Have you ever grappled with the question of why healing doesn’t always seem to come, especially in cases of severe illnesses like cancer? Today on the podcast, Christa, Bob, and Jeff tackle this head-on, navigating the spiritual terrain that arises while waiting for prayers to be answered. We unpack the frustration that surfaces during these trying times, drawing strength from the comforting words of Psalm 23. As we wade through these waters, we offer a fresh perspective on the inclination to question and lament, inviting you to see these situations in a new light.
Our journey doesn’t stop there. We go further, exploring the role of suffering and how strength can be found in the most unlikely places. Using Biblical figures like Job and Paul as guides, we highlight how their health struggles led them on a path to fulfill their purpose in unexpected, purposeful ways. We also dive into the impact of our understanding of God’s sovereignty on our prayer life, underscoring the importance of patience, reverence, and trust. Discover how to see the blessings in both good health and suffering, as we share our experiences, insights, and the strength that comes from a deep and unwavering faith in God’s plan, even when it doesn't align with our desires.
In this episode, you will learn:
Have you ever grappled with the question of why healing doesn’t always seem to come, especially in cases of severe illnesses like cancer? Today on the podcast, Christa, Bob, and Jeff tackle this head-on, navigating the spiritual terrain that arises while waiting for prayers to be answered. We unpack the frustration that surfaces during these trying times, drawing strength from the comforting words of Psalm 23. As we wade through these waters, we offer a fresh perspective on the inclination to question and lament, inviting you to see these situations in a new light.
Our journey doesn’t stop there. We go further, exploring the role of suffering and how strength can be found in the most unlikely places. Using Biblical figures like Job and Paul as guides, we highlight how their health struggles led them on a path to fulfill their purpose in unexpected, purposeful ways. We also dive into the impact of our understanding of God’s sovereignty on our prayer life, underscoring the importance of patience, reverence, and trust. Discover how to see the blessings in both good health and suffering, as we share our experiences, insights, and the strength that comes from a deep and unwavering faith in God’s plan, even when it doesn't align with our desires.
In this episode, you will learn:
On today's episode.
Bob Fleischmann:By its nature, the world does not have a savior. There is no life beyond. There was an obituary the end of October 2023 in the Milwaukee Journal of Sentinel, and the family obviously wrote the obituary talking about the deceased, who was a science teacher who had died and basically said he didn't believe in a life you're after. Whatever you remember happening before your birth is what you're going to remember after you die An almost kind of a mockery type thing. And when you understand that that's the way the world thinks and views it, sometimes you have to pause for a moment and ask yourself am I acting like the world? Am I facing the diagnosis as if I have lost everything? There is nothing. I'm ready to make my exit and I go into nothingness, and I will tell you from experience that part of the hardship is realizing how worldly you've become in all of this.
Christa Potratz:Hi and welcome back. I'm Christa Potratz, and I'm here today with pastors Bob Fleischmann and Jeff Samelson, and today's episode we are going to be talking about this topic of when the healing's not happening. As children of God, we are encouraged to go to God with our problems, and we often do. We can think of situations where people are sick, or whether it's maybe ourselves or our loved ones, and we pray to God, and sometimes we get responses back right away, and those moments, you know, we're just very thankful for that. Other times, though, we pray and it just kind of seems like God is silent, and that's really what we're going to be focusing on today Maybe a place to kind of start. What are some maybe more examples of situations where a believer might be waiting?
Jeff Samelson:I think one of the ones that comes to mind most quickly for most people is probably going to be something like cancer. We hear so many wonderful stories today of, ah yeah, I got diagnosed with this cancer but then I went through chemo and had the special radiation treatment and there was this new thing and now I'm completely in remission, and things like that. We get to the point where we kind of expect the good, optimistic, positive result Every time. Well, sometimes that doesn't happen, and sometimes you had the positive response in the past, but now it's come back and the doctors are saying, ah, I'm not sure there's anything we can do about that.
Jeff Samelson:And you know, no matter how much we've prayed, it seems to be getting worse and not any better. And you know that's the kind of situation and that could apply to other things, you know, other diseases, injuries. You're in a car accident or something like that and those bones just aren't healing up again. Or that internal injury it's just not healing the way it's supposed to, and can be very frustrating for a Christian, you know, in that kind of situation.
