Vince Vitale [00:00:46] Hi, guys. 

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Jo Vitale [00:00:47] I know it's always a funny thing recording a podcast because we don't know many of you who are listening to this show. But I do like to picture you out there and wonder what are our listeners facing this week? What situations are they dealing with as you are tuning in to the podcast to listen? And so I just want to say from the start today, I truly hope that whatever is going on in your life that you will just really deeply this week know the comfort and encouragement of God's presence with you this week as you're seeking him and spending time with him. And just another reminder there that if you have a particular prayer request, please do send it in. We love getting those from you and we really love praying for you personally by name throughout all week. I know that sometimes it can feel hard for us, particularly if we're in a season of hardship or fear or uncertainty when we can question why it feels as if God is never answering us or responding to us. And we can even start to wonder, is God incredibly far away or is he just not even listening at all? 

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[00:01:45] Vince and I were chatting about that this week. We're having a conversation about prayer, and a lot of you assume because we do a podcast together, we're always having deep conversations. Actually, not true at all. But in this case, we actually work for once in our lives, felt completely overwhelmed by children and whatever else was going on that day. And as we were chatting, Vince made an observation about something he noticed recently that's just been troubling him about the way that we, those who are Christian, so often talk about prayer and go about prayer as well. And so as we were chatting, we were just wondering if whether these reflections might resonate with some of the things that you have seen and experienced as well, and whether you too have felt a bit agitated by it. So we decided to spend this week and actually the next week as well diving a bit deeper into this conversation. 

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[00:02:33] And just a heads up that we're going to make this a two part conversation. In a couple of weeks, Vince is going to put more of the questions to me as we talk through the question how do we recognize God's voice? But before that, this week, I'm going to be directing more of the questions his way as we consider the question for this week: is God giving me the silent treatment? Poor Vince he's in the hot seat today of all days, which is actually his birthday. Happy birthday, Vince. 44 years young. And I'm excited for you to share with us today some of the maturity and wisdom that you have gained overnight coming in today's podcast. Although, perhaps, that's the wrong virtue to pick up on, that God was working on in our character last night because our son Raphael came down with the Norovirus and so he threw up every half hour from between I think it was 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. So it wasn't really maturity we were working on so much as patience and joy. Last night it was a bit grim. 

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Vince Vitale [00:03:29] Yeah, I have to laugh [inaudible] how 44th birthday is quite different from 24th birthday. Where it's like, what do you want to do? Let's take a little trip. A little bit of a getaway. This one started with my hands in front of my five year old's mouth trying to keep-- I won't give you the graphic details of his sickness-- from hitting the new rugs in his bedroom and then the privilege of recording this podcast this evening with some really nice brownie cookies. 

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Jo Vitale [00:04:05] They're called brookies. 

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Vince Vitale [00:04:05] Brookies. Thank you. So thank you for those. 

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Jo Vitale [00:04:08] You're welcome. 

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Vince Vitale [00:04:08] Yeah, but I wouldn't trade it actually- last night. That's just a tender moment with the kids and you can be there for them. Yeah, kind of makes you think about God in our mess. The way he comes down and gets involved. So, yeah, there's something special about it. I wouldn't change it. 

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Jo Vitale [00:04:28] Good. Well, and hopefully we can redeem some more of the birthday joy this weekend as well. Vince, why don't you go ahead and just share with us some of what has been bothering you as we were chatting a bit about prayer. 

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Vince Vitale [00:04:42] Yeah. Thanks, Joe. This is a topic I've been thinking about a lot this past week. And so this is real time processing for me. And I have had this growing concern that a lot of us may be pretty far off when it comes to prayer. Both the way that we understand it and also the way we practice it, there seems to be a chasm between the way the Bible talks about prayer and then the way that we actually pray. And if I had to kind of sum up the concern, I would say we treat prayer, many of us, like a spiritual lottery. Like there's something out there with the power to give us enormous blessings- the lottery. And when the mega millions or whatever it is, gets to 100 million or whatever it gets to-- I don't actually know anything about the lottery. But when our desire for the jackpot gets strong enough we feel almost-- I see this in people-- like an obligation to go and buy a ticket. 

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Jo Vitale [00:05:40] Everyone went at Christmas and [crosstalk]. 

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Vince Vitale [00:05:41] Yeah, everybody at Christmas. My mom was asking me to get her a ticket. But at the same time, there's almost nothing exciting about it. Because I remember I went into one of the convenience stores and saw everybody in the line nobody looked joyful or happy or excited about it. And you can almost feel like an annoyance or a frustration because you feel this obligation to go and give yourself a chance. But at the same time you know it's basically a waste of time and money. So we walk into the lottery store or we close our eyes in prayer and we pay for our ticket, and then we walk out and go home and get on with our lives. We don't expect any actual conversation with the person behind the counter. There's nothing particularly personal about the transaction. We only expect to hear from them later if we happen to win and we know that's not really going to happen. Sure, someone out there is going to be blessed, but it's almost certainly not going to be us. And here's why this lottery approach to prayer is really worrying me. 

