So, there’s this song. It’s one that I have a love/hate kind of relationship with, but I’ve been listening to it quite a bit since I arrived to Africa. It’s called Paradox of Faith and it’s by Lisa Gungor. If I wrote songs, this would be the theme of my time here in Tanzania. I would use different examples, but this is the song that I’ve been singing for the past few weeks.
Lisa tells a story about two people – a woman whose family is broken and a man whose wife has cancer – both of them pray for healing. Each of them quotes scripture and petitions to the Lord. The woman’s family is reconciled but the man’s wife dies.
My reaction to this song is as follows: What the heck God?!
This happens so often though, not just in song but in life. And I will be the first to admit that I am utterly and absolutely incapable of understanding why, which of course doesn’t surprise me. After 37 chapters of Job’s suffering and conversations with friends, the Lord finally speaks. He basically tells Job that He is Lord and that He alone is mighty. The beginning of chapter 38 says that the Lord “answered Job out of the storm.”
“Where were you when I laid the earth’s foundation? Tell me, if you understand… have you comprehended the vast expanses of the earth? Tell me, if you know all this… Who has the wisdom to count the clouds?”
I wasn’t there slash I do not.
To be honest though, sometimes I think that I know better than God does, even though I know that to be foolish. Isaiah 55:8 says, “’For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,’ declares the Lord.”
The ways in which the Lord heals are paradoxical. There are people who pray for decades for something specific and do not ever see it happen. There are times when we pray once and, in that moment, see the Lord move.
One of the lyrics in the song is –
“Why do some prayers seem to be unanswered? In return they cause our hope to falter. May hope be found not in what I pray for. My hope is in your name; I will trust your name.”
I have prayed for so many sick people and so many injured people while on the Race that my brain can’t deal with it right now. I know that there are many more to come. I visited a cancer hospital in Targu Mures, Romania; I've prayed over people in Moldova and Nepal; I’ve laid my hands on a crippled girl; I’ve seen a man who has a gaping hole in his side. These past few days we spent hours praying at the local hospital in Mwanza – I saw children with broken limbs and terribly burned bodies.
I still am waiting for something to happen. The deafening quiet shakes me to the core as I cry out to my Father. I simply do not understand why nothing happens. I wonder if my faith is insufficient. If that's not it then it doesn't make sense to me. These are just a few of the verses that I find.
Matthew 7:7-8 – “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.”
10:7-8 – “As you go, preach this message: ‘The kingdom of heave is near.’ Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons. Freely you have received, freely give.”
21:21-22 – “Jesus replied, ‘I tell you the truth, if you have faith and do not doubt, not only can you do what was done to this fig tree, but also you can say to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and it will be done. If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer.”
Mark 10:27 –“Jesus looked at them and said, ‘With man this is impossible, but not with God; all things are possible with God.”
So then, where's the disconnect? Why don't these verses seem to apply right now?
There’s this contradiction in my head that I’m fighting against. The rational, logical part of me thinks that it should make more sense. It thinks in transitive properties.
If A = B and B = C then A = C. Right?
Geometry might be like that, but life certainly isn’t.
I want to be able to say –
A: God’s word is true and God is faithful
B: It says that I have authority, the Spirit which raised Christ from the dead lives in me, I get what I ask for
C: I have authority to heal; my hands are the Lord’s hands
D: People get healed
Therefore because His word is true, people get healed through me, because of God.
But it hasn’t happened yet. And I don’t understand why not.
I'm still banking on "yet" being the key word in that sentence.
My hope is not in what I see, but in the name of the Lord.
My hope is not in what I see, but in the name of the Lord.
God doesn’t work in formulas. He doesn’t fit into boxes. His ways are higher and better than my ways. He’s not magical and there is no secret code word.
I won’t stop praying for the miraculous. I won’t stop asking the Lord to heal people. I won’t stop believing that he is who he says he is, that he still shows up in crazy and tangible ways, and that his word is true. I don't have answers, and I know that I never will, but I'm okay with that. Why am I okay with that? Hebrews 11.1
"Faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see."
