Lessons On Prayer: Talking to God When Your Heart Is Broken
March 16, 2024 — Lisa Thacker
Prayer in the midst of deep loss and suffering can feel challenging, confusing, and even impossible in some cases.
Recently, a deacon at my church shared his testimony about the faithfulness of God in answering his bold, intentional prayers related to the health of a loved one. There is no doubt that God hears every prayer we offer. Tension arises, however, when circumstances occur in life that don’t line up with what we expect from the God we always touted as good, faithful, and loving. Throughout that service, God was nudging me to share my testimony as a follow-up to the truths expressed by this fellow believer. Our experiences are far from contradictory. In fact, they complement each other by validating how God reveals Himself and His character through our prayers in every circumstance of life, including those of joy and yes, even sorrow.
God has three types of responses to our requests. Sometimes His reply is yes, which feels really uplifting to our human hearts. A response of wait often brings frustration and uncertainty about just how long the waiting may last. And even harder yet, sometimes the answer is no. The tragic loss of my 15-year-old son in May of 2020 was a prime example of the most dreaded response — the one our hearts are rarely prepared for.
After Dalton went to Heaven, I thought deeply about the prayers I had prayed throughout the 15 years of his life. As every parent does, I asked God to protect him daily. Beyond his protection, I also asked God to help him make good decisions and to equip him to be a positive Christian influence to those around him. In the aftermath of Dalton’s death, it felt like God hadn’t lived up to His promise to protect my son.
Verses like 2 Thessalonians 3:3 angered me. "But the Lord is faithful. He will sustain you and guard you against the evil one."
God, you said you would guard him from the evil one? But you didn’t! You let the enemy lie to him. How could you? My head knew that God hears and answers all prayers. But my crushed heart sure didn’t feel this truth. Nothing added up. God felt cruel instead of like the good, loving, faithful Father I had learned about in church all of my life. Since then God graciously led me to discover the prayer language of lament, the one that gives me permission to bring my frustrations, complaints, and difficult questions to Him openly and honestly. I grabbed hold of every trustworthy promise that demonstrated God’s character including His goodness, faithfulness, grace, mercy, justice, Sovereignty, and steadfast love. And the more I learned about His character, the easier it became to trust Him again.
My prayer walk in the midst of the dark has been messy, challenging, and even full of sheer doubt at times. Is there really any point in praying if God is going to do what He wants anyway? But God never lets go of me. He continues teaching me and growing my faith in unimaginable ways.
What have I learned?
God’s answer isn’t always deliverance from our suffering. Sometimes His grace shifts to sustaining us through our suffering instead.
Because I prayed for Dalton to be a positive Christian influence in the world, his death forced me to wrestle with how God could allow my son’s Christian impact to be completely erased. My narrow-mindedness didn’t recognize that God is, in fact, answering that prayer, just not the way I had planned while Dalton was physically present. Instead, He is using my husband and me to be Dalton’s voice for Christ now. His life is still making a difference for eternity each time the two of us say yes to what God asks us to do. I will not experience deliverance from my grief until I’m in Heaven enjoying a tear-free existence with Jesus and Dalton. But God single-handedly sustains me every moment of every day in my anguish and weariness.
Isaiah 46:4 says, “Even to your old age and gray hairs I am he, I am he who will sustain you. I have made you and I will carry you; I will sustain you and I will rescue you.”
Pray from a promise rather than for a promise. (This is not original to me) My old prayers focused on God granting me a healthy, happy life free of pain. I was asking Him to promise me something that isn’t possible while living in a world fractured by sin. Now, I pray from the promise of His presence, knowing He will be with me and never leave me. And from the promise of His love which has the power to sustain me in whatever He allows in my life. John 16:33 says, “In this world you will have trouble. But take heart. I have overcome the world.”
God didn’t rescue and protect Dalton the way I wanted him to. He didn’t perform a miracle on May 14, 2020, by stopping Dalton’s tragedy. But He IS definitely performing a miracle in me each time He rescues me out of my trauma and despair. He helps me survive hour by hour, day by day. He picks me up and carries me when I can’t take one more step. While Dalton didn’t experience a miracle, it’s undeniable that I absolutely am.
My former prayer life included requests focused on one outcome—what Lisa wanted. The issue with my tunnel-vision prayers led me to believe God was cruel when I didn’t get my way. I wish my prayers had sounded more like this. God, heal my loved one. I know your specialty is in performing miracles. But if you don’t perform the miracle that matches my human desires, help me to trust you, hold confidence in your faithfulness, and accept Your sovereignty. I will need your help the entire way.
Finally, my pastor pointed out two important aspects about prayer recently. One, we pray to give God glory. And two, God grows our faith through our prayers. So I ask….which outcome grows my faith more or brings God more glory? The ones where God tells me yes and gives me everything I want? Or the ones where He tells me no, and yet I choose to keep trusting Him, turning to Him, and leaning on Him, even when nothing in the world makes sense. I don’t point this out to say, “Look at all the glory I’m bringing to God. Or look how strong my faith is.” In all honesty, I still would never willingly choose to drink from this cup if it were up to me. Conversely, I highlight this to prove that stories of adversity hold greater potential to impact others’ lives for Christ. Bringing glory to God motivates me to steward my pain well for His Kingdom.
All this points to one fundamental principle about prayer: God doesn’t use our prayers to change our circumstances. He uses our prayers to change US IN our circumstances.
As this deacon closed his testimony, he led the congregation in reciting, “God is good all the time. All the time, God is good.” When my worst nightmare became my reality, uttering those words felt hypocritical. My lips refused to let them out. But God didn’t throw me away or say, “I’m done with you.” Instead, He intervened because I kept talking to Him. God showed His faithfulness as He changed ME in my circumstances. But only when I became willing to cooperate.
That Sunday morning was the first time in nearly four years that my silence was broken during this exercise. With tears in my eyes and a lump in my throat, I quietly joined. The tears didn’t result from sadness. They resulted from my awe of God’s faithfulness and mercy to love and care for me in my shattered mess. My life-changing circumstances are far from good; but the God who is holding me in those circumstances absolutely is!
So, today, I invite you to echo these powerful words with me. “God is good….all the time. All the time…God is good.” And if your lips were resistant to this exercise like mine once were, keep turning to, talking with, and trusting in your Heavenly Father. He’s got you.
Father God, I pray that the experiences you asked me to share here will fall on the hearts of anyone reading who is struggling with prayer. May something I said encourage them to keep trusting You even when the answers to overwhelming life situations don’t feel good. Thank you for being a faithful, loving Savior with a plan to overcome every struggle, hardship, and tragedy this world has ever witnessed. You already have victory over all of it. In Jesus’ name, Amen.
