When the Sky is made of Iron

Step into your prayer closet for just a moment. Do you hear it? It’s that dull, hollow sound which reverberates across the heavens as your prayers are banging against an iron sky.

Do you ever feel that way? I know I do. I offer prayers and petitions to heaven, spend hours upon my knees in humble submission and lift my requests up to God. Then, in one great resonance of silence, I hear nothing. In fact, there are times when it seems the greatest pain of my life is that I am listening for a returning voice that cannot, or will not, be heard. All I hear is the echoed words of my own heart as my prayers beat against the iron sky. Impenetrable, unbreakable, there are times when it seems that no matter how I pray, I cannot breech the wall. So if silence is deafening, the silence of God is thunderous.

David understood this. In Psalm 22:2 (NIV) he cries out, “O my God, I cry out by day, but you do not answer, by night, and am not silent.” Again, in Psalm 28:1 (NIV), “To you I call, O LORD my Rock; do not turn a deaf ear to me. For if you remain silent, I will be like those who have gone down to the pit.”

Day or night David listened, cried out, did not remain silent – only to languish in the silence of God. His distress was such that he likened it to being as one who had “gone down to the pit.” But you and I know that there is great heartache when God remains silent. Imagine wanting to talk with the one you love only to receive the quiet turn of the head with no return conversation. It’s called the “silent treatment” for a reason! That’s because it hurts.

So… where did the iron-clad sky come from? There are some possibilities.

First, it is important to consider that the iron sky might have been self-forged. Consider what God said through Isaiah the prophet, “But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear” (Isaiah 59:2 NIV). The remedy is simple, though it will require humility: repent. If the iron sky was forged in sin, it is dismantled in repentance. Humble, honest repentance God will not despise, but will receive from the contrite and lowly of heart.

Second, the possibility is that the sky was forged through selfishness. Yes, I know, selfishness is a sin as well. But there is a marked difference that is exposed in the Scriptures, a difference that is seen in your motivation for prayer.  James tells us, “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures” (James 4:3 NIV). It’s not just that you’ve sinned, but the very prayer you’re praying is only for selfish purposes.  The remedy for this is just as simple: turn your mind away from worldly pleasures and seek that which is pleasing to God. Your prayers should be a reflection of your desire for God’s glory.

Finally, and perhaps the one that all of us understand in great detail, is the iron sky of time. There is the simple fact that God does not, and will not, subscribe to our insistence. He works according to His timing and will not change. Joseph suffered for years in prison; Abraham waited for years to have a son; the Israelites endured slavery for 400 years, crying out all the while. God hears our prayers, knows our need and has already set in motion the answer – though its arrival does not come in the immediacy of our need. This calls for patience – and that is the only remedy. Patient faith requires us knowing and trusting that God will do exactly what is best and right. Again in James it says, “Be patient, then, brothers, until the Lord's coming. See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop and how patient he is for the autumn and spring rains” (James 5:7 NIV).

Though this is not a complete manifest of the iron sky that all of us experience from time to time, I hope you understand that God does hear your cry. If you’ve constructed the barrier, simply remove it. If time is the barrier, trust God. He does know your need and will bring about your best in His time.

So I leave you with the simple statement of Romans 12:12 (NIV), “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, faithful in prayer.”

Until then…

Your Servant,

Pastor Michael