Elephants 2026, Pt. 5: Unanswered Prayer // Cynthia Bryan

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So I'm Cynthia Bryan.

I have the privilege of serving as executive pastor here at BFC and excited to see all of you today.

Does prayer really work?

Should you pray about just anything?

Should you go to God with your like your list of requests?

Consider this scenario.

A man and a woman are about to meet for the first time on a blind date.

So the man prays, Lord, please let her be pretty but not too pretty.

Please let her be on time.

Please let her think I'm funny and laugh at my jokes.

Don't let her have an angry ex-boyfriend.

Don't let her be needy or difficult or crazy.

So the woman pray, the woman prays, Lord, please don't let him be an Alabama fan.

So Jamie read all my notes, but I took that joke out every time he saw it.

We're talking about prayer today.

Not just any prayer, but unanswered prayer.

Some of you are probably already thinking there are no unanswered prayers.

The answer is either yes, no, or not yet.

Well, this is true, but today when I say unanswered prayer, I'm talking about the no or not yet answer from God.

Every August in our Elephants in the Room series, we tackle tough topics that people usually don't talk about, but people are thinking about.

At VFC, we believe in the power of prayer.

We have sermons you can listen to that can help you pray, but that's not really our topic today.

Today's elephant in the room is unanswered prayer.

This topic could touch emotions and be very personal.

So if you want to talk about this, feel free to reach out to me or anyone on our pastoral staff.

And if you have any real problem with the message, you can email me and you may want to write this down.

My email address is jamie at vfcthomasville.org.

So I've prayed for some really big things and gotten amazing answers.

I've also prayed for things and the answer was apparently no.

I've prayed for my team to win and they lost.

I've prayed for someone to get healed and they died.

I've prayed for rain to come and drought remained.

I've prayed for rain to stop and it continued and ruined an event.

I've prayed for people to get reconciled and they're still apart.

I've prayed for some things over and over and over again and still not seen the answer I want.

Have you been there?

What pops into your mind?

Like me, is there an unanswered prayer that rocked your life and rocked your faith?

Someone important to you leaves, tragedy strikes, a sickness lingers, a loved one dies.

You fail the exam, the pain continues.

You wonder why pray.

Each week this month, we've talked about the messy middle.

That's where we have two seemingly conflicting truths that we hold in tension.

So here's our first truth: God hears us, and prayer is effective.

Amen.

Here's truth number two.

Prayers are not always answered in the way we want or when we want.

So we're gonna look at four foundational truths from the Bible about prayer.

And I'm gonna go through these next two slides really quick.

There are scriptures there, they're in the notes in the VSC app, but I'm gonna get to the unanswered prayer pretty quickly.

So here's a truth: prayer works, right?

So pray continually.

God is good, so pray expectantly.

And next we have keys to effective prayer.

First, seek his will.

If we pray according to his will, he hears us.

1 John 5 tells us.

If you're asking for something that hurts you, a good father won't give it to you.

Sometimes you're asking for things you think will help you, but he knows it won't.

So he says no to protect you.

Also, forgive all others.

Mark 11, 25 even says that when you're praying, if you remember that you have a grudge against someone, uh first forgive that person and then continue your prayer.

Confess your sin.

James 5, 16 says, confess and pray so that you may be healed.

Uh believe he will do it.

Mark 11, 24.

Believe that you've received it and it will be yours.

And number five, don't give up.

This is where Jesus tells the story of the persistent widow, and he ends that parable saying that we ought always to pray and never give up.

So let's look at some people in the Bible that didn't get what they wanted.

In the book of 2 Samuel, we see that David and Bathsheba's infant child is sick.

David fasted and laid on the ground all night, seeking the Lord for healing for the child, but the child died.

Consider Moses, who led the people of Israel, the Hebrew people, out of Egypt with signs and wonders.

He begged and pleaded with God to let him enter the promised land, but God said no.

From the Gospel of Matthew, on the night before the crucifixion, we see that Jesus prayed, My Father, if possible, let this cup be taken from me.

If there's any way, get me out of this.

Less than 24 hours later, Jesus was crucified.

