Many of us approach God with prayers and petitions—oftentimes to receive answers that we didn’t ask for. Answers that may be immediately difficult to bear or initially difficult to discern. And perhaps it’s most difficult when God answers this way to requests that are inherently good and godly things to ask for!
I’ve found myself in this position many times. Whether I’m in a bind or in abundance, I’ve often come to God with the following requests…
God, give me more wisdom!
God, make me into a better leader!
God, teach me to be more empathetic!
God, grant me a greater degree of humility!
God, help me to be a more forgiving and kind-hearted person!
God, mold me into a stronger, braver, more courageous individual!
I.e., God, make me more like Jesus!
Have you ever asked God for these things?
The good news is that God will not not answer this prayer. God promises that when we ask anything according to his will, he will hear us and answer us (1 Jn. 5:14). And since it’s his will to make us more like Jesus, we can therefore conclude that God will always answer that prayer (Rom. 8:29).
However, this does not mean God will always answer that prayer in the way we think he should or will. In fact, God will usually answer much differently than we expect. Oftentimes, God’s answers to prayer are wrapped differently than we imagine, given on terms we didn’t think we agreed to, and delivered on a timetable we might otherwise prefer.
Unexpected Answers
Given our digital age, I can sometimes wrongly see prayer as a type of connection to God that’s not too dissimilar from a computer’s connection to a server. I’ll approach prayer as a kind of ‘Wi-Fi connection’ to God; and likewise, I’ll expect his answers to be the equivalence of ‘airdropping’ files of provision into the spiritual ‘bandwidth’ of my operating system. Here’s 10GB more of wisdom, here’s 10GHz more of leadership, here’s a new PDF of courage… copy, paste, send, drop… received. Easy as that.
But what I’ve come to discover is that while God may answer some prayers this way, it is more often the exception than the rule. On the contrary, the main way God seems to answer these prayers is not by ‘airdropping’ new files into our operating systems, but by allowing ‘viruses’ to enter instead.
What do I mean by this? Throughout Scripture, God’s preferred method of growing his people seems to come in the context of discomfort, not comfort. The imports of his character and blessing don’t arrive on the tropical waves of spiritual ease and pleasure, but on the war-torn ships of circumstantial difficulty and perseverance.
For example, God cultivated Abraham’s trust through waiting; refined Job’s faith through loss; built Joseph’s leadership through hardship; and inspired David’s psalms through struggle. Their prayers for more of God’s character and blessing were answered not with immediate triumphs, but with long trials that challenged their assumptions, purified their motives, and exercised their God-given gifts.
All throughout the Bible, God didn’t strengthen people by ‘airdropping’ leadership, faith, and courage into their hard drives; instead, he strengthened them by allowing ‘viruses’ to test the limits of their operating system instead.
Undesired Answers
And if that’s the way God answered their prayers and grew them, it’s likely the way God will answer our prayers and grow us as well. Perhaps our stories will be different from theirs, but God’s training grounds and work out plans are not. So how can we expect God to practically move in our lives? Based on a clear pattern of Scripture, I think we can anticipate God to answer our prayers in the following ways:
When we pray for wisdom, God will probably not answer by giving you 2 extra hours to read each day or by directly increasing your IQ. Instead, he might introduce a confusing set of circumstance into your life, which will fundamentally stretch your mental categories and ability to reason. And it might force you to seek the counsel and wisdom of others who can speak into that area of your lack.
When we pray to be a better leader, God might not answer by giving you a bigger platform or a greater network of connections. Instead, he might introduce several difficult people into your life, who will fundamentally test your patience, challenge your assumptions, and exercise your ability to love.
When we pray to be more courageous, God will probably not answer by giving you the heart of a lion or giving you a grand opportunity to inspire others. Instead, he might introduce a perilous situation into your life where you are forced to trust him and take action in faith, which might involve great personal sacrifice and no recognition from others.
When we pray to be more empathetic, God might not answer by launching us into an exciting, new social cause or venture. Instead, he might allow you to go through grueling experiences of pain, betrayal, and loss so that you’ll finally be able to truly connect with others who have.
When we pray to be more forgiving and more humble, God might not answer by simply making you a ‘softer, kinder’ person. Rather, he might allow you to be sinned against and denied recognition, so you can learn forgiveness the true way and humility the hard way.
The biblical pattern is counterintuitive, but clear. God’s way up is down; the first shall be last; the servant shall be the leader. This is God’s way for his children, and it was no different with his Son, Jesus, too.
The book of Hebrews spotlights this truth in one of its more intriguing verses: “even though Jesus was God’s Son, he learned obedience from the things he suffered” (5:8). Now wait a minute… Jesus—the perfect Son of God—had to ‘learn obedience’? Did Jesus have to learn obedience because he sinned? No, in fact, in the immediate chapter beforehand, the writer of Hebrews emphasizes that Jesus lived a sinless life (4:15).
Rather, the author is communicating that Jesus learned obedience not because he sinned, but because he suffered. In other words, suffering enriched the quality and increased the weight of Jesus’ righteous life. Unlike a trial-free life, suffering deepened him, strengthened him, and empowered him to be the kind of Savior that could finally relate to us and likewise, the Savior that we could finally relate to. Suffering, trial, and hardship unleashed Jesus’ glory to not be merely one-dimensional, shallow, and impersonal—but multidimensional, deep, and personal.
