I don’t think there has ever been a group of people who were more disappointed than the eleven apostles who watched Jesus Christ die on a cross on Cavalry. These eleven men had been with him for three years.
They had staked their whole lives on Him. They had forsaken homes and jobs and families and invested their whole lives in his promises and plan and there they were, standing on that windswept hill outside Jerusalem, watching the man they loved and believed in… die a torturous, horribly violent death.
Can you imagine the prayers these disciples prayed? For hours. “God… please…don’t let him die!!”
But God did let him die.
The apostles only saw the here and now. Not the hereafter. If God had granted their prayers and Jesus had not died on the cross, they… and us, too… wouldn’t have had the eternal life made possible because Jesus died on a cross. They never would have understood it at the time… even though Jesus… several times before he died… had tried to explain it to them.
I wonder… can you relate to that kind of disappointment that comes from unanswered prayers? Maybe you’ve been praying for a rebellious child, asking God to mature them, make them responsible, shape them up. But no matter how much you pray, it seems they only become more rebellious.
Maybe you’re praying about a habit in your own life you need to change. But it doesn’t. Maybe you’re praying for a loved one’s health, a coworker’s alcoholism, financial problems and your prayers… are unanswered.
Or here’s one I just know has happened to you: You pray for just the right words to use to a friend who doesn’t know the Lord and you’re hoping to get them to church or to Bible Study or whatever but by the time you’re done talking with them it’s worse than before and they look at you like you’re nuts. That ever happened to you? Me, too.
Well, sometimes, things have to get worse before they get better so God’s ultimate purpose is achieved. See, we don’t know what’s best for us. We don’t know what God wants to do in this world. That means, like the apostles, we are going to be disappointed. But just like them, when that happens we can’t give up. We have to go directly to the Lord.
See, either one of two things happen when we encounter disappointment. 1) We can retreat or quit. Stop trying. Go home and feel sorry for ourselves. And never be what God wants us to be. Or… the second option, 2) We can trust that God knows better than we do and however he answers our prayers… yes, no or I’ll get back to you… is the right answer.
That’s how we are to respond.