In 2 Corinthians, Paul tells us that he suffered with what he called a thorn in the flesh.

He pleaded with the Lord repeatedly that it would be taken from him, but the Lord told him, My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.

I want to share with you a personal part of my story.

My husband Duke and I got married.

Three years later, I was pregnant, but I when I went for my first ultrasound, there was no heartbeat.

They called it a blighted ovum.

That doesn't sound like a baby, does it?

I didn't even know if it was a real pregnancy.

Thought maybe it was just a mistake.

Later we prayed and asked God for children.

We had tests run and got medical advice.

About seven years after that first miscarriage, I encountered the Holy Spirit in a profound way.

I immersed myself in faith-healing teachings where you find God's will in Scripture, you build your confidence in that word, believe that you've received it, so it will be yours.

Within a year, I was pregnant again.

I thought I had found the secret to the blessed life, and everything was going to be smooth sailing from now on.

I wouldn't struggle in life anymore.

I had the key to power and blessing in every area of my life and influence.

At this point, I was pregnant and believing God for a full-term, perfect delivery.

Well, what do you think happened?

It was not perfect, and it was not even full term.

After the craziness of complications and having to be induced for the birth of our firstborn, spiritually, I felt like everything had been shaken.

I was numb to God.

I think I was offended with God.

I had believed with everything in me that this would be a perfect delivery, full term with no complications.

I had the scriptures to back me up.

I had underlined them.

I had prayed them every day.

I could have taken my case to court and I would have won.

But where was God?

For three days I couldn't pray, which is a little bit crazy because I'd spent the previous four months on bed rest, praying constantly, worshiping, and uh meditating on scripture.

And now I couldn't even bring myself to pray.

It just wasn't in me.

After three days, I came to realize I could be thankful for Thomas, my beautiful, healthy baby.

And that thankfulness helped me turn my heart back to God.

I came to know that God was still good and he was still God, whether or not my delivery was perfect.

So can God move heaven and earth because of your prayers?

Yes.

Will He?

Probably.

But if you lose your relationship with the Lord trying to make an outcome happen, you've lost the one thing that really matters.

I was offended with God because my faith was tied to the result I wanted instead of the relationship that I needed with Him.

After our firstborn, Duke and I wanted more children.

I got pregnant two more times and had early miscarriages.

In all, I've had seven miscarriages.

Four years after our firstborn, with my fifth pregnancy, we heard a heartbeat.

Our son Matthew was born three weeks early with some health issues.

The name Matthew means gift of God.

So he spent 28 days, I should say we spent, 28 days in the NECU in Tallahassee.

We brought him home and he showed some improvement, but then he didn't develop like he should.

At around five months, we knew there was something seriously wrong.

He couldn't hold his head steady, he couldn't sit up, he couldn't crawl.

At this point, I was really into the word of God.

I prayed and believed for healing.

I was confident that I was praying according to God's will.

I made sure I was walking with the Lord.

I confessed sin.

I forgave everybody.

I meditated on the word.

I rebuked demons.

I had faith.

I believed that Matthew would be healed.

We were persistent.

I recited Scripture over Matthew.

It was all over his walls.

I probably memorized more scripture in the 16 months of that time than any other period in my life.

We took him to different specialists and none could help.

I honestly believed that Matthew would be healed.

In May of 2007, when he was 16 months old, Matthew started having major breathing problems.

The hospital here said there was nothing they could do for him.

And we were able to get him life flighted to England's Children's Hospital in Atlanta.

In my heart, I believed that that was the place where we would get the miracle breakthrough.

When the uh doctors had done all they could, we would see what God could do.

Three days later, Matthew died.

So I had done all the things to get prayers answered, all the things on my list.

I'd prayed according to his will.

I forgave everybody.

I confessed sin.

I had faith.

I believed, I was persistent.

I had a ton of faithful believers praying for us as well.

But I did not get the miracle.

I didn't see the healing.

Our precious son, Matthew, a gift of God, he died.

Some Christians would assume that Matthew died because we didn't have enough faith, or there was sin in our life.

There's an idea in the prosperity gospel and the faith healing movements in Christianity that if I have enough faith for a good thing, God must do what I ask.

