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What Do You Do When God Feels Silent? · In the Stillness Podcast

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  Hey everyone, I'm so glad you're here today.
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  My name is Friendsly, and however you're tuning in,
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  whether you're starting your morning with this or it's the
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  middle of your day, or maybe you're even winding things down
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  at night, I'm so grateful that we get to spend a few minutes
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  together. So today we are going to be
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  reading in Matthew 15 verses 21 through 28 and it is titled
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  Jesus sends a demon out of a girl leaving that place.
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  Jesus withdrew to the region of Tyre and Sidon, a Canaanite
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  woman from that vicinity came to him crying out, Lord son of
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  David, have mercy on me. My daughter is demon possessed
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  and suffering terribly. Jesus did not answer a word, so
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  his disciples came to him and urged him.
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  Send her away, for she keeps crying out after us, He
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  answered. I was sent only to the lost
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  sheep of Israel. The woman came and knelt before
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  him. Lord help me, she said.
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  He replied, It is not right to take the children's bread and
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  toss it to the dogs. Yes, it is Lord, she said even
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  the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master's table.
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  Then Jesus said to her, Woman, you have great faith, your
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  request is granted and her daughter was healed at that
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  moment. OK, there's a lot happening in
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  this passage and honestly, I think for me at least, some
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  parts can feel confusing. There's some terms, some phrases
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  that need clarification and might not land at first, but I
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  do believe that if we pay attention, there is so much
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  depth. And so one of the first things
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  that we notice is Jesus does not respond right away.
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  The woman is here, she's crying out to him, and he clearly hears
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  her, but he's silent. And that's something I think we
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  should pause and think about for a second.
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  Silence does not mean God's absence.
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  Just because God hears us, that doesn't mean that he's always
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  going to answer immediately. And I have a verse.
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  It's Isaiah 6022. This is one that I memorized
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  last year. And it basically is talking
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  about how the Lord, he makes things happen in his timing and
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  according to His plan. So sometimes y'all the waiting,
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  it's intentional. That might not be what you want
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  to hear, but God may be stretching your faith.
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  It teaches us to keep depending on Him, to keep asking and
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  seeking and knocking and to keep believing.
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  And we learn patience all along the way.
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  So it's important to remember that it wasn't that Jesus didn't
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  want to help her. It's not that He didn't care.
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  Remember his heart, guys. He is healer, but knowing God's
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  heart, this also means knowing and believing that He desires
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  good things for His children. Romans 828 underlines this
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  perfectly that we know confidently.
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  We know that in all things God works for the for the good of
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  those who love Him. So in this moment, Jesus wanted
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  to do something within the woman before answering the physical
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  need and request that she had. He was working on the inside
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  internally before addressing the external miracle.
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  So let's Fast forward now to the disciples because truthfully, I
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  think this is something we can all relate to at some point in
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  our life and wrestle with. They are frustrated by this
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  interruption. They're just bothered by the
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  inconvenience. But in that frustration, they
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  miss the woman's real pain that she's experiencing and what her
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  daughter's real need is. And I think so often it's easy
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  to get caught up in our own schedules and our plans for the
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  day or kind of how we have it mapped out in her head for how
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  it's going to go. I get it, truly.
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  I tend to be more type A and plan everything to AT but this
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  passage it's asking us to really ask God to shape our hearts more
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  into his and to make us more attentive to others to give us
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  the eyes to serve how Jesus would.
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  And there's a verse Acts 2035. It says it is more blessed to
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  give than to receive. So I just want us to become more
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  aware of opportunities all around us that we get to share
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  the hope of Jesus because that is why we're here.
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  That's our very purpose and essence and existence.
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  And so now I want to talk about the part of the story that I
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  think can get kind of confusing. What I was alluding to in the
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  beginning, the reference to dogs, but First off, when Jesus
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  talks about being sent to the lost sheep of Israel, he's
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  pointing to the fact that it's the Jewish people that were
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  first given the opportunity to receive him as Messiah.
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  This was God's plan all along so that the Jewish people could
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  proclaim him to the rest of the world and the word dog.
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  So that's a term that the Jewish people used for Gentiles and
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  Gentiles are just non Jews. So I'm assuming a lot of people
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  listening to this, we're not Jewish, I'm not Jewish, so we're
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  Gentiles. But this was a term that was
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  degrading and it revealed pride. It was the belief that God's
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  blessings were reserved only for the Jewish people.
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  But here's the ironic thing we need to remember a lot of Jewish
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  people even up to this day, they stumble over the truth and they
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  miss who Jesus was and is. While a lot of Gentiles and just
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  non Jews, they're receiving him fully as their Messiah.
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  And it's not an accident that Jesus in this story is teaching
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  and performing this miracle in Gentile territory.
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  But I do think that this moment, it's revealing something even
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  bigger. The gospel, it's for everyone.
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  It's for anyone and everyone who chooses to receive Jesus.
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  It doesn't matter what somebody's background is or
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  label or what your past looks like.
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  And the woman's response, it's so powerful.
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  It's incredible. She responds with pure humility.
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  She doesn't argue. She's not defending herself to
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  Jesus. She is so willing to accept any
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  label or name if that means that her daughter will be fully
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  healed. And whenever I was reading this,
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  I kind of was just asking myself, like, why?
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  Why would she not? I don't know.
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  Why would she not kind of fight back?
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  And it's because she understood something deeply important.
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  Jesus. He is the only one who can
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  perform this miracle. It's in Jesus that there's life.
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  And she knew who she was talking to.
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  She knew who's present. She was in y'all.
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  She was standing before the name above all other names, Jesus,
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  and nothing else mattered to her at that point.
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  Her desperation. It reveals humble persistence
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  because she didn't just walk away or give up after the first
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  response. She waited and believed and she
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  trusted and Jesus, He honors her faith.
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  And so this is the big point that I want to end with because
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  it is the heartbeat of just this entire message.
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  Y'all, we serve the same God today.
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  He is the God who parted the Red Sea, the God who appeared to
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  Moses in a burning Bush, the God who reigned manna from heaven,
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  the God who raised Lazarus from the dead, and Christ himself.
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  Y'all, God has not changed. And so I want these stories to
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  build our faith and to remind us of who God still is today.
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  So with that, I'm going to close in prayer.
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  Dear Father God, we come before you.
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  We're so, so thankful for who you are.
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  Jesus, you were the same yesterday and today and forever.
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  So would you help us to trust that you're always working for
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  our good, even in the quiet moments when we may not sense a
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  response immediately? Would you teach us to wait with
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  faith rather than fear? Make us more desperate for you,
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  not just for what you can do. We know that you are the miracle
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  working God, but more for who you are.
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  Help us to cry out to you every single day and to praise You for
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  your presence, Your presence that's always with us.
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  Would you equip us to approach you boldly, just as your words
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  as we can in Him and through faith in Him, we can approach
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  you with boldness and confidence and freedom.
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  So help us to stand firm in our faith today, God, even when it
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  means being misunderstood or labeled by the outside world.
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  Would you make us more aware of others needs?
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  Would you use us to reflect your compassion and to share the hope
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  of Jesus wherever we are, whether that is in a work
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  environment or in the gym or in school with our own families?
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  God, we want to be your light and radiate your light, Jesus.
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  So we trust you, we praise you, we thank you for being the same
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  faithful God today we pray this in Jesus name, Amen.
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  OK, so that is that. I'm really praying that you'll
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  get something out of it. And again, take it to God and
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  ask him to speak to you directly.
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  But I hope you all have a blessed day and I will see y'all
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  tomorrow.