Lent, Holy Week, and When God Says No

“No” isn’t a funny word at all—until you try to pluralize it. In her book, The Irrational Season, Madeliene L’Engle includes a chapter about Good Friday titled, “The Noes of God.” Doesn’t “noes” both look and sound funny, as if “s” and “e” switched places just for amusement?

The word itself may make us chuckle, but we know its meaning too well: we have all received more than one no from God. And sometimes it’s the same no over and over and over. We can wonder if it’s wrong to want a yes, whether God really cares about our desires, or whether it’s worth suffering the wait for God’s better yes.

What do you do when you feel like you’re stuck in the waiting of Lent or the suffering of Good Friday?

Jesus: Even when God says no, it’s ok to want a yes

And going a little farther he fell on his face and prayed, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as thou wilt.”

Matthew 26:39 RSV

We can’t force ourselves to not want something, nor will self-shame rid us of the desire. It’s ok to want good things, and many of our desires are God-given. We may want a specific answer to prayer, or we may just want to be delivered from the suffering of waiting for an answer.

But in our suffering, let’s not forget that the one who received the hardest no from God is the one who least deserved it. And this no turned into an infinitely greater yes: the redemption of humanity.

Think about it: Jesus didn’t want to suffer the cross. He asked for a way out. Jesus—fully man and fully God, perfect and unblemished by any stain of sin or even hint of selfishness, cowardice, or fear, asked his Father that he would be spared the immense suffering ahead of him.

Above all, Jesus desired his Father’s will, but he wasn’t afraid or ashamed to ask his Father for another way. And the Gospels tell us that he prayed this same prayer three times!

If it’s ok for Jesus to want a way out of suffering, then why do we shame ourselves for wanting a way out, too?

The Father’s no to his Son meant unknown agony for both—an agony they mutually deemed worth it, so that the world might have life. So that you and I might know how very much God loves us.

And if the Father’s no to his dearly beloved Son could have an end so triumphant and glorious—despite the suffering in between—can we not also trust this same Father to bring good out of the noes in our lives? A greater good than even the thing we asked for?

Experience is painfully teaching me that what seems a NO to man from man’s point of view, is often the essential prelude to a far greater YES.

Madeleine L’Engle, The Irrational Season

Martha: The answer isn’t what you think

Though the Father’s refusal of Jesus’ petition is the hardest no in the Scriptures, there are many other examples of painful and confusing noes in answer to heartfelt prayers.

On the fifth Sunday of Lent—the last one before Palm Sunday—the Gospel reading shares the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead, as recorded in John 11. Think of Mary and Martha and the no they received. We can only imagine the prayers they offered for their brother’s healing. But when they sent word to Jesus, asking him to come, the Scriptures tell us Jesus stayed where he was for two more days. No—not yet.

By the time he comes to Mary and Martha, Lazarus had been dead and buried for four days. What must these sisters have felt as they waited for Jesus without a word from him, and as they watched their brother die and be laid in a tomb, their hopes decaying in the dark?

How their faith must have been tested, tempted by feelings of despair, hopelessness, and perhaps a sense of betrayal and disappointment in Jesus. Where was he when they needed him most? And now that he was here, what difference would it make?

How often we’ve prayed—and prayed and prayed and prayed—and God doesn’t show up, at least not on the timeframe we want or in the way we want. And we watch our dreams and desires die and be entombed, our hopes shrouded in graveclothes.

And how often are we like Martha, who, when Jesus raises our hopes with statements like, “Your brother will rise again,” immediately concludes, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection at the last day” (John 11:24).

I know, I know: all my prayers will be answered, all my longings fulfilled, all my griefs consoled and my wounds healed on the “last day,” in heaven. But it’s hard to believe that a “yes” is still possible this side of the grave—that Jesus can still show up, even when it seems too late, and reverse the “no” with a miraculous resurrection.

Yet the Gospel reveals Martha’s faith: “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. And even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you” (11:21-22).

Even now . . . the miraculous is possible.

Jesus doesn’t tell her what he’s going to do next or that her faith will soon be rewarded. Instead of giving her an answer, Jesus asks one of her: “I am the resurrection and the life . . . Do you believe this?” (11:25-26).

Sometimes we’re so focused on God’s answer to our prayers that we forget our answer to him.

Martha desired resurrection for her brother, but first Jesus offers himself to her as resurrection and life. It likely wasn’t the answer she expected. But in that moment, perhaps she realized it was the one she needed.

Had her and her sister Mary’s initial prayers for healing been answered, they would have only known Jesus’ power to delay death. There had been lots of prophets and teachers in Israel’s history who could do that. But Jesus’ initial no made space for the yes of witnessing his power over death.

No, Mary and Martha didn’t see their brother healed. Instead, they saw him walk out of his own tomb. They saw God incarnate among them. And all those who witnessed the miracle saw this, too.

It’s true for us as well: the answer we need most isn’t the answer to our prayers. It’s the person of Jesus himself.

Mary: The story isn’t over (but the end will be good)

As the Lenten Gospel readings transition to Holy Week and Jesus’ Passion, we see a silent but suffering witness to the greatest no of God: “But standing at the cross of Jesus [was] his mother . . .“ (John 19:25).

Mary, though she had total faith in God’s plan, couldn’t fully understand it nor know exactly how it would unfold. It’s likely she’d stayed close to her Son throughout his ministry, that she’d heard (and believed) his words about being raised on the third day after his death. So Easter Sunday probably wasn’t the shock to her that it was to the disciples.

But what comfort was that knowledge, really, while watching her Son’s agony and humiliation? When she witnessed her baby boy bleeding from a cross? When she held him one last time—mutilated and lifeless as his body was?

Mary knew her Son’s death wasn’t the end of the story, but that didn’t spare her the suffering of the initial no and the waiting for the ultimate yes of resurrection.

Our struggle with waiting for answered prayer is that we think we know the end of the story based on the present or past chapters of our lives. We often feel that the Lord has been so long in answering us that either he’s not going to show up or it’s too late for him to redeem the lost time.

We seal our hopes and desires away in a cold, dark tomb, resigning ourselves to waiting for a resurrection “at the last day.” And while there will always be desires that can only be fulfilled in heaven, we must beware of losing hope that Jesus can show up anytime and resurrect something we’d long given up on.

Can we, like Mary, have the humility to accept that no matter how dark or sad or painful our present chapter is (or all the past ones were), that this is not the end of our story—and regardless of what the final page holds, it will be good?

God is the Word, the Author of our story, and He keeps writing the story until the last line is good. No page is the whole story, and no dark gets to write our last line.

Ann Voskamp, Waymaker

Can we have faith like Martha who, though she guessed at the ending—a lifetime of waiting for “last day” resurrection—held on to hope and made space for a miracle?

Can we, like Jesus, receive the Father’s no and choose his will above our yes? Can we trust that even God’s no is better than the yes we’d hoped for, because his ultimate yes will be far greater than anything we can imagine?

This is not the end of your story, nor is it even the next chapter. Always, always leave room for hope, because sometimes God can enter in and raise the dead places of your heart, stunning you with a display of his glory and drawing others to himself through you—yes, through your waiting and suffering and yes, even your resurrection.

I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living! Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the Lord!

Psalm 27:13-14 RSV

Photo by Samuel McGarrigle on Unsplash