The faith they describe is a mental certainty that the thing will happen.

I do my part, and then I get the result that I asked for.

Mental certainty is not the same thing as faith in God.

They are different things.

You can be certain that something is true, but there's something more important.

You need to trust in God's character, not in your prayer.

Trust in his love, not in your effort.

Rely on his faithfulness to you, not your faithfulness to him.

In the prosperity gospel and the word of faith movement that I diligently listened to, there was no room for suffering, no room for unanswered prayer.

God always prayers.

If you pray, God always heals.

If you pray for healing, then if you don't get the answer, you did something wrong.

Your faith is not strong enough, or there's sin you need to deal with.

I have experienced God moving in part because of the faith I had in Him.

And Hebrews 11:6 says, without faith, it is impossible to please God.

Hebrews 11:6

But we don't put our faith in the answer to our prayer.

Our faith isn't in the result, our faith is in God.

Consider this situation.

This is not a joke.

It's a story, an illustration.

My husband Duke says he's gonna meet me at a certain time and place.

So if he doesn't show up, but I was certain, I was confident he would be there, I could be upset with him about that.

But if I trust Duke, then I'm gonna know that he's making the best decision at that time, and the best decision for the moment, and everything's gonna be fine.

Our faith can't be in what we expect, in the thing we have an expectation for from God.

Our faith and trust is in God Himself.

So when Matthew died, it was a really hard thing.

Uh, but I had tremendous peace that I cannot explain.

There was the pain of loss, of losing our baby, and all the expectations we had for his life, but there was this overwhelming, abiding peace of God that is unexplainable.

In the book of Philippians, Paul says that there is a peace that surpasses all of our understanding, and it will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.

It seems crazy that I had this crisis of faith after the difficult delivery of our firstborn, but after the death of our second child, I had peace.

Why?

I think it was because my relationship with God was different.

I knew that God was good and I could trust him even if I didn't get the answer.

I knew his abiding love for me and my family through hard things.

I desperately wanted the result for Matthew to be healed.

But the truth was I was trusting in God.

I knew and trusted that God was good even when I didn't see the answer, the miraculous healing.

I want to say this.

I don't know why prayers aren't answered the way we want all the time.

I don't have time today to get into the issues of like our fallen world and the work of Satan in the world.

That's another message.

My mission today is to help you focus on your heart in any place that you have disappointment or disillusionment with God that might be hindering your relationship with your family, with your church family, or with God.

So Duke and I have been through some stuff, but God has been faithful and He's been with us.

Knowing and abiding in the love of God is the thing that gets you through the trial.

And deeper faith comes as you weather the storms with him.

On the day of Matthew's death, in my spirit, not an audible voice, I heard the Lord say, Will you go away from me as well?

This is the same question Jesus asked the 12 disciples in John chapter 6.

John 6 · chapter mention

After many disciples had left him, and the 12 were still there, he said, Will you go away as well?

Like Peter's response to Jesus in that chapter.

I responded to the Lord.

Who else would I go to?

There's only you.

You have the words of life.

Our faith is not in what he does for us, it's in who he is.

He's our redeemer, he is our savior, he is our counselor, and he is our friend.

He is the one who sticks closer than a brother.

I also want to be clear about this.

I spent the 16 months of Matthew's life believing that he would be healthy in having a wonderful life, a great future on earth.

Looking back, I would not have spent that time in any other way.

It's okay to believe God for something that doesn't happen.

I have questions I don't know the answers to.

That's okay.

I don't have to have the explanation.

Knowing why isn't always helpful.

I don't have to know why, but I do know who.

I know the Lord.

I know who is with me.

I know who carries me through, and I know who holds the future on earth and for eternity.

Jesus tells us to have faith.

So let's believe God for a miracle.

We don't always see that miracle.

So what do we do?

We keep praying, we keep believing, we keep trusting in God.

And if the answer is clearly no, we press in and receive his comfort in his presence.

There are so many biblical examples of godly people who walk closely to God and also experience so much pain and suffering.

When we, you and I, ask for God's blessing, we may be thinking of health, money, reconciliation, peace, and sometimes we receive those.