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[00:06:41] It worries me for lots of reasons, but this is probably the biggest one. It impugns the character of God. It maligned the character of God. Think about it. We say God is our loving Father, but then the way we communicate with him is through prayer and we treat prayer as if we only expect a response 10% of the time, or maybe less, maybe a bit more if we really grovel and beg him over and over. Imagine if I treated my kids that way. If I only cared enough to respond to them a small percentage of the time that they speak to me and imagine if I was so distracted that they needed to nag me over and over and over if they really wanted a response. That would not help them to experience me as a loving father. Actually, that would gradually disintegrate my relationship with my kids. And pretty soon they probably wouldn't like talking to me and they would gradually stop talking to me. We don't tend to be very motivated to talk to people who generally ignore us. Understandably so. But sadly, I think this is the trajectory of prayer for a lot of people and it winds up depicting God as a distracted, disinterested sort of unloving father. 

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Jo Vitale [00:07:53] Yeah, I hadn't thought of it in those terms before, but once you said that earlier this week, that really resonated with me. When I think of all my memories of my dad, he was always so welcoming. I don't remember ever feeling like he didn't want to hear from me. But it's really going to impact you if that is how you're coming before God, which we just kind of do; don't we? We're assuming that God is too busy or important or disengaged to respond, and therefore that's just absolutely going to erode our trust and our confidence in him. 

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Vince Vitale [00:08:27] And it's not going to make us very excited to enter into prayer. And then it becomes more of that duty or that obligation rather than something that's a joy. 

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Jo Vitale [00:08:34] Yeah, it's this assumption he's not really going to do it. And so, yeah, I think we see it all the time that when people just kind of settle into this rhythm in their prayer life and their relationship with God as almost as if the only way to cope or manage in the Christian life is just to lower our expectations. But that begs the question for me, well, is that just the way it is and ought to be? Is that how it was set up for us in the first place? Or have we seriously veered off course from what scripture initially taught us to expect in prayer? So how does what we're experiencing now square with what the Bible taught us to anticipate in our prayer life? 

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Vince Vitale [00:09:09] Yeah. And as I've done in this past week, I've found thankfully this is not what I see in the Bible at all. And the Bible affirms in all sorts of ways that God is really generous with his communication. We don't need to twist his arm to get him to talk with us. He's eager to speak with us. And of course, again, that shouldn't be surprising. The Bible commands us to pray continually. Think about what an odd instruction that would be if God was only planning to respond once in a blue moon. So much of scripture speaks to a God who is gracious and generous and free with his communication. Here's a few examples. James 4: "Drawing near to God and he will draw near to you." That's a promise. And surely God drawing near includes him communicating with us in some sort of way. He's not just going to draw near and sit there awkwardly in silence. He communicates with us in all sorts of ways. 

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[00:10:05] He communicates through the very creation that we're living with. In Psalm 19: The heavens declare the glory of God. The skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day (hear this language) they pour forth, speech. Pour forth. Not stingy. Not a man of few words. Night after night, they reveal knowledge. Their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the earth. No matter who you are, no matter where you are. How about James 1: If any of you lacks wisdom, you should ask God who gives generously (to who?) to all without finding fault. And it will (again that assurance) be given to you. First John 5: This is the confidence we have in approaching God; that if we ask anything (all these universal words, anything) according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have what we asked of him. Do you hear the abundance and the generosity of the biblical language? It's so very different from the way that we often treat prayer. We don't need to do cartwheels to get God's attention or do some spiritual rituals in just the right way to make him look at us. First Peter 3:12: The eyes of the world are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer. All of this biblical language gives such a different sense from the way we normally approach and often experience prayer. It's the exact opposite actually, of begrudgingly buying a lottery ticket- the exact opposite of that. 

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Jo Vitale [00:11:43] Yeah, so different, isn't it? The thought of a God whose attention you're desperately trying to get. First is this God whose attention is so fixed on you that he's hanging on your every word. He's like watching your mouth, waiting for you to speak and excited to hear what you're going to say. That is just such a different paradigm. And you haven't even touched on what Jesus has to say about prayer. You know what I love so much about Jesus in this regard is that he's not someone who just teaches about prayer, but he's constantly showing us how essential prayer is for any kind of meaningful life with the Lord because he relied upon it so much in his daily life, in ministry. And if Jesus couldn't get through a day without prayer, and if he didn't want to, then there must be something vital about it that we're in danger of missing. Jesus is always going away up the mountain; isn't he? That's where he seems to want to be. He's obviously not experiencing prayer as something that is frustrating or where he's experiencing this disconnection. So what did Jesus then teach us, Vince, about what we should expect or make of prayer from what he knew himself? 

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Vince Vitale [00:12:46] Yes. And we get Jesus's quite specific instructions for prayer in Matthew six. And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly, I tell you, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your father who is unseen. So when we don't pray just for show or as some sort of ritual, but genuinely and relationally, Jesus goes on, then your father who sees what is done in secret (again, this assurance here) will reward you. This confident language. He will respond. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them for your father knows what you need before you even ask him. 

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[00:13:38] Once again, it's relational. It's someone who knows you. It's not a matter of how many lottery tickets you buy. It's about the person that you're talking to. When I listen to the language that we tend to use around prayer, it sounds so different and so much less confident than what I hear in scripture. Once in a while we talk about God answering a prayer. And by that we usually mean that we asked for something quite specific and concrete and God gave us that thing. But when I read the Bible, I wind up asking myself, does God ever not answer prayer? And, again, I'm driven back to the fact that God is a loving Father. And I think, well, of course he always answers prayer, just like I always answer my children when they speak to me. 

