BEING HUMAN

Day 17, 17 December 2024, the 1028th day of the full-scale war.

As we endure a third winter of full-scale war, our prayers seem to vanish into a void. Each massive strike prompts fresh appeals, each casualty report sparks new pleas, and the missiles keep falling while the death toll mounts among our defenders and our civilians. Like the ancient psalmists questioning divine silence, we wrestle with hard questions. What happens to faith when prayers for peace come back empty? How do we understand God’s ways when countless appeals for protection have met apparent refusal for three years? What turns an unanswered prayer from a stumbling block into a stepping stone toward a deeper faith?

“But while he thought about these things, behold, an angel of the Lord appeared to him in a dream” (Matthew 1:20, NKJV).

The Christmas story reveals a hidden pattern in which seemingly rejected prayers may mask deeper purposes. Joseph, a righteous man, surely prayed for what any devout Jewish man would want: a normal family life, an orderly marriage, children born without scandal. Instead a divine disruption shattered every expectation, with his fiancée’s unexpected pregnancy, his wedding plans dissolving into confusion, his hope of a quiet family life turned into a midnight flight from a murderous king. His prayers for the ordinary met silence, and that very silence cradled the story of salvation.

Mary’s experience mirrors the pattern with its own meaning. As a young woman expecting her first child, she must have longed for a conventional motherhood, with community support, family celebration, peaceful preparation for a birth in familiar surroundings. Instead she was led through social suspicion, dangerous travel late in pregnancy, and a delivery in a stranger’s stable. Her prayers for normality seemed ignored, and that abnormality brought God into human flesh.

The unanswered prayers of the shepherds carry similar depth. Night after night they joined Israel’s pleas for deliverance from occupation, for a better life beyond poverty, for the Messiah to appear in power. What they received was a sign of ultimate vulnerability, a baby in a feeding trough. Their prayers for political and military liberation met silence, and that silence revealed God’s solidarity with the oppressed in a way no triumphant Messiah could have demonstrated.

Even the journey of the magi reflects it. They likely prayed for a straightforward route to the newborn king. Instead they navigated political intrigue, received a warning in a dream, and went home by another way. Their prayers for clarity seemed denied, and that complexity protected the child from Herod’s rage.

Today this pattern echoes painfully in our own reality. Parents pray while missiles hit schools. Defenders seek victory as battles grind into stalemate. Families await reunion while an occupation extends. Chaplains plead for peace amid escalation. Volunteers ask for resources as the needs multiply, as I keep asking you. The wounded seek healing while the trauma deepens. The bereaved cry for comfort as the losses mount. And you could go on adding to this list of our unanswered prayers.

And the Christmas story suggests these prayers may serve purposes we cannot yet see. Joseph’s disruption became a channel of salvation. Mary’s scandal carried redemption. The shepherds’ continuing oppression witnessed to divine solidarity. The complicated journey of the magi protected providence’s plan. Perhaps when peace seems denied, endurance grows. Perhaps when protection appears withheld, a community of hope strengthens. Perhaps when healing is delayed, deeper wounds find treatment. Perhaps. I am not sure. I want to believe, and Lord, help my unbelief.

Perhaps unanswered prayers are sacred invitations rather than divine refusals, calling us past simple prosperity and positivistic solutions into a deeper partnership with purposes we do not understand. Jesus, how do we learn that Your silence often cradles Your most profound answers, in the long nights of the soul and of prayers for peace that seem to go unheard?

Prince of Peace, whose silence often shapes us more than Your answers do, grant us faith to trust Your wisdom inside our unanswered prayers. When peace seems distant and protection elusive, help us recognize Your hidden work. Transform our questioning into questing, our disappointment into deeper trust. Give us Joseph’s faithful persistence, Mary’s courageous acceptance, the shepherds’ hopeful watching, and the determined seeking of the magi. We pray in the name of Jesus Christ, Lord of silence and of unanswered prayers. Amen.