Rusty George - Why Doesn’t God Answer My Prayers?

Show Notes

Rusty George - Why Doesn’t God Answer My Prayers? by Browncroft Community Church

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Peter Englert: Welcome to the Why God Why? Podcast, my name is Peter Englert. We are answering the question today, why doesn't God answer our prayer with author and pastor Rusty George. Just a reminder, we respond to the questions you don't feel comfortable asking in church. I am here with our fantastic producer, Nathan Yoder, our illustrious co-host Aaron Mercer. Hello, hello. You ready?

Aaron Mercer: And I'm here with our amazing co-host Peter Englert. I don't know, amazing, does that work? So Rusty, you got to know, we've been trying, he says illustrious us all the time. I'm trying to come up with something though. Maybe we should have some listeners send in some ideas for what we should use for Peter's intro.

Rusty George: That's a great word.

Aaron Mercer: I love that you've got, Peter's got, he's got a great book here he's going to talk about in a minute, one of Rusty's books, but you look like you're doing some product placement for a University of Valley Forge here too.

Peter Englert: Hey, you got to support alumni.

Aaron Mercer: There you go.

Peter Englert: We'll probably talk about this, but Rusty's not even wearing his Kansas City Chief's shirt. So there we go.

Rusty George: I'm still mad at them.

Aaron Mercer: Nice. Well, Hey, you want me to jump in here?

Peter Englert: Yeah, I think we're ready.

Aaron Mercer: Yeah, I'm just glad that we're doing this episode. I think the title, why doesn't God answer my prayers, it's a great title, a great subject matter. It's something that people I think a lot of people wrestle with, whether people are going to church or not, a lot of people will at some point pray and wonder, is anybody listening? And sometimes the circumstances make you wonder that too. So I think it's something that at least, I think it cuts close to all of our hearts at different times. So I'm glad we're talking about this some more. What do you think, Peter?

Peter Englert: Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah, without further ado, Rusty, before we... Just introduce yourself to our listeners and tell us a little bit about your story and we'll go from there.

Rusty George: Sure, yeah. I currently live in Valencia, California, which is just north of Los Angeles. Our claim to fame is we have a Six Flags here in town, which was the location for the original Wally World if you're a fan of the movie Vacation. So that is our claim to fame. But I haven't always lived here. I grew up in Kansas, which is why I'm a Chiefs and Royals fan. Nobody chooses that. You're just predestined to be it based upon where you live. And then I graduated from a Bible college in Missouri and then moved to Kentucky. I was there for nine years as an associate pastor and then I came out here to be the lead pastor of this church that was still meeting in a movie theater at the time. And now we're in a building and I've been here almost 19 years. So it has been quite a ride. I'm married, two kids, one in college, one junior in high school and yeah, I think that's the bio.

Aaron Mercer: That's great. That's a good ride there too from Kansas and all the way over to California. So good time.

Rusty George: Yeah. The joke I always tell people is when you grow up in the Midwest, California is a place you visit, not a place you moved to. So I never thought I'd live in California, but God has other plans so here I am. I'm glad I didn't say Baghdad, but we ended up in California.

Aaron Mercer: Where did you live in Kansas? Where was home for you?

Rusty George: Wichita.

Aaron Mercer: Wichita. Okay.

Rusty George: Grew up in one of the big cities there, right outside of Wichita and was there all the way through high school and then moved away.

Peter Englert: Well-

Aaron Mercer: Go Shockers, right?

Peter Englert: Yeah, go Shockers.

Rusty George: That's right. That's right. The Wichita State Shockers.

Rusty George: Yeah. I was there back in the good old days of Xavier McDaniel and Antoine Carr and Cliff Livingston. If you're not my age, you don't know those names, but it was fun.

Aaron Mercer: Awesome.

Peter Englert: I think it was Cliff Livingston, he actually coached one of the Rochester Razorbacks, our pro here.

Rusty George: Really?

Peter Englert: Oh yeah.

Rusty George: That's awesome.

Peter Englert: So, hey-

Rusty George: He made a little noise because he was on I think the second Bulls team that won a championship. So the 92 team. So he's got a ring. He might be the only Shocker to have one.

