Sometimes, praying and receiving from God requires a waiting season. This is a time when anxiety builds up and faith is tested. There is always a sense of urgency that makes it look like something crazy will happen if God does not come through. But in the waiting season, days may turn to weeks, and then to months, and then to years. And still, nothing changes, and the world is still oval, or should I say it is still circular in shape (whatever the scientist had said it is).
But there is another dimension to prayer and receiving from
God that I believe is also familiar. That is when you have prayed and believed
and exercised great faith, and God says NO to your prayers. Yet His thoughts
towards you are not evil, but peace to give you a future and hope. So, in
today’s blog, we will discuss what happens when God says NO to your prayers.
Some years back, my husband was eyeing a position in the
company where he works. As far as he was concerned, he was a perfect fit for
the job role. As a matter of fact, his boss had mentioned to him that he was
being considered for the role, and he needed to prepare for an interview, as
that was a placement policy in his organization. There was no handpicking into
job roles allowed.
We prayed together. I sharpened my faith, and we believed
God for the best. He also prepared for the interview and gave it his best shot.
By the time he did the interview, he was confident he had gotten the job
because everything went well. The feedback he got from those who interviewed
him was great. And then the wait began.
What we thought would happen in days turned to weeks, and
then to months. After about four months of waiting, his boss called him to say
that he wouldn’t be getting the role. The boss of his boss refused to approve
the role for him, saying that he didn’t have the required exposure for the job.
He was given another role (not precisely what he wanted,
which we had prayed and agreed on), but the situation at hand left him no
choice but to accept it. Matthew 18:19 tells us that “if two agree concerning
anything that they ask, it will be done for them by our Father in heaven.” This
one request was one of those things that my husband and I prayed in agreement for,
for four months, yet God declined that request. Or so we thought.
The new role he was given was not in our home country. It
required that he relocate to take the job, and, by company policy, it meant
that the entire family relocate too. That felt like some respite of some sort.
It was not what we wanted, but it wasn’t a complete NO. I gave thanks even in
that. Strangely, I wasn’t disappointed. It still proves a ground for gratitude,
and I praised God as if I had received the answer that I wanted.
And then he moved first to start the job and the children,
and I had to wait another year and two months to be able to join him. It was a
very challenging time in our marriage. But in the middle of it, I found the
strength to be grateful — the grace to thank God even when I didn’t fully understand
what was going on or why we had to go through what we were going through.
I never stopped praying, and I never stopped praising God. You
would want to ask me what I was praising God for if He didn’t give me what I
wanted, and didn’t prove the efficacy of His own words. But Jesus is all I know.
He has done a lot for me in my portfolio of testimonies, so this particular NO
was not big enough of me to be ungrateful for. More so, my pursuit is to make
heaven, and I know that praise and worship are all they do in heaven, so I'd
better cultivate that habit here on earth, too.
About 8 months into my waiting, that is, after my husband
left to start his new job, he got an email relating to an immigration enrollment
we had put in for 23 months before then. We put in our expression of interest,
and nothing happened. We re-enrolled after 12 months, and this was the 11th
month after we re-enrolled. Personally, I had given up on that enrollment. That
was another prayer point for my husband and I that I felt God was silent about,
but also didn’t feel it was big enough to stop my worship.
The email came, and we were asked to submit our documents
for a complete application. Six months after putting in our immigration
application, we were able to get our immigration documents to join my husband
in the country where he was working. The wait was over, and my steadfastness
felt like it paid off. For me, it was like getting two blessings for a single
wait.
But if God had stopped at this point, I would have been too
blessed because I felt grateful, I felt heard. For me, it was worth the wait. But
God didn’t stop there; He continued to show up. Four months into a relocation,
we got another email from the country we had applied to in North America. Our
application had been approved, and we were to proceed to the next stage of the
process. We put our documents together and submitted them.
