THE NEED IS GREAT. Perhaps it’s a broken relationship. Perhaps it’s an impending financial or medical crisis. Whatever the situation, you know you need a miracle. So you pray. And you wait. And you pray and wait some more, again and again. You ask others to pray, and you all wait to see what God will do.

And to you, it seems like God isn’t doing anything.

The people who are praying with and for you ask you how it’s going, and you tell them: nothing’s changed.

So, how long do you keep praying? How long will it be before it’s just rote behavior or you give up altogether? How long before people begin looking at you sideways, wondering if you deserve your suffering or just haven’t prayed faithfully enough?

. . .

OVER THE YEARS, I’ve heard story after story about people who not only suffered some difficulty, but had more suffering heaped on top of it by Christians who accused them of a lack of faith or some private sin. And yes, it’s possible to read some Bible verses as suggesting that the faithful shouldn’t suffer needlessly. Again, for example, the worldview of Psalm 1 suggests that the righteous should be blessed and the wicked punished.

But the Psalter as a whole shows how the psalmists continually wrestle with the fact that life is more complicated than that. Sometimes, the righteous suffer for no apparent reason; sometimes, the wicked prosper. And the psalmists cry out to God: Why? This isn’t right! Why aren’t you doing something about this?

Occasionally, by the end of the psalm, God has acted, the psalmist is vindicated or saved, and all is right with the world. But often, the psalms leave you hanging, wondering what will happen next. The psalmist has to continue to believe in God’s compassion, justice, and faithfulness, even when everything seems upside-down, even when it seems God has turned a deaf ear to their prayers.

. . .

PREVIOUSLY, WE’VE SEEN Luke’s parallel annunciation scenes, in which the angel Gabriel is sent first to Zechariah the priest and then to Mary. Both are startled at the sudden appearance of the angel; both receive the incredible promise of a son who will serve a crucial role in God’s plan of redemption.

But Luke tells the stories in a way that seems to highlight the differences in how they respond to the news. Zechariah seems doubtful and uncertain, asking for a sign: “How can I be sure of this?” (Luke 1:18, NIV). But Mary’s response seems more faithful. She too asks a question, but her question is more curious and confused than doubtful. And in the end, she submits herself fully to God’s plan, saying, “I am the Lord’s servant” (vs. 38).

Zechariah’s wife Elizabeth is also painted as the more faithful of the two, praising God for the promise of a son, and later, being filled with the Holy Spirit and humbly prophesying to Mary. The prophecy is such an encouragement to Mary that she breaks out in a song of praise.

But before we have a look at Mary’s song, I want us to consider some of the personal implications of the story we have so far, the story of how three people responded to the announcement of God’s plan through God’s chosen messenger. Who’s faithful and who isn’t?

It’s more complicated than it might seem at first.

Again, Luke doesn’t tell us the whole story: we don’t know when, for example, Elizabeth first heard the news and what her initial response was. What seems clear from the way Luke tells the story is the pain and disgrace that Zechariah and Elizabeth carried with them from all those years of remaining childless. One imagines the whisperings, the gossip, the unfounded and unkind things their neighbors said about them as they tried to come to terms with how bad things could happen to what seemed like good people.

And again, just because Zechariah’s response isn’t as faithful as it might have been, that doesn’t make him faithless. Remember, Luke portrays both him and his wife as righteous people. And when, a few verses later, Luke reports Zechariah’s hesitation and doubt in the face of Gabriel’s announcement, I don’t think we’re meant to take that as a negation of Zechariah’s righteousness. Luke isn’t saying, “Remember that stuff about the man being righteous and blameless? Just kidding.” If he believed that, he wouldn’t have described Zechariah as righteous in the first place.

So here’s the thing: sometimes, even those who might otherwise be described as righteous in the sight of God don’t always respond as faithfully as they might, particularly if they’ve been carrying heavy burdens for a long time. Doubt isn’t ideal, but it’s understandable. And it doesn’t negate the plan of God.

For those who have ever been told that their prayers weren’t being answered because they weren’t faithful enough or were harboring some secret sin, here’s the other thing we learn from Luke’s tale: the story belongs to God, not us. Zechariah asks for a sign, and God gives him one, albeit not the one he anticipated. Zechariah doubted the promise of a son, but the son was still given. And why? Because it’s God’s story, not Zechariah’s. Zechariah has a role to play in the unfolding drama, but flubbing his lines doesn’t cancel the performance.

That’s the problem with the mistaken idea that all our prayer requests will be answered the way we want if we just have enough faith. It puts us at the center of the story, as if God were merely a supporting character and the only thing that mattered is whether our personal stories unfold according to our plan. Theologically, that gets things exactly backwards.

Yes, God wants us to be faithful and believe. Yes, our faithfulness matters. Yes, God wants us to trust him.

But our spiritual and emotional exhaustion, our doubts and uncertainties, do not derail God’s plan. Nor do they nullify God’s faithfulness and compassion toward us. His plan may not be our plan, and we may not always understand why. But we have to believe that God is both good and trustworthy, and sometimes, that has to be enough.