God and Me-Incongrous Praying

I'm still doing a study on prayer, mostly because I've been struggling with feeling like my prayers and my beliefs about God's character aren't in line. Incongruent. Out of sync. Nonrepresentative. It's like my continued praying for Conleigh's adoption doesn't mesh with my beliefs about Who God is.


I think everybody has those moments. Like when you believe in your heart that God is a fair God who is full of perfect justice, yet your own prayers for justice seem to be unmet. Or when you believe in your heart that God is full of compassion, gentle in Spirit, and that He hurts deeply right alongside His children. But in real life, you see certain situations where God's loving kindness seems to be on back order, somehow absent. Or when you believe God to be omnipotent, more powerful than earthly rulers or spiritual forces. Yet again and again, lowly people and evildoers seem to reign.


I don't doubt for a moment that my beliefs about God's character are correct. It's the waiting for those beliefs to align with my circumstances that is troubling. That last sentence is a bit of a misstatement. God has not abdicated His character for even one moment of time. He is Who He says He is in all situations. It's just that our view of what that will look like, in relationship to specific situations is skewed by our humanness. In my life, it's hard not to think that if God were really fair, He wouldn't let Conleigh's file be detained. If God were really kind, He would know that an orphanage is not a place for a child to live any longer than necessary. If God were really powerful, He would simply rearrange the circumstances that are preventing our file from being signed out.


That's when I decided to study prayer, because prayer was becoming such a problem. I was frustrated by praying prayers that pointed out all sorts of incongruency between Who God is and Who I want Him to be. For a quite a while, I've been praying the same prayer about Conleigh. And truth be told, praying that same prayer is getting old. But not praying about it would make me feel guilty. How to I juxtapose my frustrations about unanswered prayers against a relentless faith in God's ability to answer my prayers? And at what point is a simple prayer and a simple faith enough that I should leave well enough alone and simply let God work His plan in His way?


I've really been wanting to stop praying. As in, "this isn't doing any good so let's just stop." But this week, the Scripture I read all dealt with continuing to pray in faith. Colossians 1:9-10 Continued to pray....all the while you will learn to know God better and better. 1 Thess. 5:17 Pray continually.

This week, God said, "Enough. Stop praying about Conleigh's release from IBESR. Other people are praying for that. Pray for her homecoming and transition." In other words, stop fixating on the incongruencies and letting those things that seem true in moment keep you from praying. Instead, spend time focusing on something yet to come, an event that is all about God's faithfulness.