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Jo Vitale [00:14:22] Okay. That's interesting because I think that could be some pushback here in terms of people might say, well, what about the times when we clearly see in the Bible that people are experiencing silence in their relationship with God? I'm thinking particularly of some of the Psalms that the times that the psalmist is very vocal and honest about the struggle, the having of seeking God desperately but feeling like they're being met with silence and that kind of crying out of that place of frustration. So what would you say to that? 

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Vince Vitale [00:14:52] Yeah, that's the real and the Psalms are the first place that my mind went in that respect as well. Numerous Psalms where his experience of feeling as if God is silent, maybe the most famous one might be Psalm 22, which Jesus quotes from the cross where David writes, "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me? Why are you so far from saving me? So far from my cries of anguish? My God, I cry out by day but you do not answer by night. But I find no rest." It sure sounds like God is silent, but I would say only out of context. Text without context is pretext. Many a preacher have said. So we need to read on and consider not just like an isolated verse. Often the beginning of a psalm the psalmist is expressing this feeling and emotion, but what does the psalm say as a whole? And so if you keep reading that psalm, you get to verse four and you see David begin to remind himself, "In you our ancestors put their trust. They trusted and you delivered them. To you they cried out and were saved. In you they trusted and were not put to shame." So he begins to remember God's faithfulness and then he draws close. The next thing he does is he draws close and recognizes his dependance on God. Verse 11: "Do not be far from me, for trouble is near and there's no one to help. I'm coming to you for help.". 

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[00:16:14] And then out of this place of nearness with God, he begins to worship him and he says, now we're in verse 22, "I will declare your name to my people in the assembly. I will praise you. You who fear the Lord, praise him. All you descendants of Jacob, honor him, revere him, all you descendants of Israel." And then what happens? Must read on. "For he has not despised or scorned the suffering of the afflicted one. He has not hidden his face from him, but has listened to his cry for help." By the end of this Psalm, and precisely through the process of writing a Psalm of prayer, David realizes that God has not hidden Himself, that He has listened to Him. And David ends his prayer in a place of confidence and gratitude. He says future generations will be told about the Lord. They will proclaim his righteousness, declaring to a people yet unborn, he has done it. My point is that sometimes we point to the beginning of certain Psalms as evidence of God's silence, when if we read on those very psalms or acts of prayer that so often are the very means by which the psalmist does hear from God. 

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[00:17:22] One other example, Psalm 28, another great example of this; also a some of David starting in verse one, "To you, Lord, I call you. You are my rock. Do not turn a deaf ear to me; for if you remain silent, I will be like those who go down to the pit. Hear my cry for mercy as I call to you for help." Again, it sounds like God is silent if we just stop at that point. But then David again he enters into worship. "As I lift my hands toward your most holy place." And then by the end of his prayer in this psalm, we read, "Praise be to the Lord, for he has heard my cry for mercy. The word is my strength and my shield. My heart trusts in him and he helps me. My heart leaps for joy. And with my song I praise him." If you read the Psalms in full, they actually, I think, prove the opposite of God's silence. They prove that, yes, that's may be our real experience. And that's real at times, but it's precisely by coming to God in prayer that he does speak and that we can be confident that he will speak and that he wants to speak. 

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Jo Vitale [00:18:28] Yeah, that really strikes me especially because arguably you could say if anyone ever experienced God's silence or God not answering that prayer, it was Jesus from the cross. In that moment where we say he became sin for us so that we could become the righteousness of God. And then we often think of him in terms of as sin that he is forsaken by God, that he's rejected, so that we're not. That everything that's due to us, he experiences. So often we think of Jesus in that moment as the one person who maybe is left in that isolation and darkness. But even Jesus in praying that Psalm, whether he's reminding himself of what's to come or whether he's just leaning towards like even in this moment I know that the Lord is not actually overlooking my suffering and the afflicted one. And just that amazing last line. He has done it. Just echoing from the cross like it is finished. That even for Jesus and the most utterly isolating experience anyone has ever been through, he still knows there's a sense in which God the Father is absolutely with him watching on, not forsaking him at work. That really begs the question, is there ever a situation when any of us experienced that? Even Christ when he took on sin for us has that hurt. So that really is impactful. 

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Vince Vitale [00:19:42] And it's almost like an opposite instinct that for some of us we feel like we're still developing in how we pray. And we haven't really figured out prayer. It's not like we pray and it feels like a silent. But when I look at the Psalms and Jesus, they're choosing to quote Psalm 22. It's almost like an opposite instinct. When God seems silent, pray. Not when you pray, God is silent. But when God seems silent, pray. And that actually will put you into a place where you hear the voice of God. 