Bob Fleischmann:I think a lot of it has to do with almost a sense of what I would call rational entitlement. It's the idea that we're called upon to proclaim the gospel to the world. I've got this great plan to do that and it's aggressive and we're going to, we're going to accomplish a lot and reach a lot of people and so forth. And why am I hitting these obstacles? It seems like it's a rational. I'm not asking to be rich, you know. I'm not asking to kill my enemy, I'm just simply saying I want to do God's work and it's not happening. And we apply that rational approach to a lot of our prayers, like what Jeff was saying about. You know, you've got a cancer diagnosis. Wonderful people, you know you don't want them to have cancer, so you pray about it. It seems reasonable, it seems like a rational request and you don't get the answer you want.
Bob Fleischmann:Paul Brand was a, he worked with leprosy and he was a physician, died maybe 10, 15 years ago, but he was a brilliant physician and he made this observation. He said that in a book he wrote on the gift of pain. He said that as we become more accustomed to things being nice and getting you know all the things money can buy. He said we have a lower tolerance for rejection and for pain and for discomfort than he sees in foreign countries where people will have so much. So I sometimes wonder if the problem is internal with us and we just keep moving the bar around to suit our needs.
Christa Potratz:And I think too, when Jeff was talking about how, just with modern medicine and things nowadays, we do hear stories of people being healed right away or things not being so bad for others and kind of going back to that comparison, I don't again you know where we just use, tend to think, well, why me, why am I going through that difficulty? You know, when we think about some of these things then too, what does scripture really tell us? What are some things there that could be helpful for us in these situations?
Jeff Samelson:I'll start with one of the real easy ones, because it's everybody's favorite Psalms, Psalm 23. We tend to focus. You know the Lord is my shepherd, but for times like these, the line yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me. These times when the healing is not happening can feel like a walk through the valley of the shadow of death. You know what's coming and it doesn't seem to be. You know, on every side you seem to be surrounded by this dark prospect of what lies ahead. And you know, this Psalm is a wonderful assurance that the Lord, my shepherd, is still walking with me and he's taking care of my every need throughout. Even if things seem dark, he is the light and I can trust him.
Bob Fleischmann:I've always been troubled and this troubled in my own life with my approach to it, but also, as I see it, in others. And that is all the hand-ringing, the lamenting we do over healing doesn't come. It's not the way I thought it was going to be, all that kind of stuff. I don't see much of that or any of that in Scripture from God's people. In fact we do have King David. When Bathsheba was expecting the first child, he was caught in the sin and David went into this very elaborate mourning process and appealing to God and then, when the child died, we're told that they were afraid to tell him because they didn't know how he'd react. And to their shock he just kind of brushed things off and went on. He said I thought, while the child was alive, I would ask, and basically God gave his answer, but then he accepted it. So I think first of all, god wants you to talk to him in prayer, but secondly, it's how we respond when we don't get the answer we want.
Bob Fleischmann:That really is the challenge here, because we tend to venerate our judgment above God's. On occasion you begin to think I know how this should play out best, and when you're dealing with the equation of seven billion people. You're dealing with the equation of all the intricacies of changes and things that occur with just a single decision by one person, or what they call the butterfly effect. You put that all together. God is eminently more qualified to make the right judgment and I think that oftentimes when we're in this crisis whether it's cancer, some terminal condition, whether it's healing because the pain is just too much, that kind of stuff we have to it ultimately becomes a test of faith.
Bob Fleischmann:Either, I take God as a word that even in death there's life, even in suffering there's joy. What I can't get over is I was just reading a sermon by Charles Spurgeon, and Spurgeon made reference to the fact that one of the great blessings of life is good health. One of the greater blessings in life is suffering. Yeah, and I think that a lot of times we forget that, that in suffering, because you feel horribly equipped, when life is going well, like I'm ready to tackle the world, and then all of a sudden you get the terminal diagnosis you're in an accident and you were injured beyond what you expected, and then you find out just how frail you really are.
Christa Potratz:With the kids I read some of these missionary stories in the evening and we've read ones like George Mueller, Hudson Taylor, Amy Carmichael they all had actually, like quite serious health problems. And you read some of these and you're like, oh man, you know, it's like, and there is that tendency to think like, oh, like what could have been the work that they would have done if they hadn't had these health issues. But then, since I mean we get that whole story of it, we can see then you know, okay, they had a health issue. Than it meant, you know, I think, like an Amy Carmichael's instance, like she wasn't able to go to Japan where she wanted to. She ended up in India and did all of these great things, helping, you know, orphans in India, and so that was really so part of, like, her journey. Where were these health problems that she had? And that's kind of how it was for the other ones too. And so I think I mean there definitely is this element to where God can use us in these moments.
