Enduring When God Feels Silent - The Story of John

One of the biggest challenges with God is when we feel like He’s not paying attention. Our lives get dark, things get rough, and we run into challenges. We begin to doubt. When our circumstances change, it has a tremendous impact on our confidence in God, our endurance, and our faith.

Sometimes our lives feel like this, sometimes our faith feels like this. So, how do we endure when God feels silent?

John Risks It All
John the Baptist was the first prophet, outspoken, and an eccentric reformer. He was Jesus’ cousin who came onto the scene in the midst of a very different time for Jewish people. They were an occupied nation, oppressed by the superpower – the Roman Empire, and the Jewish religious system was in cahoots with the Romans and exercised tremendous power.

John preached repentance and talked about the coming of Jesus as the Messiah, who many Jews saw as the solution to the Roman political problem – the one who would bring freedom from oppression.

John then goes on to call out King Herod, because he was in a scandalous, adulterous relationship with his brother’s wife.

So, John shows up, calls out the local king, and proclaims the coming of a liberator. He was a gutsy guy, chancing imprisonment at best, torture and death at worst. He took a huge risk for his cousin from an obscure family who was making huge claims. And it catches up with him because he gets put in jail.

Jesus is out doing all these amazing things – healing people, creating miracles. John feels forgotten, and he sends word to Jesus through His followers.

Matthew 11
1 After Jesus had finished instructing his twelve disciples, he went on from there to teach and preach in the towns of Galilee.
2 When John, who was in prison, heard about the deeds of the Messiah, he sent his disciples 3 to ask him, “Are you the one who is to come, or should we expect someone else?”

John basically says, “Uh, Jesus? A little help here?” John probably felt like he stuck his neck out for Jesus, and He just passed by him. John starts to rethink his belief of who Jesus was.

John Questions God
Have you ever asked yourself, “Where is God?” You’ve taken the chance on faith, you’ve signed on, you’ve taken a step or risk, but it hasn’t paid off.

Have you ever endured, but God feels silent?

It feels like God isn’t listening or paying attention to your situation or what’s going on in the world. What happens to many of us in that situation is that we look down and begin to lose perspective. We begin to ask questions or doubt.

But we aren’t seeing the whole story.

The story of John begins much earlier, and it gives us perspective that we otherwise wouldn’t see.

• Luke 3 – John the Baptist shows up on the scene before Jesus, the first guy who’s looked like a prophet in hundreds of years. The people think he might be the one – the Messiah.
• John points past himself to the one who is coming right after him – Jesus. “The thongs of his sandals I am not worthy to untie.”
• He says, “Prepare the way of the Lord.” And when Jesus appears, He says, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world.”
• And then for all his trouble – for sticking his neck out, standing up for what’s right, what’s true – he gets thrown in prison.
• And then Jesus shows up, and He is the one who John said He was, and He begins to do the things John said He would.
• And Jesus is filled with the Spirit and returns to His hometown – Nazareth – the big reveal. Rumors and stories have been spreading that He might actually be the one. He goes to the temple, and this is the moment. Meanwhile, John is still in prison.
• Jesus opens the scriptures to one of the prophecies about the Messiah.

Isaiah 61
The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me, because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners,
2 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor 

And He ends by saying, “Today, this is fulfilled in your presence.” I AM the one.

Jumping back to the present, this is how Jesus responds to John’s followers who asked that question. “Are you the one?”

Matthew 11
4 Jesus replied, “Go back and report to John what you hear and see: 5 The blind receive sight, the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the good news is proclaimed to the poor.

It’s the same list. Jesus is telling us that the things He said He was going to do, He’s doing except for one. The one that’s missing is the one that applies to John right now. Freedom for the prisoners. The one that would give him hope, encouragement, or endurance. It’s missing.

John Feels Left
John would have known the prophecy. He would have remembered Jesus opening the scroll, saying, “I am the one.”

What Jesus really says is, “Take a look at what I’m doing.” John was left wondering why he wasn’t being bailed out, feeling left in the middle of his circumstances. He told people Jesus was going to bring the fire, but there was no fire.

Have you ever felt left without the one thing that would make a difference?

Now, imagine that feeling, and then on top of it, Jesus tells us to gain perspective and keep going.

Matthew 11
6 Blessed is anyone who does not stumble on account of me.”

The original word for “stumble” does not mean sin, it means falling off the path or giving up, meaning God might allow things to happen or might do things that cause us to question.

There will be times when God is silent, or we don’t even know if He heard us. There will be times and places that cause us to lose heart or give up. Everyone experiences these things. It’s not because of a deficiency in John or something he did or didn’t do, and the same goes for us. It’s not about having more faith or changing what we do.

Matthew 11
11 Truly I tell you, among those born of women there has not risen anyone greater than John the Baptist; yet whoever is least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he.

John never hears this.

Sometimes we won’t know what God is doing on this side of eternity.

Sometimes, we conclude that our personal struggles with endurance reflect how God feels about us, or whether He has even heard us. That’s not the case.

“Blessed is anyone…” We think blessing looks a certain way, but what Jesus is saying is even if it doesn’t work out the way you think, God feels distant or silent, or we don’t get what we think we need from God or what He owes us, we can trust Jesus.

Enter the struggle, come to Jesus with your doubts, and bring them to light, because as Pastor Michael tells us, you can endure, even in the dark.