Trumps Day of Prayer (Part 4) - Baby Trump?

Let’s assume, for the sake or argument, that Trump is a man with real faith in the Lord Jesus Christ who is following the Bible’s command to humble himself in calling the United States to pray. There is much in the media portrayal of the man that might cause us to question that but ultimately only God can judge his heart. So for the sake of argument, let’s give him the benefit of the doubt. The Christian God is not a genie or a vending machine who is obliged to listen to every prayer. We can go further than that and say that He is not obliged to answer every prayer in the way we expect.

To illustrate this think about a parent with a nagging child. When children ask for things they really need - like food, water, or rest - a good parent is only too happy to provide. There are occasions when children ask for things that would be harmful - to drive the car, play with dad’s chainsaw, or parachute off the roof with an umbrella - and a parent has to say “NO!” But there are other occasions where a child feels a real need but asks for something which does not meet that need appropriately. They ask for chocolate because they are hungry but what they really need is to wait 20 minutes for the healthy nutritious meal you have been preparing. They want to spend their pocket money now but you know they will get better value if they go to a different shop (or ask grandma to pay!). The requests children make are often met with the answer “Wait” or “Take this instead, it is better”. It maybe many years before a child (now grown up) can ask “Mum, Dad, why did you do that?” and parents can explain “Well, this was going on. You couldn’t understand it at the time...”.

From a Christian perspective, even the most powerful, intelligent human beings are like little children before God. In fact, on one occasion when Jesus friends were arguing about which of them was the greatest and best, Jesus summed up the attitude of faith and humility which is essential to genuine Christian prayer in this way:

“Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, 

you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. 

Whoever humbles himself like a little child is 

the greatest in the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:1-4).

In God’s eyes Trump really is a baby - and so are the rest of us! We cannot understand the bigger picture of what God is planning and what God thinks is best. He often does great things in ways which are completely incomprehensible to us. What if we currently only see things with the eyes of a 5 year-old? One day, perhaps, we will be able to look back from a position of spiritual maturity and God might say “You couldn’t understand it at the time but I was doing this...”.

This is not a difficult idea to grasp but it is not in any way meant to be a reason to stop thinking. God asks us to be childlike in relation to Him, not childish and doing that well requires an intellectual and a spiritual maturity. We must still think as rigorously as we are able to. In fact, many people have found that recognising something of the transcendent reality of God is a maturing process akin to the childhood experience of realising that you are not the centre of a very small universe but a small part of a much bigger universe.

Nor is this meant to be an cop-out which ignores the real intellectual and existential challenges that the problem of suffering confronts us with. The Bible is full of examples of people who experienced all kinds of pain and asked the question “Why God?” In the moment God usually answers with silence. But by trusting God through the agony and the darkness they gained a different kind of knowledge - not a rational explanation of the problem of pain but a personal knowledge, the knowledge of a relational friendship with God. It is often only in retrospect that we start to realise the bigger plans which God was working out for good.

The clearest example of this in the Bible is the death of Jesus Christ. Anticipating His imminent arrest, torture, and crucifixion He prayed like a submissive child

“My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; 

nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will”. (Matthew 18:39).

His cry from the cross was met with divine silence:

“My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?” (Matthew 27:46).

But the path through suffering led to resurrection power, exaltation, and salvation for the peoples of the world.

And being found in human form, he humbled himself by 

becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a 

cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed 

on him the name that is above every name, so that at the 

name of Jesus (meaning “Saviour”) every knee should bow, 

in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue

 confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of 

God the Father. (Philippians 2:8-11).

To know Jesus is not to know all the answers to the questions of suffering but it is to know someone who knows what it is to suffer. He has promised to come alongside those who pray to Him for help, to walk with us and comfort us in our sufferings.