In
life, there are simply times when no matter how hard we pray, how long
we choose to fast, or even how many other faithful friends steadfastly intercede on our behalf, life's circumstances may not change or even get
better. In fact, to our dismay, they might even get worse.
Miracles
do not always happen that change our circumstances, no matter how much
faith we may have. In fact, the Scriptures teach us that when there is
no miracle, that does not mean that God does not have a plan. The Bible also
teaches us that having our own way, may not always be a good thing, in fact, it can even lead to disaster and heartache (See Numbers
11; Psalm 106:15).
Our
request for a miraculous change in our circumstances may sometimes not be granted. Some
stubbornly refuse to let go of a request for God to intervene and heal or
deliver a loved one from a tragic set of circumstances. Over time, when there is no miracle one can
become disillusioned regarding God's faithfulness and mercy. The real miracle that God desires is a completely yielded heart, trusting Him regardless, that He might be glorified however the situation turns out.
The Prayer life of Jesus
Jesus spent much time alone so that He could pray to His Father and commune with Him in The Quiet Place. His prayer life provides us with a model for our own personal worship time with God. It also provides insight into
how He lived His earthly ministry under God the Father's Sovereignty.
He made Time for The Quiet Place
“After He had dismissed
them, He went up on a mountainside by Himself to pray. Later that night, He was
there alone.” Matthew 14:23
“Very early in the
morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to
a solitary place, where He prayed.” Mark
1:35
“One of those days Jesus
went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God.” Luke 6:12
“Yet the news about Him
spread all the more, so that crowds of people came to hear Him and to be healed
of their sicknesses, but Jesus often withdrew to lonely places and
prayed.” Luke 5:15-16
It is insightful that no matter how busy and exhausted Jesus became, He always found time to go to The Quiet Place to meet with His Father. The time or place was not significant. He found the time and He made a place. What an encouraging example this is for each of us to make time for The Quiet Place no matter what is happening in our lives. We can sometimes be tempted to say, "I just haven't had time to pray about it." Really....or is it rather that we have just not made it a priority to pray about it.
Surrendering our Will to God
The
Lord wanted his disciples to really grasp the reality that life for
them as His followers was not about maneuvering God’s will to fit their
plans, but rather submitting to God’s Sovereign authority to discover
how to live under His plan.
He taught them what to center their prayers upon, so as to prepare them for serving God in the troublesome days that were soon to come.
“This,
then, is how you should pray: “‘Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be Your
name, Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.
Give us today our daily bread, and forgive us our debts, as we also
have forgiven our debtors, and lead us not into temptation, but deliver
us from the evil one.” Matthew 6:9-13
They
would later become Apostles who would wield miraculous power and authority,
as the New Testament Church was established. They all would suffer extreme hardship and persecution, and
most would be tortured, and die as martyr's, refusing to deny Him. Their present plan had to give way to His perfect plan.
"Our Father in Heaven, hallowed be Your name, Your Kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven.”Matt. 6:9b -10
There
is a critical step in this model prayer that directs us to humble
ourselves and bow the knee in reverential submission to the Sovereign
will of our Heavenly Father. The will of the King is to reign in His Kingdom.
God's Will must Reign over Our Will
We all have a tendency in life to want everything to go our way. In The Quiet Place God
wants each of us to learn that our way may sometimes be in direct
conflict with His will. Our life will sometimes have seasons of
difficult trials, discouraging disappointment, and painful devastating
suffering. Regardless of our feelings, our circumstances or our dreams,
His will must reign over our will.
"This is what the Sovereign LORD, the Holy One of Israel, says: “In repentance and rest is your salvation, in quietness and trust is your strength, but you would have none of it." Isaiah 30:15
Christ Submitted His Will to God's Sovereignty
Jesus
later modeled this truth at a time when He was soon to face the
greatest test of His earthly ministry. As He prayed to His Father in the
Garden of Gethsemane, He prayed knowing the horrific circumstances that were to
come. He sought to prepare His heart for the coming agonies of the Cross.
We
will never know the sweetness of precious worship and intercession with
God, until we are brought to a place where we kneel alone before His
Glory and Majesty as our Sovereign Father. This is especially true when there is no evidence of a miracle we so desperately had hoped that He would grant. It is often in the darkest
hour of sorrow and suffering, that the Holy Spirit makes His presence intimately known, as we fall prostrate before His Throne in absolute surrender.
In The Quiet Place Christ Communed with His Father
Christ
had but one place to be on that terrible night in Gethsemane, and that
was to seek out His Father, and shut out the world around Him. The only
way, in the midst of suffering that we can rise above the pain, and despair, is to
draw near to God, and share our heart with Him alone.
Try
to picture that night in the garden of Gethsemane. Jesus knew He was
about to be thrust into unspeakable horror and the unimaginable anguish of the crucible of the Cross.
He
was about to give His life, and take upon Him the sin of the world, as
mankind’s only atonement for sin. He was about to die for all of us. You
and I were in His mind, and on His heart at that very moment in time (Luke 22:41-43).
He sought first of all a private place apart from others where He could lay down His heart and will before His Father in Heaven.
