Category Archives: Prayer

Heavens of Brass

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Once in a while we hear Christians say, “When I pray, the heavens seem made of brass.” It’s an expression that comes out of the King James Version of Deuteronomy 28:23. God is comparing and contrasting obedience with disobedience, detailing the blessings that come with one and the curses with the other. In verse 23 he’s describing the curse of failing crops: “The heaven that is over thy head shall be brass, and the earth that is under thee shall be iron.”

He’s telling them that if they refuse to obey, he won’t answer their prayers for rain. From this reference the phrase “heavens of brass” came to mean silence from God.

Most of us nod our heads, having experienced the frustration of unanswered prayer. Why would the Lord purposely withhold guidance? What valid reason could there be for such coldness toward us?

Actually, there are several:

  • When God seems cold, it’s then that we want to warm up to him.
  • When he’s silent, we call to him more frequently and with greater intensity.
  • When we can’t hear him, we listen more carefully for his still small voice.
  • When we aren’t getting his half of the conversation, we crave his counsel all the more and realize advice from others just isn’t good enough.

….all good things.

But what if we’re faced with a decision and he won’t tell us what to do? Are we supposed to just roll the dice or close our eyes and point? What do we do when the deadline is upon us and he hasn’t answered yet?

Sometimes I’m helped by thinking of God’s guidance like a GPS. I depend on “Lee’s” GPS voice to let me know which road decision to make, just before I get to the intersection. Key words? “Just before.”

God does that, too. He may be silent as a deadline looms, despite promising to direct us. We cry out for instruction, and it doesn’t come. “Which choice, Lord? Help!”

One of two things will happen. Either he’ll let us know exactly what to do in the nick of time, or he’ll expect us to make no new moves but to continue as we have been. With my GPS, Lee doesn’t say a word if I’m supposed to continue going straight. As my wise daughter Linnea says, “When you don’t know what to do, think back to the last time God put you on a specific path. Until you hear something different, stay put.”

God may get quiet for a time, but his heavens are never made of brass. He’s continually hearing us and is closer than we realize. And though we think he’s silent, he’s actually still speaking, inviting us to continue calling to him in expectancy, holding out hope that when the time is just right, we’ll hear from him.

“Come close to God, and God will come close to you.” (James 4:8)

Overpowered (conclusion)

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My morning prayer time yesterday became overwhelmed with the many severe problems on my post-it notes, each in need of prayer. Can a person become too discouraged to pray? Isn’t that the moment we ought to double-time-it toward God with our needs?

Blubbering all over my notes, I finally set everything aside, closed my mascara-smudged eyes and said, “Father, help me here. What am I supposed to do? What should I be thinking about all this?”

Immediately, from out of nowhere, he plopped an old photo into my mind like a slide into a projector, a 65 year old black and white picture Mom had taken. It’s one of my favorites from childhood and shows a 3-year-old-me sitting on the beach, upset about something. My daddy is leaning over my shoulder trying to do several things:

  • hear my words
  • understand my problem
  • show sympathy
  • help me cope

My head is tipped toward his, pressing cheek-to-cheek as if to say, “I’m not going to let you fix this too soon, because I’m really loving being close to you.”

As I sat in my chair, eyes closed, I thought about that picture. What was its connection to my feeling swamped by the heaviness of so many prayer needs? As I sat quietly, God answered that question.

“Margaret, the reason you like this picture is because it shows the power and security of a father’s love. After your daddy came close to you, you became sure everything would end well.

“I’m also your Father. I’m near to you in that same way. I love you as he did, and I care about your problem and those of the people on your notes. You need to have the same confidence in me that you had in him. Since you’re talking to me now instead of him, I’m here to tell you everything is going to end well.”

I was stunned by the simplicity of God’s solution to my predicament. I’d made it far more complicated than it needed to be, so he gently brought me back to the basics:

He can.

I can’t.

The minute any of us puts a toe over the line of “I can fix this myself,” stress soars and tears flow. When we trust God to do the fixing, stress lowers and faith soars.

My task in yesterday’s prayer time, then, was to lift my post-it-people to God, not with a heavy heart but with strong trust in him for whatever comes next in each of those lives. I’m to be confident he has heard, has understood, will sympathize, and will help… just like my daddy.

It didn’t occur to me until I wrote this blog that the first letters of those 4 things God did for me (and my daddy, too) spell HUSH. God had to hush me up so I could listen, before I could understand the right way to talk to him.

“When you ask him, be sure that your faith is in God alone. Do not waver.” (James 1:6)

Overpowered

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With all the strife and struggle in our headlines these days, we can listen to news reports and quickly feel overwhelmed. None of us can fix all that’s wrong, and there’s frustration in realizing that.

This morning I felt the same crushing helplessness during my prayer time.

Sitting down with God in the corner of my bedroom each day, I put several things on my lap: a clipboard filled with blank paper, an array of scribbled post-it notes in all colors and sizes (prayer requests), a pen, pages of Scripture verses grouped by topic, and my daily devotional book by Charles Spurgeon. A cup of coffee is within reach, and maybe a rice cake with peanut butter on it, at least briefly.

As I start praying, it always impacts me that God is willing to listen and, more astoundingly, to answer prayers. But something else is always present, too. It’s a determination to “do business with God” over my own sin. He never fails to let me know what needs purging and deals with me accordingly. Sometimes the whole hour is spent on that. But most mornings there’s time to sort through the post-its and pray a wide variety of requests over the names and needs on them.

This morning was that kind of prayer time, and I looked forward to claiming biblical promises over the various needs, and listening for God’s directions on how to pray. But something unexpected happened right after I got started.

Reading the serious nature of the requests on the notes, one after another, began to swamp me. Each tiny piece of paper held weighty problems seemingly much too heavy for it, and as I handled the notes, their burdens jumped off the papers and onto me. Trying to prioritize them, my mind swirled like it was in a hurricane of sorrow. Just like with the turbulence in our headlines, I knew I couldn’t fix anything on those notes.

I started to cry, wishing I hadn’t put my mascara on before sitting down to pray. Using the paper napkin that had been under my rice cake, I began dabbing at tears until it was soaked, and then just let the other tears fall. What was happening? I’d prayed for many of these same people in their same dilemmas on multiple occasions in the past without “losing it.”

What had happened to my confidence in God’s ability to do what I couldn’t? Was I doubting he could affect change in the lives of the people I was praying for? Had I forgotten that it was God’s job to “fix” things, not mine?

But God was, as always, up to something completely different than what I thought. And he used a 65 year old photo to let me know what it was.

(Concluded tomorrow)

“God does great things beyond searching out. Who will say to him, ‘What are you doing?’ ” (Job 9:10,12)