And so it is with us, too, when God begins his sanctifying work. Suffering, trial, and hardship can yield a peculiar effect. Albeit painful, suffering can function like a drill that deepens the well of your soul for greater degrees of wisdom, humility, empathy, leadership, and courage to be poured into you so that greater degrees of it can be poured out of you and into the lives of others.
Unexpected Outcomes
When I prayed for wisdom, I didn’t expect God to answer with trial and confusion. When I prayed to be a better leader, I didn’t anticipate God would answer with abrasive people and difficult circumstances. When I prayed for empathy, I didn’t think God would answer with pain and loss.
I don’t know about you, but that initially makes me not want to ask God for good things anymore. It frightens me to consider how God might answer!
However, deep peace can be found in the truth that these difficult answers from God—as hard as they might be—are still in the hands of God. And if they’re in his hands, then that means trials are not chaotic, but controlled. Difficulties are not victimizing, but sanctifying. And pain is not gratuitous or arbitrary, but gracious and advantageous. For example…
Abrasive people can be unbelievably unnerving, but in the hands of God, they can be God’s means of ‘sanding down’ our own rough edges, making us more agreeable and attractive to those around us.
Difficult situations can be truly aggravating, but in the hands of God, they can be God’s means of stretching our minds to think more deeply, consider more reasonably, and grow more dependently upon him and his church.
Being sinned against can feel particularly piercing, but in the hands of God, it can be God’s means of injecting into us a deeper sense of how much we’ve been forgiven and how much we’ve been loved.
Pain and loss can be both emptying and terrifying, but in the hands of God, they can be God’s means of drawing us closer to himself, strengthening our faith in future grace, and showcasing the splendor of his provision in the seemingly impossible.
Truly, God does answer our prayer for more his character, but his character does not simply come through ethereal learning or spiritual ritual, but through circumstances that will challenge, stretch, and exercise the very frameworks, lenses, understanding that God knows need to be broken, expanded, and refurbished in our lives. God’s answer to our prayers is not more data to reinforce our current worldviews, but new trials to transform our hearts—to refine the corrupt, to deepen the shallow, to strengthen the weak, and to refurbish the old.
A Bifurcated Favorite Verse
I’m sure you’re familiar with the verse, Romans 8:28. It’s perhaps one of the most empowering promises in the entire Bible:
“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.”
But have you ever notice of its immediate next verse? It reads,
“For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the image of his Son” (v. 29).
The connection between the two verses is not random. They’re put side-by-side for a reason. We love slaking our thirst on the nourishing stream of Romans 8:28, “all things work together for good…”, but we rarely consider how it empties into the crystal clear basin of verse 29, “…to be conformed to the image of Jesus…”
Together, the verses profoundly communicate that trials are the greatest invitation to the greatest opportunity. Therefore, we should expect that our lofty prayers may often be answered with lowly situations.
If we bifurcate Romans 8:28-29 into two separate ideas—and do not read them as two integrated verses that declare one profound truth—then we will miss the meaningful connection that God uses our trials for our transformation.
Discomfort is not what we pray for, but its yields are better than we can imagine. This is because we don’t just get more of Jesus’ capabilities, but more importantly, Jesus’ heart. If God merely airdropped information to us, we would remain the same people. Only until God walks with us through the fire will we come out with less of ourselves and more of Him.
It might feel as if God’s answers are more hurtful than helpful right now, but it’s simply an understandable, emotional response of spiritual shortsightedness. God’s answers don’t merely gratify our requests for the moment; thankfully, they fulfill our requests exactly how we would have wanted if we knew everything he knew.
Is God Listening?
Even so, you might ask through tears and disappointment, “How do I really know if God is answering my prayers after all?” Christian, if God seems to be giving the opposite of what you hoped for right now, it might not be absence of his attention, but the very proof of his activity.
Perhaps you’ve also been praying for good, godly things—yet, the immediate results are the polar opposite of what you had originally anticipated. You’ve asked for a palace to lead from, but like David, God has given you a pasture to shepherd in. You’ve asked for a type of wisdom to speak with, but like Paul, God has given you a trial to wrestle through.
To our empty, tired hands, God will not easily give the character or blessing we want, but instead, his own nail-scarred hand to hold on to through trial. This, my friend, is proof that he’s giving you exactly what you need right now, and leading you exactly to what he wants for you later.
God often answers our prayers this way because it’s an appropriate response to our thinking too little of our situation and thinking too less of the God over it. Our requests are sometimes too narrow and God is too big to deliver in a way that would only serve to reinforce the very frameworks that need to be transformed in us.
If you’re praying to be a light in others’ lives, don’t resist the dark clouds coming your way—for they hold the rain that you and others need to grow.
Judge not the Lord by feeble sense,
But trust him for his grace;
Behind a frowning providence
He hides a smiling face.
“Many people owe the grandeur of their lives to their tremendous difficulties.” –Charles H. Spurgeon
For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.
For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
so are my ways higher than your ways
and my thoughts than your thoughts.
—Isaiah 55:8-9