Jeff Samelson:If you're in one of these situations, you know the waiting, the, you know God saying not yet, or even no great place to go spend a lot of time meditating Romans, chapter eight. You know sometimes, that wonderful promise that all things work together for the good of those who love, love God for those who've been called according to his purpose. Sometimes that we hear that and we're like, well, yeah, yeah, yeah, you know, I know that, I've heard that all my life, yeah, yeah, yeah. But but what about me right now? Or what about my loved one right now? And, as Bob was saying, it's it is a matter of faith, of trusting this. And sometimes we look at the other stories and we'll say, well, yeah, yeah, you know that person suffered, but then in the end everything worked out all right. And we're not at the point right now in our own life or in dealing with the loved one situation where we can say I see the end, the end where it all works out part.
Christa Potratz:I think that too, like in my life, I mean I want an awesome faith and I want to see fruits of a really strong faith. I don't want to always work to get there, and I mean it's just kind of odd, you know too, because I mean really, yeah, I mean it's, you know, daily Bible reading and it's going through really tough times. You know that, where you can see God working through situations and trust and all of that that comes with that, that really gives you that very strong faith. But I think that you know, in so many times we just don't want to put in that work that it takes.
Bob Fleischmann:Well, and I think impatience has always been a problem, but especially a problem in a society where you don't have to be impatient by a lot of things. And I always remember my grandpa Fleishmann, had a one of the first remote controls for TV. And what was interesting is it's not a remote control like we have remote control. You had 13 stops on your VHF dial and he would press it and first of all, you couldn't stand in the way you know of the remote and the TV. He would press it and that dial go fump, fump, fump. So if you were on channel two and you wanted to watch channel 12, it was a time involved journey and it could have gone so much further to just get up and turn it, but of course it was remote control. And nowadays you don't have that. And if you told everybody you have to use that kind of remote again, there'd be rebellion. We're always impatient, you know.
Bob Fleischmann:And which gets me into the story of the apostle Paul on his missionary journey, being prevented from going into Asia and Bithynia. And I always look at that and I'm going. Now you're called by God, or one of the few people who gets this direct vision, and all of a sudden you're prevented from going there. So he doesn't go into Asia. And then he wants to go into Bithynia. No, can't go there. He ends up crossing over, and my favorite part of that whole story is he crosses over the water, he gets up into the Thessalonica and then he gets in Berea, and each time he kind of gets into a little trouble and so finally they move him down into Athens. And the part that's not in the Bible which I imagine should have been there is the part where they said okay, paul, we're going to leave here, we want you to wait for the others, try not to get into trouble. But of course he did. He immediately started looking around the town, saw the statues to the other gods and the statue to the unknown God, gets to the Areopagus and he says now I'm going to tell you about this, I'm going to tell you about the one who raises dead people back to life.
Bob Fleischmann:And when we read about it in the Bible, it maybe takes five minutes to get through the Hulton Asia, the Hulton Bithynia, go through the experience up in Thessalonica and Berea to get down into Athens. But can you imagine living that experience? You're going, let's go into Asia. No, we can't, let's go into Asia. No, okay, all right, let's move down the road a little bit. Let's go into Bithynia? No, you can't, it takes time. And the point is is that God had a far grander plan that Paul couldn't have even imagined, and I think that you've got to get to the point of accepting one. There's more to life than life and that you're part of a bigger plan that maybe you're the centerpiece, but maybe you're not.
Jeff Samelson:Yeah, and it's a good point to remember what Paul said, writing to one of those churches that he ended up at, instead of going into Asia or Bithynia. When he wrote to the Philippians, he was talking about his own possible death and he's saying you know what? It's actually better for me to go, but it's better for you that I stay. So that's probably what God's going to have me do, but that attitude that he had, that stay or go, die or live, whatever God has in mind is what's best, and there's no no lose losing here. It's win, win, and that is something that it's really helpful for us to keep in mind. When things just don't seem to be getting better, god has things well in hand and however he works things out, that that's going to be the win.
Christa Potratz:Right, right. So in situations then, where maybe somebody has a loved one who is sick and there really is no healing happening, or maybe it seems like things are getting worse, what can that person say to that individual? You know, maybe what are some good things to say to somebody who is waiting, and then what are maybe some things that you should not say?
Jeff Samelson:Well, obviously, prayer is always going to be powerful and effective, as James reminds us in his letter. We talked about faith. You know, just use the other word for that trust. Trust that God will do what's best, but offering comfort, offering compassion, your love, your support, your help. And with what to say? Just, we had an entire episode about this.
