Why God Won't Give You A Sign
So the Lord became angry with Solomon, because his heart had turned from the Lord God of Israel, who had appeared to him twice. 1 Kings 11:9
But he said to him, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rise from the dead.” Luke 16:31
Jesus was angry at a generation that sought a sign (Matt 12:39), evidence before belief. The very nature of faith is reaching out for something you can’t see, yet being — by appearance, often — unreasonably, illogically, completely convinced that what you seek will materialize right as your hands grasp into the air for it.
It seems crazy, it seems foolish. Especially to those on the outside looking in.
Why would Noah build a massive ship on landlocked, desert ground when no one had ever seen rain before (Gen 6-7)? Why would Naaman the Syrian wash seven times, consecutively, in the murky Jordan river (2 Kings 5), and why would Jesus wash the feet of those who would shortly betray and abandon Him (John 13)?
We have answers to those questions now, because we get the luxury of looking back.
But we don’t have that same luxury for our own lives. Jesus makes it very clear that the blueprints of our lives and the circumstances that affect them are not for us to see, much less modify, if we are truly after His heart (Acts 1:7). There are times ahead that ask us what will happen in the times in between, and we cry out to God for an answer, for a sign that He’s there and that He’ll work everything into a favorable outcome, only to hear Him say, “If you don’t believe my word, you still won’t believe me or be willing to walk with me in the dark, even if I parted another ocean to prove it to you.”
Before he passed away in Jan 2017, my pastor and Uncle, Bo Kendall, used to say that “God won’t pet your flesh” — the part of us that is worldly, the remnants of the “old man” from which the Spirit of God is daily delivering us. He is not moved by whining or by our indictment of Him: the King of Heaven feels no pressure nor urgency to prove Himself. He is; He is good, and if anything or anyone is minimized by a lack of faith or by railing accusations, it is us, not Him.
However, He does respond beyond favorably to simple, unfeigned faith.
Faith in Jesus Christ and the validity of what He’s accomplished through His death and resurrection. (1 Cor 15:14)
Faith that the heart of God is good toward us, merciful and just, at all times. (Ex 34:6-7)
Faith that we truly do belong to Him, that WE ARE BELOVED, because we’ve been accepted in the Beloved. (Eph 1:6)
Faith that God’s grace (“the divine influence upon the heart, and its reflection in the life” — Strong’s G5485) will forever be sufficient for every area in which we find ourselves deficient. (2 Cor 12:9)
Faith that God is our strength and our shield, that He will provide for us and never leave us without hope. (Ps 28:7)
Faith that as Jesus believed — as He knew — the Father always hears us when we pray in agreement with His will. (John 11:42, 1 John 5:14)
While He doesn’t promise to give us the signs He gave Moses and the people of Israel in the wilderness, He does give us a promise in the midst of our wilderness — the same promise He gave Joshua, Moses’s successor:
…as I was with Moses, so I will be with you. I will not leave you nor forsake you. Josh 1:5