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Jo Vitale [00:20:09] That's really helpful. But it gets me thinking about what about the cases where perhaps it's not so much that God seems silent so much as that he seems to be deeply reluctant and frustrated with our prayers. I'm thinking about the times where it seems almost as if God needs to be badgered into responding to our prayers. And it's not because he wants to. It's just because we won't quit nagging. It's kind of like the daily experience in our house when our kids finally get up and do something not because they have any desire whatsoever to do it for me, but simply because I will not get off their case until they do. And finally the frustration outweighs the unwillingness. I guess I'm thinking of Jesus parable of the persistent widow at this point. Oftentimes, I've even heard people make the comparison, well, that's how intercession is supposed to be with God. We're just supposed to beg and beg and beg and just don't quit knocking and knocking and knocking. Just push and push until finally he'll just give in just to kind of make us go away. And so what are your reflections on that parable of Jesus? 

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Vince Vitale [00:21:10] Yes, that passage seems to be used like that a lot. I think it's really important to look into this because there's this tendency to interpret as if God is silent and yes if we just coax him or nag him enough, then maybe we'll be able to break the silence. Which immediately strikes me as a questionable way to read a passage such as that, because again, it's so contrary to the consistent emphasis of the rest of Scripture. That God is ready and willing and eager to respond to our prayers. So let's look at it. We're in Luke 18. We start here in verse 18. "Then Jesus told his disciples a parable." So that's important, okay? Which means it's not going to be an exact 1 to 1 correlation between this metaphor, this analogy, and the principles that we're taking from it. But this parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said, "In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.' For some time he (meaning the not God fearing judge) refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care what people think, yet, because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice so that she won't eventually come and attack me.'". 

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[00:22:31] Then the Lord and Jesus said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you; he will see that they get justice and quickly." I think we really misuse this passage when we make it into a model for prayer. Basically, keep asking for the same thing over and over and over and over. And if you do so repetitively enough and bothersomely enough, it'll become so annoying to God that eventually he'll relent and give you what you want just to get you to shut up and go away. I think that's really problematic because again what does it imply about God's character as a father? That's the exact opposite of who God is; the one who wants us to always draw near to him and continually come to him in prayer. And so what are we to make of this passage? Well, let's look at what it actually says. First, the parable that Jesus tells is about an unjust judge who does not fear God. So right away it should be pretty obvious to us that this judge is not going to be some sort of 1 to 1 parallel with God. He's not going to be a model for the way that God acts. The point of the passage seems to primarily be that if even an unjust, Godless judge responds to consistent prayer, how much more graciously will God respond to consistent prayer? 

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[00:24:00] And quite to the contrary of saying that we can expect God to be silent and only slowly relent if we nag him; if you read the passage carefully, it actually says the exact opposite. It says that the unjust judge refused the widow's request for some time. The unjust judge was silent for some time, but this is contrary to what it says explicitly about God when it says that God will see that we get justice quickly. The unjust judge is supposed to be contrasted with God, not held up as a model for how we need to pray. And actually I'll just mention briefly there is a very similar passage in Luke 11 as well. There Jesus says, "Suppose you have a friend and you go to him at midnight and say, 'Friend, lend me three loaves of bread. A friend of mine on a journey has come to me and I have no food to offer him. And suppose the one inside answers, 'Don't bother me. The door is already locked. My children are in bed. I can't get up and give you anything.' I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity, he will surely get up and give you as much as you need." 

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[00:25:08] Well, once again, we need to be careful not to make this into some sort of direct parallel or exact model for prayer, because obviously Jesus is not likening God to someone who won't accept inconvenience in order to help us. That's completely contrary to the gospel. And obviously he's not likening God to someone who can't be bothered to be generous out of friendship. Once again, this passage is contrasting the stinginess of one person with the generosity of God and saying, if even this very imperfect friend will respond to you, how much more can you expect God to respond to your prayers? And it's with exactly that confidence that Jesus then ends that passage? He says, "So I say to you, ask and it will be given to you. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be open to you. For everyone who asks receives, the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks the door be opened. Which of you fathers if your son asks for a fish will give him a snake instead? Or if he asks for an egg, we'll give him a scorpion. If you then though you are evil (that contrast) know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him? 

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Jo Vitale [00:26:26] It's so convicting when you hear that because it's ridiculous, but sometimes it's so hard to believe that God's love stretches further than the love we have for our children or the love that our parents have for us. I think in our minds we don't intend to think of it this way, but this is what we're kind of assuming in the way that we treat or approach prayer. I'm just thinking of last night when Rafael was throwing up and we immediately get his mattress off his bunk, pull it into the hallway so that he's next to the bathroom, but also right next to our bedroom door, we keep it wide open. And then I'm just lying there all night. And as soon as I hear the slightest sound from him, I'm out the door running, throwing my arms around him, holding him while he's throwing up. I'm not stopping him from throwing up because I know actually he needs to get it out; it's the only way to get through this thing. But I'm there the whole time, holding his head, stroking his head saying, "I'm here. I'm here. You're not alone." And I'm thinking of those words and Jesus's parable of the persistent widow when he says to those who are crying out day and night and won't the Lord respond quickly? If that's the immediacy that we like as parents, and then thinking of that second one, how much more will your father in heaven give the Holy Spirit? Like how much more will he be present to those who seek him? It's actually a staggering promise, but you're so right. I don't take hold of that in the way that I approach so often in my prayers. That is not my assumption that that is how he's going to come to me. But it's quite astonishing. 

