God Can Handle Your Questions

God Can Handle Your Questions 

“We must understand that for God to give “songs in the night,” He must first make it night.” – Lettie B. Cowman

A man named Lazarus was ill and eventually died. In John 8 we read the story and like to skip to the end when Jesus raises him from the dead. Lazarus’ sisters, Mary and Martha, weren’t looking for a resurrecting, they were looking for a healing. They knew Jesus could heal him. They sent a messenger to go find Jesus. He was a few towns away ministering. When the Savior got the word that His dear friend was sick, He waited.

Have you been there? You find yourself in a situation where no earthly hope is possible. But you have faith in a heavenly promise and a Savior who promises to never leave you nor forsake you. So you pray, you cry, you seek God in every way possible. 

Only, it is met with silence. 

No response to your prayers. No whispers of hope or miraculous healings or answers. Only silence. Desert living for sure. A desert time. I remember waiting a whole weekend during the adoption process with our son for an answer to a question. Just three days we had to wait, and it felt like an eternity. We look back and say, well, it all worked out. And maybe Mary and Martha’s friends looked at the sisters four days later and said: Well, it all worked out. But God’s silence still hurts. 

And silence feels like a no. Did Mary and Martha feel like maybe Jesus’ silence was a “No.”?

No, I’m not going to come to comfort you. 

No, I’m not going to heal him. 

No, I am not powerful enough. 

No, I am not who you think I am. 

Sometimes as we too face moments of silence from God, we pray, beg, and seek in earnest from Him. We wrestle with Him as Jacob did: give us a blessing! We cry. Only we are met with nothing but more questions. In the questions, I think we can find answers. Jesus’ silence didn’t mean He wasn’t listening.

I have so many questions about my life. I have so many unknowns. Why did certain people leave me? Where will my children end up? Why did this person get sick? Why did my friend’s baby die? Will my sisters come down to visit us when we move away? 

God’s faithful love, the never-ending, never-giving up, the eternal faithfulness of God’s love is the reason we can praise Him, even in the midst of so many questions. So many doubts and tears. 

I have so many unspoken questions I can’t even write. Private questions seem hard and vulnerable. Fear asks these questions, and I don’t think they are wrong. God can handle my questions. God can handle them because He knows the answers. He knows when I can handle the answers too. He knows when to give me answers and when to keep silent.

Martha was allowed to come to Jesus and say her words of heartache to His face. Mary too, was welcome to speak her questions to Him. He wasn’t afraid or upset at their questions. 

 I can come to God in the silence with all of my questions. I can lay them out and hand them over to Him because He can handle my questions. Even in the silence, God is still working. Even when I have so many questions and they don’t all get answered, I can offer them to Him in the days of desert living.  Here. Like an offering. A sacrifice of my will. Of my life and surrendering. 

I can lay them before Him, in my prayer journal, or say them aloud. God will hear them, and He is answering. Silence is still an answer. And I can keep asking God the questions. I can come to him in humility and repentance and faith – believing He will meet me here, in the middle of my questions. Often the darkness is where we see Him clearest. 

 

God can handle my questions in the silence. One of the things I love about this passage is, God does come through for the sisters. Maybe they never understand why they had to endure the silence, but God eventually came through and intervened. It wasn’t what they would have wanted, but God made things right. 

In the middle of my most frustrating seasons of silence from God, I am reminded again of God’s truth in His word. He will never forsake. He is God. And He is good. 

If you have questions for God, feel free to email me.*** I can’t promise I have the answers, but I can promise to pray for you! I count it my honor to pray for every request that comes through my inbox. Click Here To Email Me

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Sarah E. Frazer is a writer and Bible study mentor at sarahefrazer.com. She is the wife of Jason and mother of five who all serve as full-time missionaries in Honduras. Her passion is to encourage women to fall in love with the Bible. Sarah is the author of several Bible study resources for women. She share tools for deep-rooted Bible study at sarahefrazer.com. Follow her on Instagram (http://www.instagram.com/sarah_e_frazer) and join her free prayer challenge at sarahefrazer.com/prayer