“He withdrew about a stone's throw beyond them,” Luke 22: 41a
“He knelt down…” Luke 22:41b
He brought His desire and request before His Father as a separate singular issue.
“He …prayed…” Luke 22:41c
He
acknowledged that His Father alone had the authority, and therefore the
power to grant His request, or to choose not to grant it.
"Father, if you are willing…” Luke 22:42a
He specifically requested for a deliverance from the tragic and horrific circumstances that were about to come to pass.
“… take this cup from me…” Luke 22:42b
He submitted to His Father’s will with reverence and obedience.
“…yet, not My will, but Yours be done.” Luke 22:42c
It
comes down to this issue for each and every one of us: God has the right, and
does not need our permission, to rearrange our life to achieve His
purposes. In the blink of an eye, anyone's whole life can get turned
upside down and, and like the Old Testament example of Job, you may not be
able to make sense of it, others may judge you because of it, and it
even may get worse before it gets any better.
Yielding our Hopes and our Dreams
Our dreams for our lives will only truly satisfy our hearts, when He is able to weave them into the tapestry of His Sovereign plan. For
that to be so, we must come to trust Him as Lord above all things. He
must have uncontested authority over our hopes, dreams and our plans.
This is so easy to say and so difficult to put into practice. This issue will be
tested every single day of our lives. His Sovereignty alone must dictate
how we respond to suffering, and hardship, and everything else in our
lives.
Joni Erikson wrote the following insight, reflective of her life and the hardships that she experienced,
“The
best we can hope for in this life is a knothole peek at the shining
realities ahead. Yet a glimpse is enough. It's enough to convince our
hearts that whatever sufferings and sorrows currently assail us aren't
worthy of comparison to that which waits over the horizon.” Joni Erickson Tada
Hope is Rooted in God’s Sovereign Will
His
Father did not grant His request. Let’s pause for a moment and reflect
upon this staggering truth: His Father did not grant His request. It is
without question that His Father's heart would be torn, and broken by the
events that were soon to come upon His beloved Son, yet He did not grant His Son's request.
Even
at the expense of His Son’s suffering, knowing that Jesus would have to
experience humiliation, torture and mutilation before a godless sinful
angry crowd of people...God The Father did not grant His request.
His Father would seemingly step back and witness such horrific and tortuous acts that were to be inflicted upon His Son. His Father also knew that amidst the obsidian cloaking darkness that would shadow those moments upon Calvary, unimaginable wickedness and unholy sinfulness would also be was placed upon His
Son. He also knew that His Son would cry out from the cross in anguish and confusion
that His Father would not come to His aid and rescue Him.
“About
the ninth hour Jesus cried out in a loud voice, "Eloi, Eloi, lama
sabachthani?"—which means, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" Matthew 27:46
Sometimes
the silence of God can be misunderstood as the uncaring negligence of
God to help us with whatever it is that we are in anguish about.
However, the apparent silence of God may be because He alone knows that
deliverance from a difficult circumstance is exactly what we do not
need.
“God had one Son on earth without sin, but never one without suffering.” Augustine
Some
have reflected that God is not interested in our happiness but in our
holiness. That is true. However, let’s take this truth to a deeper core
truth: God is not interested in our happiness…He is wanting us to be His.
“I'm
not sure God wants us to be happy. I think he wants us to love, and be
loved. But we are like children, thinking our toys will make us happy
and the whole world is our nursery. Something must drive us out of that
nursery and into the lives of others, and that something is suffering.”
C. S. Lewis
"You
will make known to me the path of life; In Your presence is fullness of
joy; In Your right hand there are pleasures forever." Psalm 16:11
Does
God want to bless us, provide for us, and prosper us? Of course He does,
and the Scriptures are full of His promises to substantiate just that.
He also has a Sovereign plan for each of us, and sometimes that plan will
lead us to unhappy times where it is His Joy alone that must flow through us, and not mere transient happy feelings that come from only happy temporary circumstances. If our happenings don't happen to happen like we hope they happen, how can we be happy anyway?
When There is no Miracle there can be Peace
We
need strength during tough times. Weariness breaks us down. It is God’s
deepest desire that we experience His strength as we yield in The Quiet Place
to His Sovereignty and trust Him. It is only then, that His peace will
flow to our troubled heart, and His it is only then that His joy will give us strength to
endure.
"Do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.” Nehemiah 8:10
Perhaps
you are facing your own Gethsemane in your life right now. You know
that to obey and trust God on a matter, will bring about consequences
and perhaps suffering that is unavoidable. In that hushed moment when you are transparent and open before God, His love and His glory will flow
through you, and His peace will sustain you under severe trial, for the
pathway to the Throne of Grace is found in the hushed sanctum of The Quiet Place.
“Therefore
let us draw near with confidence to the Throne of Grace, so that we may
receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need.” Hebrews 4:16
It
is beside the still waters, in The Quiet Place, where The Good Shepherd
waits to meet with you and restore the weariness of your soul.
"The LORD is my shepherd, I shall not want. He makes me lie down in green pastures; He leads me beside Quiet waters. He restores my soul..." Psalm 23:1-3