Peter Englert: Oh man. Well, I better be careful for our listeners, I can talk basketball all day.

Rusty George: Oh really?

Peter Englert: Yeah.

Rusty George: We're recording this in March, it's getting real exciting.

Aaron Mercer: That's right.

Peter Englert: Oh yeah. Oh yeah. So because it's March madness, there's going to be a lot of people praying, I guess that's how we'll segue that.

Aaron Mercer: That's a good segue Peter.

Rusty George: Nice segue. Yes.

Peter Englert: So the reason we want to interview you, I have your book After Amen, and I guess for our listeners, we landed on this question for you because there's a story behind it. Why don't you share your motivation and your heart behind this book of what happened to you that led you to say, "Hey, I want to talk more about why doesn't God answer my prayer and what happens After Amen."

Rusty George: Yeah, it's interesting. We can even segue from the Wichita State Shockers and I'll tell you why. Back in the middle of the 80s, early 80s, the Shockers were in the Elite Eight and were trying to go to the Final Four for the first time in their history. And I was such a fan and I remember going into the other room, getting the Bible out, putting my hand on it and praying. So I was quite young at the time, that God would help the Shockers to win and they lost to LSU. So I think even at an early age, you start wondering why, I mean, first of all, now I know, it's ridiculous to pray that prayer, but why does God answer some prayers, why does he not? And I think we all sit in church and we hear people talk about, "Oh, Jesus did this and Jesus took the wheel and Jesus is just all right with me," whatever.

Rusty George: And it usually is things like "I was driving on Black Friday in the mall and a parking spot opened up right at the front. Praise Jesus." And then you hear somebody talk about, "Yeah, our child was born with multiple birth defects and lived four days and died and we prayed and God didn't answer." And so it really develops this weird theology that we have of why does God say yes to some and no to others? And the question we have is am I doing it wrong? So my story continued on into being a pastor and I would find myself standing out in the lobby with people all the time and they would come up and ask me if I'd pray for them about various things, a sickness, a upcoming doctor's test, a need for a job.

Rusty George: And I would say absolutely. And I would encourage them, you can pray as well. We're in California. I know you guys are east coast. So you know that with the high Catholic population, there's a lot of a feeling of the pastor is the priest so he must have a closer connection to God. So people think that out here as well. And I try to encourage people that they can pray also, and then they looked at me and said, "Well I did, but I didn't get anywhere. So what do I do now?" And I got to thinking about that. I guess it was a question I'd always had in the back of my mind ever since that day I prayed for the Shockers of, what do we do after we say amen? There's so many books out there about how to pray, so many books out there about how to prepare to pray.

Rusty George: And Jesus himself talks about here's what you do when you pray, you go into your closet, you close the door and here's how you pray and gives us a template with the Lord's prayer. But nothing written or said about what do you do after you hang up the phone? And I think that for a lot of us, we feel like we've sent God a text message and the three little dots and the bubble popped up and then it went away and we don't know, what do we do?

Rusty George: And so I wanted to investigate what are we supposed to do? So that's what I did. And I spent a good amount of time just doing a deep dive into when people would come to Jesus and they would ask for things, it was like their prayer, will you heal me? Will you heal my son? Will you fix this? We're out of wine. Those kind of things. Jesus answer there was very rarely you got it. But it often was "Yes, but here's what you need to do now." And there was some work to do. So we did a little at that and we put them into seven different categories and that's what the book turned out to be.

Peter Englert: Hmm. I guess too you also talked about the church that you were serving as a community was going through a lot. I believe you mentioned a school shooting and right now as we record this, we're in the middle of Ukraine. And so there's the Ukrainian situation, there's still COVID. And so there's kind of this helplessness of, I prayed, and so how are you even speaking to people today about prayer, but also our response to prayer? And we don't have Jesus physically here in the sense of the way the disciples did too.

