Sometimes Faith Doesn't Look Like Answers, It Looks Like Coming Back

Faith.

Why do we lose it?

Sometimes we lose it because we pray for things that don't show up when we'd like them to.

Sometimes we lose it because we make choices we know we shouldn't have made and we begin to feel like it's too late to make the better choice.

Sometimes we lose faith because voices in this world tell us our faith is foolish.

There's a story of a woman in the bible who didn't lose faith no matter how much it looked like she had every reason to do so. Her name was Hannah. She was one of two wives of Elkanah, and while his other wife Peninnah had many children, Hannah had none.

In that culture, barrenness was shaming.

Yet, year after year, the family would travel to the temple at Shiloh to worship and sacrifice. And year after year, Peninnah would provoke Hannah, mocking her infertility until she wept and could not eat.

One year, in deep anguish, Hannah stood before the Lord and poured out her soul - no rehearsed prayer, just tears and quivering lips. Her grief was so strong that Eli the priest mistook her for being drunk.

When she explained her grief, Eli blessed her. And Hannah, still without a child, walked away with a different kind of peace that day, not one based on suddenly having a child, but on surrender.

And in time, her prayer was answered. She conceived and gave birth to a son, Samuel.

The beauty of Hannah’s story isn’t just in the answered prayer. It’s in her resilience. In the way she kept going back to God even though it hurt. In the way she believed before she received.

Her story reminds me that my faith doesn’t always look like all is well. It often looks like going back when things couldn't feel more unwell.

Not just once.

But again.
And again.
And again.

I have some prayers in my life God has not answered. And it's frustrating. Maddening at times. Yet in my anger, God is always waiting. Waiting for me to come back.

I have made choices in my life that didn't work out well. At times I've allowed the results of those choices to fill my life with shame. But God isn't shaming. God isn't blaming. God is waiting. Waiting for me to come back and make the next better choice.

I have voices in my ear at times telling me that my faith is foolish. Voices provoking me to believe my pain is a signal that God isn't listening, God is not here.

But there is always another ear, another voice, and it is always calling me to ignore those voices and come back.

That is faith many days, going back in spite of the voices, in spite of the appearance that going back has never paid off before so it surely won't now.

God's rewards don't often come in the form of instant gratification, of instant answers. God rewards - God's greatest blessings - often come in all that we learn and come to believe in the willingness to keep coming back.

Again and again and again.

Often faith doesn't look like answers, it looks like coming back.