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Vince Vitale [00:27:56] Luke 11 as well, Jo, in bed that's what I saw last night. We're in bed and then from the other the other room it's, "Mom, dad, help me." And are we going to stay in our beds? But it's amazing we jumped up [crosstalk]. 

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Jo Vitale [00:28:14] I never move that fast. 

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Vince Vitale [00:28:16] We never move that fast. I'm 44 now [inaudible] and pull a hammy. And I'm jumping, climbing and diving up into the top bunk last night carrying his throw up to the bathroom. But it's just yes we think of God as so much more aloof and slow to respond to our prayers than the way that we respond to the deep needs of our children. These passengers are saying it's exactly the opposite. Whatever their situation is, where you think this is your child's deepest need and this is how eager you are to respond; the perfect God of the universe, the all loving father of the universe, he's even more eager to respond. 

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Jo Vitale [00:29:03] A hundred percent. And the funny thing is we joke about it being frustrating and gross, but actually there was nowhere else we would rather have been. It was a privilege to be there with our child when he's that sick and just to be the one comforting him. And so how much more so with God? That's quite amazing. Wow. God is really amazing. I think for some of us maybe that's the hardest thing as well; isn't it? That it's actually in those places of great suffering and pain that we often feel like God is most silent. And so in a way it can compound the agony when not only are you going through the worst time of your life, but that is exactly when we can often experience as if God has disappeared. And so what do we make of cases like that? The book of Job would be an example, right? This long suffering, terrible suffering that Job goes through in his life. And all the while that he's going through it; God doesn't speak until the very end of the book. And there's a lot of discourse, but God doesn't show up and start talking until the very end. And so what do we make of that in this conversation about how God is speaking all the time and always answering prayer. Was that Job's experience? 

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Vince Vitale [00:30:13] Yeah, that's good and I appreciate the way you entered into that because sometimes I can almost think of Job and the Book of Job as just as a abstract, almost fictional, narrative. But this was a real person that had to go through unthinkable suffering. And so I really want to be sensitive to that and that his experience of that was very real and understandable. And as late as Chapter 30 Job says, "I cry to you for help and you do not answer me. I stand and you only look at me." That does sound a lot like a God who's silent. And then in chapter 31 he's still in this difficult place. And he says, " Oh! That I had someone to hear me. I sign now my defense. Let the almighty answer me. Let my accuser put his indictment in writing. Surely I would wear it on my shoulder. I would put it on like a crown. I would give him an account of my every step. I would present it to him as to a ruler." And he's in this place of frustration. But I do think that one of the main points of the Book of Job is that Job and his friends they talk a lot and they won't stop talking. And they go on and on. His friends with their thoughts and their wisdom. And there's a sense through that book like God can't get a word in [inaudible]. And then what happens as soon as they finally stop talking, God speaks. 

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[00:31:44] In chapter 38, "Then the words spoke to Job out of the storm. He said, 'Who is this that obscures my plans with words without knowledge? Brace yourself like a man. I will question you and you shall answer me. Where were you when I laid the Earth's foundation?" And then he goes on to reveal so much about who he is to Job. God speaks. And then how does Job respond once he hears from God? Then he knows he's heard from God. As soon as God speaks it's almost God's been waiting to speak and finally there's this pause and God can speak. And then chapter 40 Job is humbled and he says, "I am unworthy. How can I reply to you? I put my hand over my mouth. I spoke once, but I have no answer. Twice, but I will say no more." When God speaks, Job completely changes his attitude. It's not that you were quiet, God, it's that I needed to be quiet and not listen to all of my friends and all of their superficially wise thought. I needed to let you speak and listen to you. So, again, I think Job's another example of you can read early on and say God seems silent, but if you read it in the context of the whole book, I think you need to say this is a God who was eager to speak and was waiting for Job to be in a place to be ready to hear from him, to hear his voice, rather than all these voices of his friends. 

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Jo Vitale [00:33:09] So what you're saying here is that actually God may may well be speaking or wanting to speak, but it's more the case that we're not in a place to hear it. 

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Vince Vitale [00:33:19] Yeah. 

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Jo Vitale [00:33:20] What are some of the reasons you think why we might not be hearing. 

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Vince Vitale [00:33:26] Again, I find the analogy of parent and children so helpful here. Sometimes, just like in the book of Job, it's not that our kids aren't asking things of me, but that they're asking so repetitively over and over without ever stopping to listen for an answer that I can't get a word in [inaudible]. Other times I wait to respond because our kids are distracted and I know answering them before they actually focus and look at me isn't really going to do any good. Sometimes if I answer them, Jo, I'll literally look at them and say, "Look at Daddy's eyes." 

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Jo Vitale [00:33:59] Yeah, still he takes a few requests. 

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Vince Vitale [00:34:01] I usually take a few requests.

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Jo Vitale [00:34:02] And sometimes you have to hold them by the face and turn their head. 