Rusty George: Right. That's a great question. And it seems like there's always something, isn't there? You mentioned our situation where our community went through a school shooting. Two of the kids who were shot were from our church, one died and it raised a lot of questions. The question of your podcast is so brilliant, why God why? Why would you allow this? And even the families of the child that died versus the child that didn't die, why my child and not theirs? Which is no one wants to ask that, but you think that. Then you get into issues of the Ukraine and Russia dilemma and obviously things that happened during COVID and there's a lot of questions. And I think there's a chance for a lot of us to do the whole armchair quarterback with God.

Rusty George: "Well, if I were God, then this wouldn't happen and this would happen." Which is something that we talk a lot about in the book, finding out God's bigger vision, kind of the yield to the how and this idea of figuring out, aligning with the why. In other words, God's got a bigger story he's telling and as horrible and as awful as these events are, there's a bigger thing coming and we don't always understand that. And God has allowed us enough free will for some of us to cure cancer and others of us to create bombs. And he didn't predestine it that way, it's just we're wired with free will and sometimes we make good choices and sometimes we make bad. But God does seem to intervene at times. And God does seem to stop some things at times. The question is why and how does that happen?

Rusty George: So I think in our case, there's a series of things we have to think through. I think we have to think through yielding to your kingdom come, your will be done, not my will. Figuring out that God's got a bigger purpose in mind. And what is my part in that? We talked this weekend at our church about how when we see issues of homelessness and poverty and the lack of basic human needs in the world, we're all quick to judge God for that and say, "If there is a God, how could he allow that?"

Rusty George: But the reality is that the amount of food that is thrown away in America could feed the world. And the amount of tithe that if every follower of Jesus, every Christian were to tithe to their local church and they distribute that to meet needs in their community, it would meet every basic human need in the world. So in some ways God has given us resources, we just haven't appropriated them properly. What do we do with a situation like Ukraine? Yeah, we pray. And we pray for God to do something greater than we could ever imagine and that we're even able to participate in. And at some point we have to yield to his agenda.

Aaron Mercer: Do you find that people will have a hard time sometimes with if someone prays for something and then it doesn't come about, or it doesn't come out about right away or even a certain deadline in someone's mind goes by and it doesn't come about, what sort do things do people wrestle with? Here's what I was thinking, did people feel like maybe I didn't do enough or I didn't... Do they have to strike the right deal with God or something? What sorts of things when people come to you and they're seeking counsel for why it seems like God is quiet or said no to them, what sorts of things do you have to navigate through in those conversations?

Rusty George: Yeah, that's a great question. I find the two things everybody assumes is, if I don't get what I ask for from God and if I'm not blaming God, I start blaming me. And I think it's either a lack of passion or a lack of perfection. So either I didn't pray the right way. I didn't yell enough. I didn't cry enough. I didn't pray long enough. I didn't use the rosary beads the right way or say enough Hail Mary's. Or it's a lack of perfection. I'm just not good enough so I need a priest or a pastor to pray for me who's a little better off than I am and might have a chance at God's ear instead of me. The story I always like to remind people of is just the prayers of Jesus, especially in the garden of Gethsemane.

Rusty George: No one would question his perfection, but let's not question his passion either. He's praying so hard he is sweating drops of blood, which is that condition of hemarthrosis I believe is how you say it, easy for me to say, where the capillaries in your skin begin to burst because of the tension you feel in your body. You can't question his passion or his perfection and yet God still says no to Jesus, because Jesus is praying is there another way? So at some point we have to figure out that God's got a greater plan here and he is still in this. So I think the tendency is either to blame God, and then if we stop doing that, we blame ourselves and we think it's one of those two things, when all throughout scripture, we read God answering prayers of horrific people and saying no to very righteous people because God obviously has his own agenda.

Peter Englert: For many of our listeners, they're de-churched, unchurched, maybe open, but I think one of the problems with the church is we've thrown some cliches that have some truth at it. So I think immediately of let go and let God, and just pray about it and I can see you laughing, which is great. So I'm pretending to be that listener that I just don't find that helpful. So what would you say that maybe is one of the biggest misconceptions about prayer and about our relationship with God that you would want to say to that person that has kind of been, I don't want to be pejorative, but has been fed these cliches that they're all things work together for good, I know that the Bible says that, but I don't feel that right now. Let go and let God. How would you help that person process through that?