Four months later, we got our immigration papers to move to
North America, barely 8 months after joining my husband in Europe. We stayed
for a couple of more months in Europe on our own decision before moving to
North America. But if God had stopped there, I would have been super blessed
and graciously grateful. But He didn’t. He continued to show up.
We decided that my husband could not leave his job yet till
he got a job similar to what he had. I wasn’t working, and so we could not
afford to have both of us unemployed. We went back to praying and trusting God.
It was another moment of bringing to life Matthew 18:19. He applied to a couple
of places and did a series of interviews, and nothing happened. I didn’t know
when or how God would show up, but I was convinced He would.
After settling the children and I in North America, my
husband went back to Europe to continue working. It was another time of
separation. But your girl held it down with God. If He had held us this far, He
will not leave us now. And surely God came through.
Three weeks after my husband returned to Europe, the boss of
his boss, who had declined to approve him for the role he wanted three years
before then, came visiting the plant where he worked in Europe. This senior
boss was on a global tour of their company's facilities. He met my husband in person
for the very first time, and they exchanged pleasantries. He mentioned that he
had overheard that my husband was planning to resign. Hubby confirmed his plans
and said he needed to be close to his family, who now live in North America.
They left it at that, and he wished my husband the best of
luck. By the next day, my husband got an email from a regional HR Director
saying the company was not willing to let him go, and if his only reason for
leaving were to be close to his family, they would find a job for him in North
America that would cater to that. That was on the instructions of the senior
boss, who had initially declined to approve him for a job he had wanted in
Africa.
The same senior boss nominated my husband for the exact job
role he was praying for in Africa three years ago and ensured he got it, but
now not in Africa, but in North America. Within 3 days, my husband got an offer
he could not refuse. It came with a promotion. But good as this sounded, God
did not stop there. But I will stop here for now.
I started this story from the point where we were praying,
and God did nothing. As a matter of God, He gave a subtle NO. At that time, it
was painful that we didn’t get what we wanted. We didn’t know what He was up to,
and it was as though God was cruel. But we learned to thank Him anyway. I
didn’t know where it would end, but I trusted the One who was leading the way.
This write-up is just an abridged summary of what the waiting period was like. It was characterized by pain, doubt, suffering, and frustration. But while I was passing through my valley of the shadow of death, God's rod and staff were there to comfort me.
When I needed money, He provided a job for me that paid me
six figures monthly, without me applying for the job or a referral coming from
anywhere. Just someone who never knew me looking me up on LinkedIn and offering
me a job just like that. And I had not worked for seventeen years before that
time.
His NO to my husband and I was not because He stopped being
God, or His love for us failed. He was actually preparing a table before us. He
took from us what we thought was the best option to give us what was a far
better option than our own best. The devil tried his best to create doubt, but God’s
love always shows up exactly when we need it.
In three and a half years, I have lived legally and
legitimately in three countries, on three different continents, and He is still
not done with me yet. I am no more special to God than you. The grace that He
showed me in my waiting period is so very much available for you. The grace of
God is like a river that never runs dry. The container of faith that you go to
that river with determines the quantity of grace that you will carry.
We will all have our refining process with God, unless you
are not like gold in His hands. As long as you are precious to God, He will
continue to refine you until you shine like He wants you to, and you become all
that He has called you to be.
If you are a child of God, do not despise His process; never
complain on the training ground. The present suffering is nothing compared to
the glory that will be revealed in you, and the entire creation awaits your
manifestation.
Just imagined if I had fallen along the way. Imagine if I
had cursed God, imagine if I had called Him a liar, I would not have the grace
to enjoy what I have today, let alone share it with you. The process may be
painful, Romans 8:18 acknowledges that truth when Paul called it suffering. But
that suffering is a fraction of the glory that will be revealed in you.
A lot of people see me and call me lucky. I am not lucky; I am just the evidence of God’s goodness and grace. I am the evidence that God does not fail those who wait on Him and trust Him. When you read this piece, be very sure that your NO is not the final verdict. If He says NO today, it’s because something better truly awaits you.
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