When the Lord takes longer than we expect

There are many ways that God answers our prayers. What we have to do is leave that part to the Lord and do our part which is to pray to Him, cry out to Him and present our needs.

In the last segment we were talking about the Lord inviting us to make our needs known to the Lord in every prayer and I pray, says the apostle Paul. Instead of getting anxious and fearful what we have to do is discharge our needs to the Lord and He promises to answer and answer our requests.

And that is why we see that Martha and Mary ask the Lord: help us, help us instead of staying there in their crisis they appeal to that relationship of friendship as we must appeal to that relationship that we have preferential in a sense with Jesus through His blood, by which we love Him and believe in Him, and worship and serve Him, and have a sustained relationship with Him.

We must take advantage of that, not waste it, but ask because the Lord tells us to ask and it will be given to you, it is the Lord, the Word itself who invites us to ask the Lord and pray to Him, and not waste that resource that we have in every situation. He says in every prayer and I beg, so says the Apostle Paul. In other words, in any situation, prayer should always be a resource.

We should pray as we always breathe: in the car, in the supermarket while we are shopping, before eating, before going to bed, when we wake up, in the morning before going to work, when we have a big problem, a small problem our life should be a continuous breathing in prayer and continually presenting to the Lord every need and seasoning, and saturating every aspect of life with that relationship of continuous dialogue with the Lord.

So I said in the last program: our part is to submit our requests to the Lord and then rest, and let Him respond as He best wants. Because many times He has a plan that we do not understand, so many times He will respond with silence, with waiting. It may be with a red light saying no. It may be with a yellow light saying: hey, little by little I will answer your need. It may be with a green light saying: you know what? Before you asked me, I had already begun to answer that prayer that I knew you were going to ask me.

Because look what happens in this part. It says that: "Hearing it Jesus" means that the prayer of Martha and Mary reaches the Throne of Grace, "Hearing it Jesus said: this disease is not for death but for the glory of God, so that the Son of God may be glorified by it . " It says that Jesus called Martha, her sister, and Lazarus, but here's something interesting in verse 6 of John chapter 11, it says: "When he heard that Lazarus was dead, he stayed where he was for two more days."

How weird this. The Lord listens to the request of Martha and Mary where they tell him that Lazarus is very sick, to run to see him and then that man who tells us that he loves Lazarus, Martha and Mary, Jesus, instead of running immediately to help One of them says that he decided to stay two more days in the place where he was as if he did not care in a way what was happening to Lazarus.

I think that's why Juan clarifies and says that Jesus loved Martha, her sister and Lazarus. In other words, what John is saying here is: Jesus had a great love for these brothers and yet before that he decided to stay 2 more days before agreeing to the urgent request that they were making of him for immediate help. What is going on in the mind of Jesus right now?

We can see this behind the scenes in light of the Word. The Lord is like riding on the stage for a great miracle. He wants many people to believe in Him, that the faith of many including us two thousand years after reading this passage, ours and countless generations who were to read about this incident, our faith to grow. Our theological knowledge will expand, our understanding of Him, His power, His Glory, His love, His Lordship, His complex way of acting in human events will be enriched.

All of this is in the mind of Jesus when He decides to stay two more days. Why two more days? Because that was the time it took for Lazarus to die, for the process of decomposition of the body in the heat of the Middle East to take place, for it to seem like there was no longer any hope and for then the Lord could perform a miracle of incredible proportions, the resurrection of a dead person and that His Glory, His Lordship, His power, His deity were then in full manifestation to all who were witnesses of this great miracle.

What's going on here?. The Lord is setting the stage to demonstrate His Glory. And he does it in a sense, I am not going to say playing because that word is very light but he does allow himself certain freedoms with the feelings of Marta and María and even Lazaro who are saying: come immediately, take the first plane and arrive as quickly as possible. You can right?

Doesn't this happen sometimes in our lives? We ask the Lord for something and we want an answer now! However the Lord takes more time than we expected and one then tends to doubt Him, tends to question His love, tends to question His mercy. But if we could see behind the scenes as we can in this case because we benefit from the benefit of Scripture, what could we perhaps see? God setting the stage for something greater in our lives.

And sometimes what we believe to be a loss without any redemption is the necessary scenario for us to see the Glory of God manifested in a greater way and then grow spiritually and that He can be glorified through our need and our trial. God is sovereign, let us trust Him and never doubt His love or His mercy.