Rusty George: Oh man, I think you could spend an entire year just unpacking the horrific theology we have given people when it comes to how do we write size this idea of God in our life? Even just the horrible cliche of everything happens for a reason. There's a great book out there by a guy named Larry Osborne called to 10 Dumb Things Smart Christians Believe. And if you ever met Larry, you know that's his personality. But one of them is everything happens for a reason. And I think those other ones fall in there too. Let go and let God. I want you to think about it from a parenting standpoint. Would you tell your kid who's asking for a brand new Ferrari at the age of 16, "Just ask your dad for it and then let go and let your dad." Well, no, because there's something bigger.

Rusty George: He's got a plan for you that does not involve you wrapping that car around a tree. So what is the best thing for that child? And I think this is what we miss with prayer. We assume prayer is getting what we want from God. But prayer is God getting a relationship with us, where it is a give and take. It is a conversation. And when Jesus gives us the Lord's prayer, it's not a pray this and this only, it is a template for how to pray. In fact, there's a great pastor and author named Chris Hodges that has an app out called Pray First. It's great app, it's free, but he gives you like seven different prayer templates that are throughout the scriptures that really set you up for things you should talk about with God. And the whole asking for things is way down the list.

Rusty George: It starts off with praise. It starts off with right sizing his kingdom versus ours. And once you get through all that, then you're able to figure out boy, this is really what I should be talking to God about rather than my desire for a Ferrari at the age of 16. So I think once we figure out that this is more about a relationship, a lot of these questions we wrestle with, like if God already knows what we want, why do we even pray? Or if I let go and let God, how can I trust him? And everything happens for a reason. We like to say that differently. We say it as, everything doesn't happen for a reason, but everything can be redeemed. And the closer I am to God, the more I talk to him and listen to him, the quicker I am to see his redemptive work. You get to the book of Hebrews and you get to chapter 11, the hall of faith as we call it, all these people that had great faith for God.

Rusty George: There's a chilling, chilling sentence in there that says some of these people never saw the answer to what God promised them, and yet they still had faith. And recognizing that this is a long story God is writing and we're a small piece in this and we don't know what God will do with our part of the story, with our sphere of influence, how that impact, that seed being planted, even that tragedy. I'm reminded of a time that there's a... I hope you guys don't want me going off on a tangent here. But when I was in Bible college, there was a guy that was one of our professors who was just a living modern day Job. He'd just been through it, from having polio as a kid or losing the use of one of his arms, to his wife dying of cancer, to one child being born with multiple birth defects.

Rusty George: He just on down the line, and he preached a message on the life of Job in our chapel. You could have heard a pin drop because you know you're talking to somebody that's lived it. And I remember asking him later, I said, "Why do you think God allowed that to happen to Job?" Satan comes to him and wagers this deal with God and God goes, "All right, I'm in," and wagers Job's life on it. And this professor looks at me and he says, "I don't know, but I'm sure glad he did because that story has brought me much comfort during my modern day Job lifestyle."

Rusty George: And I think sometimes the lives that we live, we're never going to know sometimes the way that our faith will impact our kids, our spouse, a coworker, the next generation, we may not be written up into a book that's read thousands of years from now, but God never wastes a hurt, there's a good cliche, but it's actually true, and everything can be redeemed. So this whole idea of what the rabbit's foot view of God, we got to remember, he's got a bigger plan and he wants to have us in this relationship as we walk through it.

Aaron Mercer: There's so many different directions we could go with this, but I'm really interested, there are definitely the... There's what could be viewed as selfish, certainly if you're asking for a Ferrari, that's definitely a selfish prayer. There's no doubt about that. But even for, we can be praying for, I really am interested in X job and whatever that job is and is it good to pray for that? But maybe you can hit on that, but I think where I wanted to go with this question is what about God does say no sometimes to prayers that are not about us, that are about other people.