We have a good father.

But what is the blessed life?

Is it health, a house, a car, plenty of money, and perfect kids?

What if the blessed life looks like Paul's life?

The Apostle Paul?

Paul was imprisoned, beaten, stoned, and shipwrecked.

He was betrayed and rejected by his people.

He was abandoned by ministry partners.

He describes time when he was.

Was all alone.

He says that he learned to be content in every circumstance, whether in plenty or in need, that he could do all things, handle every situation through Christ who gave him strength.

That verse that we quote so often, if you look at the context, is literally about suffering.

That we can do it all.

We can stay close to God, we can persevere through God who gives us strength.

In Philippians 3:8, Paul says, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus, for whom I have lost all things.

Philippians 3:8

He goes on to talk about like that that he would, like he desires to share in the sufferings, in the fellowship of the sufferings of Christ.

There's a depth of God when you go through the sufferings and you go through it with Christ.

Paul believed that knowing Christ was everything and that the Lord was worth his life and his devotion.

What if the blessed life looks like the Apostle John's life?

John experienced the loss of his brother James, who was brutally murdered by order of the king.

This would have been a devastating loss.

John would have known of the systematic killing of his closest companions, the others' disciples who had lived together with him for three years as they ministered with Jesus.

He was exiled on the island of Patmos because of his witness for Jesus.

He describes himself to the readers of Revelation as your partner in suffering and in the patient endurance to which Christ calls us.

Because of the Roman persecution of Christians during his life, Paul would have been under the constant threat of persecution, constant threat to himself, to those he loved, the people, and the churches that he shepherded.

But John knew the love of God.

Perfect love cast out fear, he said.

He writes his letters to the church as a grandfatherly mentor, as the last remaining one who ministered with Jesus, who saw him, touched him, and now waited for him, for his return.

I picture John on the island of Patmos, which is this rocky outcrop, not much on it.

They say that he lived in a cave.

He was elderly, sleeping on rocks, and writing out the visions that he had with the Lord.

You don't hear him in any of his letters complain, but he's one who knew the love of God.

He knew the love of Jesus.

He describes himself in the gospel that he wrote as the one that Jesus loved.

And I believe that love sustained him through every trial and every suffering he experienced.

Maybe the blessed life is a life of faithfulness through trials while abiding in the love of God.

1 Peter 1, 6 through 8.

Peter says, now for a little while you may have to suffer grief in all kinds of trials, but you love Him and are filled with inexpressible and glorious joy.

I love that Eric described in worship like being mad or aggravated and getting in worship, and you just can't stay there.

You know, that's where we are, even through trial, when we come in the presence of God.

Joy is ours, and maybe even glorious joy is more available to us when we press into the presence of God, the joy of his presence.

A friend who went through a life or death crisis in the past, excuse me, a life or death crisis in the past recently told me, I actually miss the intimacy with the Lord that I had during that time of crisis.

I wouldn't trade anything for that time with the Lord.

How will you respond to unanswered prayer?

How will you respond when the answer is no?

After a heartbreaking loss or a difficult unanswered prayer, you have a choice to make.

What will your response be?

You could walk away from God.

You put your heart into believing for a miracle, you gave it your all.

At the time when you needed the miracle, he didn't come through.

Your spouse leaves, you lose your job, your child won't speak to you, a loved one dies.

After a devastating experience with unanswered prayer, maybe you choose to walk away from God, you gave it your best and it didn't work for you.

Maybe you keep your distance, you choose to stay connected with God, but you resolve never to put your heart into prayer like that again.

You decide to protect your heart.

Maybe you choose to keep God at arm's length.

You decide he broke the faith and you don't really trust him anymore.

You set your boundaries.

Tough love, right?

You keep God at a distance.

People think they are protecting their heart, but they're really just deciding it's safer not to believe.

Then you can't be disappointed again.

Are you doing that with God?

Distance can also mean you decide that searching your heart and your relationship with God is just too painful.

So you pretend that everything's fine, you go to church, you sing the songs, but a part of your heart is behind a wall.

Is that where you want to end up?

Just going through the motions?

Or you could choose to draw near to God.