Jeff Samelson:Don't be trite, there's just so much that supportive and I guess a lot really has to do with willing communication that don't assume that you know what the other person needs to hear. Don't assume that you know what kind of help that person needs. Ask them. Maybe they won't give you a good answer, but at least you will have asked in the right way and try to be specific. You know, don't just like, well, hey, is there anything I can do for you? Most people are really uncomfortable saying, yes, could you mow my lawn please? It's two weeks past. That's when you say, well, hey, you're probably kind of having trouble taking care of things around the house in the yard. Could I help with some of your yard work? Do you need someone to help with cleaning or your laundry, or something like that. You know to be helpful in the ways that you can, and that's a wonderful way to show love and compassion and support.
Bob Fleischmann:I think one of the important things is to remember that, believe it or not, you're different. When you call yourself a person of faith or a child of God, you're different. And 1 Peter 3:15, you know, we're told about always being prepared to give an answer to anyone who asks you the reason for the hope that you have. But then you kind of come to the shocking conclusion that nobody ever asks you the reason for the hope that you have, because you don't always look any more hopeful or any different than the rest of the world. The world does not have, by its nature, the world does not have a savior. There is no life beyond. There was an obituary the end of October 2023 in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel and the family obviously wrote the obituary talking about the deceased, who was a science teacher who had died and basically said he didn't believe in a life hereafter.
Bob Fleischmann:Whatever you remember happening before your birth is what you're going to remember after you die, almost kind of a mockery type thing. And when you understand that that's the way the world thinks and views it, sometimes you have to pause for a moment and ask yourself am I acting like the world? Am I facing the diagnosis as if I have lost everything. There is nothing. I'm ready to make my exit and I go into nothingness. And I will tell you from experience that part of the hardship is realizing how worldly you become in all of this. And for me that's always been difficult to comprehend is that I really have in many ways embraced a lot of what the world offers. I mean, I love a challenge, I love being creative, I love doing new things. Any time any segments of that is removed, there's that worldly response of I've been deprived. But God says no, there's something so much better coming, and either we believe it or we don't. Either we mean it or we're faking it.
Christa Potratz:So if you're praying and it seems like God I mean, it seems like really nothing is happening I mean, what do you do then? Do you keep praying the same prayer, or do you think, oh man, maybe I need to reevaluate or change things around? I mean, what do you do when you're praying and it seems like there is silence there?
Jeff Samelson:Yes, I don't mean to be flip when saying that, but it's not going to be the same in every situation. One that I find instructive from scripture is in 2 Corinthians 12, is it? Paul's talking about his thorn in the flesh and he says three times I prayed for the Lord to take it away, and I don't think that that was just. On three occasions he said Dear Lord, please take away this thorn, you know, and he said that on three times and that was it. I suspect that this was three occasions in his life where he was praying really hard about it. But anyway, the answer was my grace is sufficient for you. And you get the impression that after the third time Paul said Okay, I'm not going to be praying about this thing anymore. I recognize that whatever this thorn is, it's going to be a permanent part of part of my life now, and so I think there is a time sometimes when we will just kind of get the sense from God that, yeah, you're done praying about this, and it's not a harsh thing, it's just I'm trusting that God has taken this matter into his hands and whatever he's doing with it is fine.
Jeff Samelson:But there are plenty of other places in the scripture, where we're encouraged to be persistent in our prayers, bold and confident in our prayers. We don't want to fall into the trap of thinking, well, the reason I didn't get the answer that I wanted was because I wasn't praying hard enough or because my faith wasn't strong enough. But yeah, sometimes God's intention is keep asking. We've got the example of the Serophonician woman in the Gospels whose daughter has a demon and she comes to Jesus with her request and he basically puts her off, talks to his disciples more than to her, he makes that comment about the dogs and things like that, and what's he doing with that? Is he insulting her? No, he's giving her the opportunity to come back to him with an even stronger request, an even more faithful request, and he honors that. And sometimes that's how we should be interpreting the no and the not. Yet it's like okay, god, I'm going to ask again.
Bob Fleischmann:Well, this recording is occurring in November starting to think about decorating for Christmas, that kind of stuff, and it reminds me that a lot of people look at Santa Claus and Christians and they'll say, well, he's kind of like the manifestation of God. You make your request and to Santa, and so forth. I actually think that the problem, the mistake we fall into, is we sometimes treat God like he's the manifestation of Santa Claus. So you make the request of Santa and then when you wanted a bike for Christmas and you got a deck of cards, you felt like Santa ripped you off and that's kind of how we approach God.
Bob Fleischmann:Is it like we've sometimes lost the on majesty of God, the Creator, god, the Almighty?
Bob Fleischmann:And I always remember when I had a mission congregation, we had this very unfortunate thing where we had this rectangle building and we would have an altar up front and a pulpit and a baptismal font up there, and then when we were done with church, we had to quick pick all that up, move it over to the side.