Aaron Mercer: And I know that's hard. That's really where we're struggling I think with in this question and the thought came to my head, are there times that you think that God doesn't, that maybe something doesn't happen because you... If you decided not to intercede, not to pray, does that have a negative effect? And we're always talking about what is the positive effect that we want, but is there something to, if you choose not to pray, if you answer this question after you say, why doesn't God answer my prayers and your name of your book is After Amen, well, after people say, "You know what, I'm not even going to ask God for anything anymore because it doesn't seem like he's coming through." Is there a potential negative consequence to that too?

Rusty George: Hmm. That's a good one. I'd say it's a little bit like going on your church's mission trip. We send a lot of people across the border into Mexico to help build houses and those trips come and go and a person can say yes, they can say no. Does the house still get built? Sure. But you missed out on the process. So I think that's what's life changing for you. Could you go down there and do something nobody else could do? Perhaps. Maybe you end up going down there and you have an interaction with a child that changes their life forever, and that would not have happened had you not gone. But you just never know. A lot of times that work will get done, especially if it's something God wants to have happen, but you would miss out on your part of that.

Rusty George: And I think that's probably the thing that we'll figure out once we get to the other side, all the things that we could have been a part of that we either, we didn't have time for or seem to comfortable for us or we just think God didn't need us because somebody else would do it. It's a little bit like building campaigns that churches do. People step up and they give all this money and they build something and see lives change, would it have happened had somebody sitting out there not put their 20 bucks in? Maybe. But they wouldn't have had that skin in the game ownership of it to look back and go, "Boy, we were in on that. We made that happen."

Rusty George: So I think these are all opportunities. When I pray for somebody else, I become less selfish. When I pray for God to move in somebody else's life, then I focus in on their life and not just mine. Would God do that without me? If he wants to, absolutely. But I could miss out on the joy of seeing that happen.

Peter Englert: When in your life have you struggled the most with this question, why doesn't God answer my prayer?

Rusty George: Well, I think there's been a lot, but the most recent was the school shooting. When I went to the hospital for one of the students, they took him to two different hospitals and they were about 20 minutes apart. And I get to the one hospital of a student and I get a phone call from the other hospital and I found out that this other girl was in there. And I'm praying about both of them. Everybody's praying about both of them. I'm so thankful that the one did live, but the one who passed, I just couldn't figure it out.

Rusty George: And here I am trying to be able to comfort the family and they're asking the same thing that I'm asking, but I'm having a hard time not joining in their chorus of screams and cries because I'm just trying to be strong for them. I think that there are times when I have very dear friends who had a series of miscarriages and could never have a child and they're the most loving people and they end up adopting kids and are wonderful. But then I hear about kids that, a girl that gets pregnant and has her baby in a bathroom at the prom and leaves it in the toilet, goes back out to the dance. And I think, "God, how could you allow that person to get pregnant, but not my friends who would definitely take care of that child?" I don't know. I don't have answers for that.

Rusty George: I think about a pastor I worked with years ago, there was a horrific car accident where a teenager was killed. She ran off the road and hit a fence. And this pastor had to go out to the family's house to tell them the bad news with a police officer. And he walked with them all through that devastating day and through the funeral and a year later, they said to him, "You know what I appreciated most about you during that time?" And the pastor said, "What's that?" And they said, "You never told us why." And I think this gets back to your question a minute ago. I think we are so quick to try to give reason to it because it makes us feel better. Well, they're in a better place. God needed them in heaven more than on earth.

Rusty George: And the reality is sometimes we just don't know. And this is where I kind of end the book with what do you do when God does say no? And I think that you have to remember that Jesus heard that no, and Jesus hung on a cross and cried out "My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?" But why did Jesus go through with that? Why did he remain on the cross? Because even though he could not trace his father's hand, he trusted his heart. And he knew that he could trust his father. And I think the more that we pray and the more that we go through those difficult situations and we continue to trust, it strengthens a trust muscle for us. It makes it a little bit easier. I like the illustration of walking into a dark room and the light switch is on a dimmer and you slowly turn it up.

