What to do when prayers go unanswered: Keep praying

“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; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” (Matthew 7:7-8)

This scripture is probably one of the most manipulated statements of Jesus’ words in the gospels. It is taken from what is commonly referred to as “The Sermon on the Mount”, which in Matthew’s Gospel, covers three chapters and depicts the nuts and bolts of Jesus’ message.

I say it is a commonly manipulated statement because some use it to prove that God will always answer our prayers. Some churches espouse a “name it and claim it” theology which takes these verses from Matthew literally and leads people to understand and believe that anything we ask from God will be accomplished if you have enough faith.

The problem arises when prayers go unanswered, things we are seeking can’t be found and doors we hoped to open are locked shut. In those instances, people who ascribe to a rigid interpretation of the scriptures have to find other ways to explain why God isn’t answering our prayers.

Usually, the answers come down to punishment for personal sins, interference of demonic forces and/or a lack of faith. At various times in my life, I have explored all those options and made applicable changes. But still many, if not most of my prayers, remain unanswered.

When our fourth child was diagnosed with a brain tumor at three months of age — I heard it all. People say the weirdest things to parents with sick kids. “The Lord only gives you what you can handle…He must have such faith in you.”

There were those who told me Diet Coke caused her brain tumor in utero (I’m sure it didn’t help, so I quit). And then there were the spiritual giants who said that the Lord was punishing us because we were Catholic.

Jumping through hoops to find excuses for unanswered prayers — it’s all too exhausting for me.

This time of year always takes me back to the chaos of that first autumn when Johanna was diagnosed. We had three other kids ages 9, 6 and 3 and Johanna was three months old. We were homeschooling and it was a presidential election year. The schoolroom was covered with election maps and posters explaining the history of the electoral college. (I was looking for them just last fall.)

In the midst of all this civics education, there was a chart of infant and child development milestones. That poster stood out to my son and caused him to worry as he compared his little baby sister’s development to the chart that hung on the wall. The day Johanna was diagnosed, this intuitive 9-year-old used the chart to explain why he felt we needed to take his sister to the doctor. Little did he know that I had been consulting the chart myself and already had an appointment with a neurologist for later the same day.

We were a praying family and my husband and I held leadership positions in the local church and in our diocese. We prayed a lot. The parish held prayer vigils and even before the advent of Facebook, we were getting messages from people around the world who were praying for our little girl.

One of the memories that stands out to me from that difficult fall 21 years ago, was a woman who approached me after we were home from the hospital following three brain surgeries in one month — starting just before Thanksgiving and ending just before Christmas.

We were taking a rare break with all four kids at a bagel shop near our home. The woman knew us from our ministry in local and diocesan churches. She had heard about our daughter’s diagnosis through prayer networks. When she came up to our table in the bagel store, she never really asked how we were feeling or how my daughter was doing.

The well-intentioned woman clearly made some assumptions because we were sitting as a family eating bagels and drinking coffee, that our trials were over and my daughter was fine. She didn’t notice the staple marks that ran like a zipper up the back of my baby’s bald head.

As she spoke to me, she offered an all-knowing attitude as she lightly padded my hand. “I knew everything would be alright,”  she said with a smug smile, “because you are faithful Christians and the Lord would not let you down.”

Weary from sleepless nights and with my inhibitions worn thin from too much input from strangers, I made the good decision to remain silent and thanked her for her prayers.

This silly experience has stuck with me these past 21 years because to me it is the perfect example of why people turn away from God when people like this woman seek to “encourage and inspire” them to greater faith. I’m certain she believed we asked, sought and knocked on the doors of heaven for healing and God answered our every prayer.

She wasn’t there when the brain bleeds and the seizures started, the surgeries continued to over 50 by the time my daughter was 10. In fact, I’m pretty certain that I haven’t seen or heard from this woman for 20 years. I’ve met a few Christians like her and most of them don’t stay around. I think it’s because our life is just too messy and because their view of God is more like a vending machine than a living, breathing relationship with a loving person.

I ask a lot of God and all the time. I talk to God from the moment I go to sleep, throughout the night and during the day. I tell Him my problems and offer solutions that He rarely chooses. I seek God in prayer, while I study the scriptures, journal my insights and walk miles every morning reciting repetitive prayers which ease my mind and inspire my faith.

I knock on every door that might open with answers for me on how to heal my daughter’s brain, give me more time, energy and support for myself, my husband and my kids.

And through it all, I praise and thank Him for all the gifts I have been given — even the ones I think I could do without.

While I am waiting for the answers to my prayers, God gives me what I need, shows me where to find the answers I seek and opens the doors that I need to walk through — always.

But here’s the thing — sometimes it takes time to recognize the answers and the lost solutions and to see the open door.

It’s not that my nagging God or perfect obedience has changed God’s mind to take my side. I am changing from within.

By an act of my will, surrendered to God in prayer, He’s changing my perspective to see the greater picture. The apostle Paul called it being “transformed by the renewal of the mind in order to judge what is God’s good, perfect and pleasing will” (Romans 12:2).

After years of intense trials, my interpretation of Matthew 7:7-8 is pretty simple: God will always give us what we are really asking for — the wisdom to know that life is deeper than our answered prayers, that every life and trial holds a purpose and we are never alone in our struggles.

Go ahead and ask, seek and knock and trust that the doors will be opened to you.