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Vince Vitale [00:34:03] Yeah, grab them by their face and turn their eyes towards me. And sometimes I think God's response to our distracted prayers is first look at my eyes. Fix your eyes on me. I don't just want to speak to hear my own voice. I want you to actually hear it. So I'm waiting for your full attention. Similarly, sometimes my kids ask in such a rush that I don't respond until they slow down and are actually ready to hear an answer. Personally, I very rarely have a really great one minute conversation. It takes time to actually settle into a good conversation. But how many of our conversations with God are one minute or less? I find that a convicting question. I'm not saying that there's anything wrong with the one minute conversation; that can be good, but there is something wrong if all of your conversations with a dear friend are one minute or less. If we really want to hear from God, we need to learn to cultivate unhurried time with him. Times when we sit down to pray and say, "God, I want this conversation to be as long as you'd like it to be. I've got no hard stop. I don't even have a soft stop. No next meeting I'm worried about being late for. Nothing more important I need to get to. I just want to spend time talking with you." 

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Jo Vitale [00:35:16] Yeah, that resonates. It kind of makes me think of the way that sometimes it feels like God wants us to really lean in. I think of when God spoke to Elijah in a whisper- not because he couldn't be loud. He could have called his attention with no trouble at all. But is there something about that intentional whisper that sometimes you just really want to bring it right down to get someone to pay attention? I sometimes feel like some of the best conversations I have with our kids are when it gets quieter. There's something about when I say, "We're going to whisper now." They actually listen differently. And again there's something going on like that with God. 

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Vince Vitale [00:35:57] Yeah, I always really admire coaches and teachers and leaders who are very soft spoken but still carry an authority with them. There can be something particularly inviting and tender, but also even authoritative about a confident whisper that challenges you to really focus and give your full attention so that you don't miss what's being said. And so, yeah, I totally agree with that. I think sometimes God whispers in response to our prayers, but again, a whisper is not silence. Speaking in a low voice, as you've said, can actually be one of the best ways to help someone who's not good at listening. And then there are other times when I think our kids ask me for something and I say something along the lines of, no, we're not talking about that until we talk about something else first. We're not talking about whether or not you can have ice cream until you apologize to your brother for hitting him in the face with a dinosaur. 

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[00:36:50] Even when I have to say this sort of thing to my kids, it is still a response. It's still me speaking. It's not silence. I don't just give them the silent treatment. And likewise, as a loving father, God might wait for our attention. He might wait for us to actually stop talking and be in a posture of listening. He might say we need to talk about something else first, especially if there's unrepentant, repetitive sin in our lives that God wants us to bring to him as a top priority. He might say that. But when we come to God with sincerity and focus, we can be confident he is going to give us a response of one sort or another. He's going to give us a valuable, loving response. He's not just going to give his children the silent treatment. That's not the kind of father he is. Psalm 1: 45 puts it this way. It says, "The Lord is near to all who call on him; to all who call on him in truth." 

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Jo Vitale [00:37:48] Yeah. That's so good. I often think of the verse in 1 Peter 3 where there's a specific commandment about the way husbands need to treat their wives with respect and with love in order that their prayers won't be hindered. And I think that's getting it a similar thing, isn't it? There's a direct correlation between the way you're loving people and how you're behaving towards them and whether you're in a place where your prayers can go unhindered or whether, again, the Lord might be kind of like, yeah, don't hit your brother in the face with a dinosaur. Let's deal with the issues here before we start talking about something else. It actually really matters to God. 

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Vince Vitale [00:38:23] Yeah, that's right. Sometimes it's, God, I want to talk about this. And God says, no, we're talking about this first. But he always does want to talk. And he's always going to talk to you about something. It may not always be the thing you think you should be talking about, but he does always respond. 

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Jo Vitale [00:38:36] Yeah. And that's kind of an irony as well that we assume when we're having conversations with God, that we're the one who should be setting the topic. We could talk about that next time. There's a lot to be said there, but there's a kind of irony to that. Like, why do we think we're the ones who get to dictate the terms of the relationship in our conversations? But that's interesting because I think it's hitting on this area of you talk about God always speaking, but at the same time, we don't always get what we ask for. You might say we often don't get what we ask for. So how should we think of this relationship between the language of God answering prayers and not answering prayers in relation to God speaking verses not speaking. 

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Vince Vitale [00:39:15] Right. I always get what I ask for. Of course, this doesn't mean that God is always going to give us what we think we want or the way that we think we want it. Sometimes God gives us what we ask for and sometimes he doesn't. Just like any loving father, sometimes gives his children what they ask for and sometimes knows that despite their wishes, it's best not to. But whether we've received what we've asked for (this is the important point, I think) is a very different question from whether or not God has responded to us in prayer. And it's really important for us to keep those as two separate questions and not conflate them. When we ask for something, yes is a response; no is a response; wait is a response; I'm waiting for your attention is a response. And so is there's something else we need to talk about. And perhaps the most important point here is that asking for stuff (I think this is critical) is a relatively small part of a healthy prayer life. 

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[00:40:14] When we spend all of our time in prayer asking for stuff, then we wind up conflating getting what we want with hearing God's voice and not getting what we want with God is silent. And then these creeps into our language about prayer. When we get what we asked for in prayer, we say, thank you, God, for answering my prayer. But if we only say this when we get what we asked for, it sort of implies that all the other times God didn't answer our prayers. That he was silent. And then God again starts to seem more and more like the lottery where we just submit our tickets and we don't expect to hear anything unless it's to give us the prize we're hoping for. And that's not going to happen very often. That's very transactional and non-relational; whereas, biblically, I believe, God desires prayer to be this continual ongoing relational conversation where asking for stuff is not the starting point or the sole focus. And here I think that the way Jesus taught us to pray is really helpful. The Lord's Prayer- very instructive. Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name. It's recognizing who God is and praising him for who he is. It's about him-- not immediately about me. 

