I prayed about it for years really–not just a casual prayer here and there, but those fervent, wake up in the middle of the night prayers. And there it was…a sort of answer, right in front of me in a clear, direct way. There could be no confusion. If this was the answer, God’s answer was no.
This wasn’t a selfish prayer. Certainly, I’ve prayed many of those through the years, but this was not one of them. This desire aligns with God’s Word, glorifies him, and magnifies his power in this world. I didn’t pray to win the lottery. It was a prayer for God’s kingdom to come on earth, in a very particular situation on earth, as it is in heaven. Still, despite that core motive, the answer seemed to be no.
How do you square that? How do you make sense of what is, without despairing over what could be? How do you trust God in prayer when bitter answers come? Many of my counselees also face these tough questions. How do you move past disappointment, discouragement, and downright confusion in the face of unanswered prayers? How do you keep listening when what you hear is a resounding no?
God’s Word is filled with accounts of many people who faced the same questions. One that recently spoke to me is 1 Chronicles 21. This chapter outlines God’s interaction with King David, who we know as a man after God’s own heart. At this stage in his personal history, David has won many battles and enjoyed many victory parties. Things are going his way. So he decides he’d like to take an inventory, a census, of his fighting men. He just wants to do a bit of accounting. After all, foreign kings put numbers to the size of their armies. Counting helps rulers decipher the pecking order. Knowing the size of their army helps commanders plan conquests, map the future, and further establish their power.
However, there was an issue with this type of simple accounting. Census-taking was something God directly told David he should never do. Joab, the army general tasked with the counting, reminded David about God’s clear mandate. Counting men was something God told them not to do. King David's resolution prevailed despite the warning. Joab began counting.
1 Chronicles 21 details the horrible end of the story. The men were accounted for, but God’s wrath was not. After God confronts David with his sin, and assures him there are corresponding consequences, David confesses and repents. God forgives, but the consequences remain. Before the incident is said and done, 70,000 Israelite men lose their lives. David is saddled with a load of guilt and plenty of innocent blood on his hands.
I’ve read this story many times, and frankly, often wondered about it. What was the big deal? Why was God so incensed by census-taking? What did this bit of accounting represent in terms of David’s heart?
In God’s economy, it represented many things. In addition to deliberate disobedience, David’s census epitomizes two dangerous heart attitudes. When I see what stands before me, take an inventory and make a judgment, I share those attitudes. There are two distinct dangers with this approach. It can lead to:
Overconfidence in our own power. God expressly forbid David to count his fighting men, although this was standard practice among the military leaders of his day. Why? A favorable inventory of what is in front of us can lead us to many places God does not want us to go. It can lead to pride. It can lead us to make decisions independent of God and his miraculous power. Numbers helped army leaders decide who they could conquer and how they should proceed in war, as they trusted in the quantity of fighters available for the task at hand. God, who repeatedly calls himself “The Lord of Heaven’s Armies” (cf. Psalm 84, Isaiah 14, Psalm 46) will not be quantified that way. Making decisions based on horizontal, human accounting is fine for those who live only in flesh. Those of us who claim life in the Spirit must give up that method of operation.
Believers are called to seek God, turn to him, and follow in faith wherever he leads. This type of learned dependence, which is the hallmark of sanctification, is not impacted by the horizontal inventories we take. The judgments we make based on what we see and quantify often lead to discouragement and despair. God constantly and consistently calls his people to use a different metric. Consider Joshua and the battle of Jericho, Gideon and his call to take up arms, Ruth and her journey to Bethlehem, or Paul and Silas in prison. The outcome of their obedience could not be accounted for on the front end. God does not work that way.
Crystal is a Christ-follower, wife, mother, counselor, and friend. She is passionate about connecting others with the truth of God's miraculous power and sustaining presence.
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