn't end in some kind of conclusion that God does here or some thing that brings it back to God who he is
really and the truth is all of the psalms are cries to God and all of the I mean from David to Asaf to whomever has written the psalm here's the crazy thing they all experience trouble and they all experienced an end of life and a struggle with life. And but when it feels like God is silent, that's that place where we go, I think you can find people that go, "God did not answer my prayer. I'm done with God."
Right?
And I'm going to walk away from this because he has not answered my prayer.
so God on mute, that's an interesting concept because he's not off Pete Greg's cover. It's self tells us God is on mute like you can mute a conversation that doesn't mean you've hung up but it's on mute that place of wondering why God hasn't spoken you look with the sisters when Lazarus died and we know that Jesus raised him from the dead but as far as they were concerned Jesus was on mute because he didn't answer and one of the sisters I don't remember which one says if you had been here
right
and that's A lot of what we struggle with, God, if you had answered, if you hadn't been here, this wouldn't have happened.
Yeah. And it's the difference between God being there and for whatever reason not responding the way we think he should or God not being there. It's not, you know, again, I'm going back to the title of the book. It's God on mute. It's not God in absencia, right?
He's not there. He just has chosen for whatever reason. And again, Then I go into the whole thing of I'm not God. I can't I don't want to pretend that I have a better answer than he does. and yet I think we come to that place where it comes down to we want to demand that God answers in the way that
Yes.
We want an answer of some kind.
exactly. And typically we don't want a no answer, but we want to answer. One of the I'm listening to God on Mage and I'm reading it at the same time, but One of the phrases that Pete Greg uses is I mean I don't think it's a chapter title. I can't find it again because as I'm listening to it I want to underline but I can't because I don't have the book in my hand.
But he uses this phrase and this has just oh my gosh it's resonated so with me. He talks about that there have been times when he is like a man praying as he's falling down the steps. So think about that. A man praying falling down the stairs. that person as they're falling down the stairs, what are they praying? They're praying, "God, save me. I don't want to be hurt. I want to land safely." And the prayers of a person falling down the stairs are that's the place. And I'm not putting words into Pete Greg's mouth because I don't know. I haven't read that far. But isn't that what we're like a lot? We're falling down the steps and we want God to answer and some way save us somehow.
Yeah. And so it's the cry of desperation. And again, it's not anything brand new. It's new to us maybe because this is our life now, but one of the prayers that's consistent throughout the Psalms. It's consistent throughout the prophets. how long, oh Lord, how long? How long? How long? How long? And that's that idea that something is going unanswered. Something is going unchanged in my world. I want changed to my benefit, to my good,
right?
And so will I continue to trust him and continue to pray even when it doesn't feel like he's hearing, but I know he is.
And I think maybe we've said this two weeks ago or maybe three weeks ago where when we're in that place, we are asking God to respond in a way that makes sense to me, to us. And trust, that word that we bat around a lot, trust in the Lord. Lean not unto your own understanding. We know the verses. We toss it around. Just trust the Lord. Just trust the Lord. That word has been haunting me. What does that mean? And I don't I can't give you a full explanation of it, but I right now I'm even closing my eyes trying to get my handle on trusting in a God when I can't see anything. When There doesn't seem to be any evidence that he's there. But believing that the God who created and the God who will come back and get us has not gone on vacation between creation and the final redemption of us. That he's actively involved. And that I've got to know him and his character. Because a lot of times people come to this and is that like I said before it's this crossroad. That's it. I'm done. How many people have you met in your life? time that have said, "Well, I tried that Christianity thing. It just didn't work." When really what they might be saying is, "I asked God for whatever." And he didn't answer, so I'm done.
Yeah. So, as you go through life, as you go through the events of life, you may be going through struggles right now, maybe not. But, but can you continue to move forward and trust in the character of God even when you don't see the answers that you want or you don't want or you wonder where God is and why he hasn't given you an answer? Because at the end of the day, the bottom line is trusting him, the one who knows all, who, as Suzi said, is the creator. He's the ultimate redeemer, but he's also the sustainer in our lives.
Let me end with this one quote. It's on the back of the book of God on mute. Pete Gar Greg steps into the dark side of prayer and engages with a hard one message of hope, comfort, and profound biblical insight for all who suffer in silence. And so we would encourage you to continue on. we'll be back again next week and again our new website redesign www. tandemspirituality. com. We hope you look it up and check it out and we hope that next week when you come back you won't hear Gus like you have the last couple of weeks. Have a great week.