“Why Didn’t God Answer My Prayer?”

My brother asked a question about a bumper sticker slogan he saw. It said faith didn’t require facts. I usually don’t answer theological questions on Facebook, but I answered because of who he is.

Another friend commented that he spent his childhood praying for God to stop his abusive father. He was praying for peace. 

The heavens were silent.

He asked if there is a God, and He has the power to answer prayers, why is there so much pain and suffering. How can evil exist?

“Why didn’t God answer my prayer to make the bad stop?”

I saved the thread so I could reflect on it. I could give the intellectual answers, yet the heart would be unreached. 

We can choose to love or hate and twist the concepts to rationalize our actions.

We are all fallen and imperfect. I recognize the evil left in my heart, and it shocks and terrifies me.

Even acknowledging evil indicates recognizing a moral lawgiver and a standard. Without that, it’s only a matter of opinion, and the issue is just to change your opinion.

God’s answer to the question of evil is Jesus. He didn’t stay in Heaven apart from it all. God came to Earth, and not as a king or a superhero.

He came as a baby.

Jesus experienced the good and the bad of life. He doesn’t just sympathize; he can empathize. 

People tried to kill him. Jesus grieved loved ones who died. He was betrayed and abandoned. 

Jesus even had an unanswered prayer.

In the Garden of Gethsemane, he asked God if there was a way to avoid the cross. Jesus, fully human and fully God, feared death, pain, and the wrath of God he faced the next day.

Jesus still chose to go to the cross. 

There, he reconciled God and man through himself. 

It will take time because there is a time when all will be judged. Either by what evil people had done or the good. 

If every evil act got a lightning bolt, there would be no one left. There would be no second chance, no mercy, and no chance at reconciliation. 

I would be dead and in Hell. So would you. 

Yet God is giving us every chance to stop and turn back to Him.

Why didn’t God answer your prayer?

We asked for a baby for years. People prayed over my wife on a night specifically for that at church. Women struggling with infertility got pregnant.

Casey got pregnant with Squiggles. An answered prayer. 

The first ultrasound revealed a dangerously slow heartbeat. I fasted and prayed that the baby would live. 

Squiggles didn’t. 

Why didn’t God answer my prayer?

The answer is…I don’t know.

I do know we were never promised an easy life. Jesus said this right before he went to the cross:

“I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
‭‭John‬ ‭16:33‬ ‭NIV‬‬

Evil will get it’s due.