Bob Fleischmann:We actually had a platform for the chancel area that could be picked up and laid against the wall and then we would play steal the bacon or you know some.
Bob Fleischmann:And of course the problem was is that you kind of lost that on reverence for the place of God, and you sense it sometimes in churches and so forth. The reason for our awe and reverence for God is because the way your fingerprints look is because of God, the way your heart beat is because of God, the way your mind processes information is because of God. And when you get awed by everything that God can do, kind of get to that part in the book of Job at the end that says, yep, I should never have questioned you. I recognize that you have a bigger plan than I realize, and so I think my point is is that we go to God with a request and we should do it with confidence that he's there and he's listening, but there should be also the confidence that when you're dealing with perfection, who's also almighty, whatever answer you get is going to be the perfectly right and best answer for the circumstance, and that's hard for us to take.
Christa Potratz:Any final thoughts on this subject?
Jeff Samelson:I'd say just, you had earlier asked about what are things that we don't want to bring up in this situation, particularly when you're speaking to somebody, or just your own personal response, and I say there's a fairly common one that we don't really think about so much, that we really want to avoid, and that's blame. It is very easy if you're the one who is suffering to think, okay, what did I do wrong? How am I responsible for this thing? Okay, it may in some cases be that you have some responsibility. I was driving drunk, and that's why I had this accident. Or I didn't take care of my health in some way, and that's why I have this disease, or something like that. But in so many of these cases you can't draw a straight line. But even if you can, there is forgiveness and the way God works with his children is not, oh, you messed up. So now I'm going to punish you because Christ took the punishment for all our sins. So anything that we suffer is more in the sense of discipline. So we don't want to blame others. Oh yeah, the reason he's suffering is because you know he did X or anything like that. We definitely don't want to be blaming God for it.
Jeff Samelson:We had an episode where we talked a lot about Job. There was a lot of God blaming happening in there. You don't want to blame others, you don't want to blame society, you don't want to do any kind of self-recriminations. I should have done this or I shouldn't have done that, because it's opposite of being faithful, opposite of trust, and it's not helpful. It serves no good purpose. It makes you, your old man, feel a little good in a little way to be throwing some blame around, but it doesn't help at all, and that's one thing that we should try to avoid.
Bob Fleischmann:You either have your Christian faith or you have the religion of secularism or humanism, and oftentimes, in dealing with a prayer life, we kind of say Christian things and do Christian things, but in our hearts practicing humanism or secularism where we're thinking like the world and so like the world if I have the ability to shovel out your driveway so you could get out. And so you came over and you said, would you shovel out my driveway? And I just ignore you, you're going well.
Bob Fleischmann:I need it because I can't do it. You know I'm old or I'm infirm, and we treat God like that. God can do anything. I've made this request of God and he's just ignoring me. Well see, you're thinking like the world, because the world doesn't know that there might actually be a better plan than shoveling out your driveway, like having me or somebody go over there. Maybe they're going to die of a heart attack or maybe there's going to be a greater. In other words, god knows best. But that's the heart of the Christian faith. Is that you recognize that.
Bob Fleischmann:Well, earlier you would ask Christa passages and so forth. The one that just constantly repeats through my head is Psalm 46:10, be still and know that I am God. And I think the reason that resonates is I think out of all the passages I read in scripture, that's the hardest one, because it's like yeah, I know you're God, I know you can do all things, but I could help you, I could tell you God how to do this best, and that's not how he works. Instead, fortunately, god's smart enough to not always listen to me or not answer the way my prayers come out, and for that you learn thankfulness.
Christa Potratz:Well, thank you both for this discussion today, and we thank all of our listeners too, and if you have any questions on this topic or anything, please reach out to us. You can email us at podcast at ChristianLifeResourcescom. Thanks so much, and we'll see you back next time. Bye.
Paul Snamiska:Thank you for joining us for this episode of the Life Challenges Podcast from Christian Life Resources. Please consider subscribing to this podcast, giving us a review wherever you access it and sharing it with friends. We're sure you have questions on today's topic or other life issues. Our goal is to help you through these tough topics and we want you to know we're here to help. You can submit your questions, as well as comments or suggestions for future episodes, at LifeChallengesus or email us at podcast at ChristianLifeResourcescom. In addition to the podcasts, we include other valuable information at LifeChallengesus, so be sure to check it out For more about our parent organization, please visit ChristianLifeResourcescom. May God give you wisdom, love, strength and peace in Christ for every Life Challenge.