(Note: AI-generated content is my graphics)

Sometimes I pray about the same situation again and again. And I wonder: “Lord, are You listening? Do You see what is happening? Are You going to do something?” David understood that feeling. In Psalm 28, he begins with an urgent plea: “To you, O LORD, I call; my rock, be not deaf to me.” (Psalm 28:1). I’m struck by how honest that prayer is. David knows God is his “Rock”, yet he still feels the weight of God’s silence. Can you relate?

But David doesn’t let God’s apparent silence stop his praying. “Hear the voice of my pleas for mercy, when I cry to you for help.”(Psalm 28:2) That challenges me. When God seems silent, I’m tempted to become silent too. But David kept calling, asking, and lifting his hands toward God. And then something beautiful happens.

By verse 6, David’s prayer became praise: “Blessed be the LORD! For he has heard the voice of my pleas for mercy.” (Psalm 28:6). The God David feared was silent was listening all along. Then comes one of my favorite declarations in the psalm: “The LORD is my strength and my shield; in him my heart trusts, and I am helped.” (Psalm 28:7). David didn’t say, “My circumstances are my strength,” or “I know exactly how this will turn out is my strength.”

He said, “The Lord is my strength.” That is what I want to remember when I am “waiting for an answer. As I’ve written before, God’s silence does not mean God’s absence. Waiting does not mean He isn’t listening. And I don’t have to understand what He is doing before I can trust who He is.

Psalm 28 begins with, “Hear me.” It ends with confidence that “He has.” That is the invitation for me today: keep praying long enough for my plea to become praise.

What prayer have you been tempted to stop praying because God seems silent?

Prayer:

Lord, when I cannot see what You are doing, help me keep calling out to You. You are my strength and my shield. Help my heart trust You while I wait, and remind me that Your silence never means You are not listening. Amen.