Story by Max Lucado (Author)
Some time ago, I took my family to the bicycle store to purchase a bike for five-year-old Jenna. She picked out a shiny “Starlett” with a banana seat and training wheels. And Andrea, age three, decided she wanted one as well.
I explained to Andrea that she was too young. I told her she was still having trouble with a tricycle and was too small for a two-wheeler. No luck; she still wanted a bike. I explained to her that when she was a bit older, she would get a bike, too. She just stared at me. I tried to tell her that a big bike would bring her more pain than pleasure, more scrapes than thrills. She turned her head and said nothing.
Finally I sighed and said this time her daddy knew best. Her response? She screamed it loud enough for everyone in the store to hear:
“Then I want a new daddy!”
Though the words were from a child’s mouth, they carried an adult’s sentiments.
Disappointment demands a change in command. When we don’t agree with the One who calls the shots, our reaction is often the same as Andrea’s-the same as John the Baptist’s. “Is he the right one for this job?” Or, as John put it, “Are you the one? Should we look for another?”
Andrea, with her three-year-old reasoning powers, couldn’t believe that a new bike would be anything less than ideal for her. From her vantage point, it would be the source of eternal bliss. And from her vantage point, the one who could grant that bliss was “sitting on his hands.”
I can’t believe that God would sit in silence while a missionary is kicked out of a foreign country or a Christian loses a promotion because of his beliefs or a faithful wife is abused by an unbelieving husband. These are just three of many items that have made their way onto my prayer list-all prayers that seem to have gone unanswered.
Rule of thumb: clouds of doubt are created when the warm, moist air of our expectations meets the cold air of God’s silence.
If you’ve heard the silence of God, if you’ve been left standing in the dungeon of doubt, you may learn, as John did, that the problem is not as much in God’s silence as it is in your ability to hear.
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