Maybe you go to God with the pain.

In the midst of the suffering, while you still have questions, while you're still struggling with faith, you take it all, the heartbreak, the confusion, the pain to him.

Are you willing to walk with the Lord through the disappointment?

Are you willing to draw near to him?

Will you receive his comfort?

Paul describes God as the father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles so that we can comfort others.

He goes on to say, for just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, we share in the sufferings of Christ.

So also our comfort abounds in Christ.

Because of his grace, I received the Lord's comfort concerning the children that we have lost.

About two years after Matthew died, Duke Thomas and I started coming to VFC.

Thomas was around eight years old.

During one of our first visits, during a time of worship, I had my eyes closed and I was thanking God that my family, the three of us, were in this place of amazing worship in the presence of God.

Suddenly I had this quick vision in my mind.

I saw several children worshiping in front of us.

I knew they were our children.

I knew where they were the ones that we had lost to miscarriage and that Matthew was among them.

And then in this vision, I turned to my right, and there was this teenager staring at me with the most loving expression, looking right into my eyes, and the vision was over.

And I'm like, I'm talking to God, I'm going, okay, I know who these kids are.

Who is this?

Like, I don't know who this is.

And then it came to me that first pregnancy that I didn't even know if it was a real pregnancy.

Um, this was the son that we never heard the heartbeat from.

And um, that that child in the natural would have been about 16 years old at the time.

And I'm so thankful for that vision of seeing that what what God was doing, and and that I could trust God to take care of my children.

But I also could have talked myself into believing that the vision was just for me if I hadn't seen this teenager.

The vision gave me great comfort concerning our children, that they're well and worshiping in the presence of God.

Occasionally, we may get some kind of comforting revelation concerning an unanswered prayer, but most of the time we must continue by faith, trusting and knowing that God is good.

There's another part of our personal story.

Thirteen years after Matthew's death, years after I had given up that idea of having more children, we brought two Ukrainian daughters and a granddaughter into our home.

I could never have guessed the way God would answer our prayers for more children.

We currently have a preschooler in our home, and she makes her presence known.

So let's make this personal.

What is the unanswered prayer in your mind?

What is the thing that is unresolved in your heart toward God?

Maybe you haven't walked away, but you're keeping God at a safe distance.

You don't really trust Him.

You choose control over trust.

But it's time.

It's time to bring your sorrow, your anger, your disappointment, your disillusionment to Him.

Isaiah 61 says, the Lord will give a crown of beauty for ashes, a joyous blessing instead of mourning, and festive praise instead of despair.

He invites you to draw near to him.

Bring everything to him.

He can handle it.

And then from Psalm 73, 23 through 26, we can declare to the Lord, yet I still belong to you.

You hold my right hand.

You guide me with your counsel, leading me to a glorious destiny.

Who have I in heaven but you?

I desire you more than anything on this earth.

My health may fail and my spirit may grow weak, but God remains the strength of my heart.

He is mine forever.

God himself is the blessing.

God himself is our treasure.

His steadfast love is better than life.

I love the lyric from the song we last sang.

If I feel your heart and never see your hand, I still have it all.

So what will you do with your unanswered prayer?

What will you do when a prayer is not answered in the way you want or with the timing that you expect?

Will you walk away from God?

Will you keep your distance?

Will you wall off a part of your heart?

Or will you draw near to God and trust in the unfailing love of your Heavenly Father?

I invite you to stand.

Will you stand?

Um, I'm gonna lead us in a prayer.

If you want to draw near to him, if you want to bring your unanswered prayer to him, you can repeat after me.

Lord, I give you my disappointment.

I give you the grief and the pain.

Lord, heal my heart.

Help me to walk closely with you.

You are the God of all comfort.

I receive your comfort.

I receive freedom from past disappointment.

Freedom from past disillusionment.

I trust you.

I receive joy in your presence.

Your love is better than life.

I praise you.

In Jesus' name.

Amen.

Thanks for listening to the VFC Podcast.

If you live in the Thomasville area, we would love for you to connect with us in person.

For more information about our weekly gatherings, including service times and directions, you can visit us at VFCThomasville.org.