Rusty George: I feel like every time we trust God, it gets a little brighter and it may not make sense, but you can see clearly to take the next step. So to answer your question of when have I felt that in my life, I think I see that a lot because it's not just my life I'm thinking of, but it's everybody in our church. And I just struggle sometimes to have the right words to say because I don't know. And I always go back to that one story of my pastor friend, the best thing he said was not why, but just I'm here.

Peter Englert: Let me ask you this. Most of our audience in their 20s, they don't have the perspective of a Rusty. Was there a time in your 20s that you can think about that God said no and you were really, really upset? And what perspective do you have today on that?

Rusty George: Yeah, that's a great question. When I first started out in ministry, we had a kid in our young adult ministry, I think I was probably 25, 26, and she was 18 and similar situation. She ran off the road, hit a fence. She did not die. We prayed for her healing. It did not come. And I wondered why, what was the purpose behind that? When I was 19, I was diagnosed with type one diabetes and I didn't even know what that was, but I prayed God would take it away. He did not. I have lost my father, I've lost friends to sicknesses and to death and all those times I've cried out. And I think that what I would say to your 20 somethings is this, befriend people who are older than you. I always tell married couples this illustration, I say, "Have you ever watched the Thanksgiving Day Macy's parade?" Say, "Oh yeah, yeah, yeah."

Rusty George: I said, "Okay, imagine your perspective if you're standing on the street level, all you can really see is what's right in front of you. But if you got in that Macy's building and went up to the top floor, you could see what's coming and what's going." I said, "It feels like every year you live, you take another level up." And I say this in marriage because when you're first married, everything seems like this is the end of the world. After 27 years of marriage, I figured out yeah, that wasn't that big of a deal. So I think in your 20s, you want to be around some people that they're are several floors up from you and can let you know, yeah, that's really not a thing, or that's not that big a deal. It will be okay. God is still in this. He's still on the throne and you can trust him. And I think that's what is so helpful about being a part of a local church.

Aaron Mercer: Yeah. I think that was a great question and I was actually, while you were talking, I was wondering, in the conversations that some of the pastors have had that you were talking about, or even some of the people in your own congregation or even the younger you, is there a certain, we don't want to put, I love what you said about how you don't want to give the why to people because sometimes you just need to be there, but is there a verse of scripture, is there a psalm or some other place in scripture that you do point people to that is helpful to them or maybe it's just helpful to you as you're trying to help others process through why God didn't seem to answer that prayer?

Rusty George: Yeah. Obviously there's some great books out there. A Grief Observed by CS Lewis is the classic. There's some great books by Jerry Sittser on grief who lost his wife, daughter, and mother all the same day in a car accident. I can't remember the name of it, but Jerry Sittser, S-I-T-Z-E-R, I believe you.

Rusty George: But when it comes to scripture, it's hard to get away from Psalm 23. I think that's so beautiful as to where God is through all the difficulties of life. Psalm 139 gives us great perspective on where God is and what I'll often tell people who are going through grief, and first of all, that's key. You don't get over it. You don't go around it, you through it. So just embrace it. Is pray a psalm a day, just make that your prayer. That'll last you 150 days.

Rusty George: And Psalm 119 will take you several days if you kind of break it down. But just don't rush it. Let that be your prayer when you have no words to pray. Because David gets so mad at God. It helps us to be able to voice those things and realize that God still considered him a man after his own heart. So he just kept coming back for more. When you don't know what to pray, then just pray somebody else's prayers and eventually you'll find the words to say. So I think the psalms is probably our best place to go.

Peter Englert: What about the, so it might not be grief, but God just feels really distant. And maybe it's someone that I'm coming to church, the songs just don't feel right. I'm reading my Bible. I'm stuck in Leviticus talking about not eating hoofed animals or there's a lot of people "I just haven't been to church in a while because I don't feel God." What are some practices, what are things that you tell them to, or even questions that you ask? So you'd kind of just start prodding and pushing, not in a bad way, but just kind of, "Hey, what's really below the surface?"