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[00:41:24] Your kingdom come; your will be done. Not what I want, but what you want on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. So then there is here a petition. There is an asking for something. But again, it's not immediately specific. Give us today our daily bread. God, you know what that is better than I do. And, ultimately, my request is for you, not just for something concrete that you can give me, but for you. Yourself. Because you are my daily bread. Forgive us our sins as we also forgive those who have sinned against us and lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. Oftentimes, our prayers are disproportionately focused on the specific things we think we want and what we think we need, and that can be really detrimental to our faith. Even when we're asking for good things, if that's all we do, that can make for a very thin prayer life. If the majority of my communication with my kids was just asking them for stuff, that would not be great. That doesn't build relationship. But when I think Raph is going to come to me and ask for something and then he just looks at me and says, "Dad," and I'm waiting for the ask. And he says, "I love you," Or, "Dad, you're the best." 

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Jo Vitale [00:42:39] He does that a lot, actually. It's the sweetest. 

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Vince Vitale [00:42:42] That is the absolute best. And that is how Jesus tells us to start our prayers. Father, hallowed be your name. What a delight that must bring to the father's heart when we say father and he's thinking, am I just going to get asked for something else? And I like when my kids ask me for things. I want to give them good things. That's my heart for them. But, boy, when they start with, I just love you... Father, hallowed be your name, what delight that must bring him. But it can be so instinctive when we pray to just start listing off all the stuff we want like we're sending a list to Santa. And I see it in our kids, and we are right in that timeframe right now. We're trying to help them learn to pray and we try to get creative and tell them, "What do you want to pray for tonight?" And it's it's so instinctive and it's partly because of our culture and the world around us and every commercial on TV and how easily we can just get stuff and we want stuff and just click this button. 

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[00:43:37] And as our kids start to pray, it's so much more instinctive for them to ask for things than to say, "Father, hallowed be your name. I love you. You are the best. I just want to be present with you. Thank you so much for just being present with me, for living within me. Thank you for the fruits of your spirit or these things that we can't even see, but they're just so good and they're far beyond anything that we could ask for. You know what we need better than we know." It's so much more instinctive to just start asking for stuff. And this is a temptation that I think we need to really fight against even as adults if we want to pray biblically and in a way that actually draws us near to God and is joyful and life giving. Let me ask you, when you pray, do you conceive of yourself as actually talking to someone? That is the critical question. Not just buying lottery tickets, not just sending a Christmas list to Santa-- entering into God's presence, sensing his love, telling him you love him, sensing him continually ready to speak to you whenever you stop to listen. Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done. Is that our approach to prayer? 

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Jo Vitale [00:44:44] Yeah, that's so good. I've heard you ask the question, Vince, is any prayer better than no prayer? How do you think about that? 

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Vince Vitale [00:44:53] Yes. 

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Jo Vitale [00:44:54] I have a sense, you know.

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Vince Vitale [00:44:56] It's interesting I feel like when I put the question that way to people, they often pause and then maybe get the right answer. But I think I often treat prayer like any prayer is better than no prayer. At least I prayed today. It might have been a pretty rubbish prayer, but better than nothing, right? And I just want to highlight the fact that that's questionable at best. Because once we conceive of prayer as conversation, not just submitting a list to Santa but a conversation where we're actually expecting to hear back from someone, that's not clear at all. That's not true about my communication and any other relationship in my life. There are plenty of times when bad communication with Jo is worse than no communication at all. I should have just kept my mouth shut. 

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[00:45:45] When I'm distracted or rushed or my heart is not in a good place, I can't just walk away and be like, well, at least we spoke about something. We got in a fight. It's like, no, would have been better to just not speak at all until you're ready to speak well. But if am honest, this is the case with my conversation with God more than I'd like to admit. Sometimes I get distracted. I forget who I'm speaking to and I just start throwing lazy flippant prayers in the direction of the God of the universe in a way that I would never do in conversation with anyone else. Prayers that aren't even grammatical or that just trail Off as I get distracted by whatever happens to pop up on my phone. That is not good enough. Bad prayer can actually hurt relationship. So this is something that we need to take really seriously. 

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Jo Vitale [00:46:32] Yeah, I think that's right. And just heading towards the close now, but one more major theme I wanted to touch on here is if God speaks consistently, what do you think about whether he's speaking clearly? Not so much is he speaking, but can we figure out what he's saying? Is he intentionally making it mysterious or difficult? Is it in a secret language? Is it a test to see how well we're listening? Is it in code? How should we think about this? Is God not just consistent, but is he actually clear in his communication? 

