When God Appears to be Silent

Last week I wrote about when I had my second son, the way he turned round in my womb the day before I was due to have a C-Section. 

Subsequently he was delivered naturally a week later by the same midwife who had delivered his brother three years earlier!

Andrew always referred to this as our miracle. Knowing how hard I prayed and how unlikely it was to happen I am convinced God heard me and more importantly answered me!

But what of those times when God appears to be silent? Does he not care? Shouldn’t he reply to our reasonable requests? Even if he’s not allowed to give us the lottery numbers!

On Wednesday I prayed with my friend whose baby was also breech, in other words the wrong way round to come out easily. She wanted her baby to turn in the same way mine did. Already having two young children she didn’t want to have an operation or the inconvenience of a longer recovery time.

Her daughter was born yesterday by caesarean; both mother and baby are safe and well.

So did God not listen? Was it his day off on Wednesday and he only received our prayer requests the next day when it was too late to do anything?

There is more to this story, you have to go back a couple of weeks to a routine ante-natal appointment. The midwife claimed all was well and baby had its head down correctly.

However there was a student midwife in that day who bravely questioned the position of the baby and she was right to be concerned.

Had she not picked up the original misdiagnosis my friend could have had all sorts of complications in labour, especially as baby had one foot up and one foot down – this girl is going to be a gymnast obviously!

My friend is also a Christian and convinced that God has been close to her throughout this time. He was certainly watching over her when he put that student in the examining room with her.

A few weeks ago I was looking back over my blog unravelling-edges and found a post from last year called Location Location Location. In it I wrote about prayers and expectations.

I had just fallen in love with my dream house and I convinced myself that God would answer my prayers, send me a buyer for my current house and let us move into a new home without too many complications.

A year down the line and we haven’t moved. In fact I have taken the house off the market and we will stay until circumstances change.

So what happened to God’s wonderful plan, or should I say the wonderful plan I thought God had in store for me?

He’s not very good at sticking to the script, he’s not writing my story in the way I would write it!

On reflection, dream house is not quite so shiny in my imagination any more; I have seen others online that I would be just as happy with.

Also if I was writing my own story, Prince Charming would have turned up and swept me off my feet by this stage. But I have discovered over the past few months that I quite enjoy the freedom of being single and doing things my way.

I found this on Facebook the other day which possibly helps explain how God chooses to answer our prayers...

love the fact that NO is NOT an answer!

God is sometimes silent but that doesn’t mean he isn’t listening. He's just plotting a far better story!