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Vince Vitale [00:47:07] This is another area, actually, where I think biblically we can expect so much more in prayer than we tend to. We're always talking about how we're trying to figure out what God is saying in prayer and how hard and confusing it can be to discern. But, again, when we open our Bibles, I think that should strike us as very different from what we actually see in Scripture. Can you think of biblical examples where God speaks to a person of faith, but that person is unsure whether it is the voice of God or is confused about what God is trying to say. And not that long ago I heard Richard Blackerby ask that question when I was doing some teaching with him. And I thought, man, that's a really interesting question. What a great question. And one example might be Samuel. He mentioned when he has to hear God's voice three times before he realizes it's God rather than Eli. But this appears to be the anomaly in Scripture. And even in this case, Samuel was young and it says he did not yet know the Lord; his faith was still maturing. 

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[00:48:13] Most of the time in scripture there's no mistake when God speaks about whether he is speaking or what he is saying. And how much more so should that be the case now in a post Pentecost age when we have the Holy Spirit literally dwelling within us? We're in a far better position to know the Lord's voice than Samuel was, than most of the people were that we read about in the Bible. And this is another example of where we speak of prayer very differently from the way it is actually depicted in Scripture. In Scripture people say the Lord said with decisiveness. But we often talk as if God intentionally speaks in cryptic ways that we have to somehow try to figure out as if God is intentionally making it hard for us to hear from him. And, again, is that true of a loving father and is that true of what we see in Scripture? I think there's so much more for us in prayer in this regard. 

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[00:49:10] I was recently teaching a group of about 30 Christian leaders, and I asked them, I said, "What percentage of the time that God is speaking to you? Do you think you actually hear him?" And I asked each of them to anonymously (so I get some honest answers) write down a percentage on a piece of paper and then drop it in a bowl. About half of the class-- and these are mature Christian leaders with a deeply committed faith. About half of the class said 10% or less, and only five people said more than a third of the time. And when I saw that, I thought, whoa, this is a big deal. We really need to focus some time here because what kind of relationship will that lead to and how are we going to have a good relationship with someone if we hear less than 10% of what they're speaking to us? I thought, man, the devil's having a field day here. Communication is the basis of any relationship, and he's convinced us that we shouldn't expect frequent or clear communication from the person we are supposed to be in the deepest relationship with. 

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Jo Vitale [00:50:13] So I feel like in this conversation we've both covered a lot of ground. But also there's still a lot to be said here in terms of how do we then hear and recognize God's voice? I think it's so exciting to think if God is speaking consistently and clearly, then we should expect to be able to hear what he's saying. But there are practical details to be thought through here in terms of how do we do that? How are we going to hear from him and what does that look like? If I really believe this about God and that he's speaking all the time, how does my prayer life actually get transformed in a way where this isn't just theoretical or theological for me, but it is daily impacting my life and my walk with the Lord. So we're actually going to get into that next time because we've already given you a lot tonight. But for now, Vince, just leave us with a finishing thought. 

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Vince Vitale [00:50:59] Yeah. From this episode I hope you take that when it comes to prayer, we tend to think that even if we wouldn't say this, if we were asked the questions explicitly, our practice of prayer tends to assume that God is not speaking that often and that when he does it's not very clear what he's saying. And that is a big problem and a catastrophic lie of the enemy, really, who's trying to sabotage our relationship with God. Biblically, we see the opposite on both counts. God is speaking and he's speaking clearly. And that should excite us; that there is so much more in prayer than we have experienced to this point. In my own life, when I've really been focused on looking into God's eyes in an undistracted, unhurried way and hearing from him, I know he can speak in very clear and very specific ways and he's eager to. There are there are many stories I could share, but I think of one time when I was walking through an airport to my gate and I was about to sit down to write the conclusion to a book I was working on that was titled Why Suffering; and God told me I just knew he was prompting me to turn around and walk away from the gate I was walking to the interfaith prayer room, which I had never in my life had any sort of inclination to go and visit. 

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[00:52:25] And if I remember correctly, it was in a different terminal. I had to walk a long way to get there. And I walked in and there was one guy sitting there on the ground, his face in his hands, and he just told me this devastating story of the suffering that he and his brother had recently been through. And then at the very end of him sharing this story with me, he says, I just don't understand it. Why would God allow such suffering? And this is literally-- I'm walking and I think I'm going to sit down with my computer and write the conclusion to a book titled Why Suffering and God turns me around because these were the things that were on my mind and in my heart and led me to a person who needed a response to exactly that question. So in summary, if an honest assessment of your prayer life reveals that at least subconsciously you believe God is only going to respond to your prayers infrequently and that even when he does, he's going to do so in some sort of obscured way that will be impossible to figure out, I hope this is an exciting episode for you because there's so much more that God desires to enjoy together with you in prayer. 

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[00:53:30] The God of the Bible is eager to reveal himself clearly to all who seek Him. In fact, I think I'll go so far as to say that there is no such thing as unanswered prayer. How would believing that change your prayer life? How would it change your entire relationship with God if you truly believed God was constantly speaking to you and that you could get to know his voice? We'll talk about this next time so well that it could become the clearest voice in your life. How would that change the way you pray? How would it change how often you pray? How much you listen in prayer? How would it change your entire relationship with God and how excited you get to speak with him? We tend to treat prayer like it's playing the lottery, right? When the truth is, it's much more like you've already won the lottery. Prayer is the prize. And when you understand it biblically, it becomes such an exciting privilege, one that is always available to you and that I believe you will want to place at the very center of your life. 

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