Rusty George: Yeah. That's good. I think you could start with what would it look like for you to feel God? What does that look like in the past? Oftentimes we have this idea in our mind of how we might feel the goosebumps we might get. And maybe we've had that before at a church camp experience or just a killer worship night or somebody preached a sermon and said something just profound. Those are great moments, but those are moments. They come and go. And as you see people progress in their spirituality, there is somewhat of a, God kind of takes his hands off the bike and lets you steer for yourself. And you sense that he is gone. He's not. He's still watching you and with you, he's just not controlling every movement. So I there's a few things I often tell people.

Rusty George: One, if you're a reader, read the book Sacred Pathways by Gary Thomas. Talks about different ways we connect with God besides just worship and teaching. And the other is recognize that Jesus said he would always be with the poor. And if you want to find God, go be where the poor are and spend time in homeless shelters and serve people less than you as far as their social status or what they have. And I have found that there are tremendous blessings that I've found in ministering to others, I find that I'm ministered to myself. And then just the simple thing, and many of you might be thinking, "Well, I can do that without ever going to church." You're right. But it's when I go to church that I find people who need me. So if my faith is small, then let me be around people who have less faith than I have that I can encourage.

Rusty George: If I don't know anybody, let me be a greeter and meet new people, find ways to serve and pour into other people and we always connect with Jesus that way. So I know there's a great exodus from the church right now because COVID got a lot of people out of the habit of it. The Gen Zers are thinking, "Why do we even need it? I can be spiritual without it." But I think COVID also taught us how much we need people. We were not comfortable just being on Zoom 24/7, and we needed others in our life. And to be around other people, older people than you that have seen difficult things and can walk you through it, other people that need you to speak into their life and encourage them. There's always somebody you can bless. So that's why the fellowship of the saints is so important.

Peter Englert: I've listened to your podcast a lot. I'd encourage everyone to go check out the rest of your podcast and I'm looking forward to reading the book, I haven't gotten a chance yet. But something that I'm just kind of surprised by this interview is you kind of keep bringing up generosity, giving, serving the poor and I guess it just sounds like that's really on your heart and mind right now. Dig a little deeper in that. When you think of answering this question, why does that keep coming up for you?

Rusty George: I think it comes up for me so much because I spent so much of my life trying to go deep with God just by studying the Bible. And one day I was reading the Sermon on the Mount and I got to the end of it at Matthew 7 and Jesus tells a story that I had heard a million times about the two guys that build their houses, one on the sand, one on the rock. And obviously the one on the sand blows away. The one on the rock stands. And this is his point, after all this great teaching he just did. Whoever hears the words of mine and puts them into practice will build an unshakable life. And I thought, I have spent the majority of my life just hearing the word of God. I'm a connoisseur of church. I consume podcasts. I listen to pastors.

Rusty George: I preach messages. I do Bible studies. I've been to Bible college and seminary. I've taught classes. But the time I feel closest to God, the times that I've grown in my faith the most are when I serve those who are in need, when I walk with those who have no faith, when I bring others to church, when I baptize people that were my neighbors and have now come to faith, that's when I feel like I'm really living it out. You got to have the hearing, but you got to do the doing. Buddy of mine likes to compare it to a golf swing. You got to have both the back swing and the follow through, you can't have just one. And a lot of us have our club up in the air, walking around, yelling at people, just because all we've ever done is hear the word of God and we haven't put it into practice. So those have been big elements for our church and certainly for me.

Aaron Mercer: Do you feel like when you are investing yourself in that way, that tunes you in better to the conversation of prayer? Whether you feel like God is saying yes to what you're praying or not, does it help?

Rusty George: Yeah. Exactly. It's a little bit like counseling, if you ever do couples counseling. If all you do is focus on yourself and what you want and how your spouse needs to be better, man, you're going to have a miserable marriage. But if you focus in on what your spouse needs and how you can meet those needs, that's when you really begin to flourish.

Rusty George: And I think about all the years, I would consume myself with not just Bible studies, but great Bible based books, great authors from the past and the desert fathers and I love all that stuff, but it became a lot of naval gazing, became a lot of probing the depths of my own soul. And I realized, "Boy, I am really alone. I am really distant from others and I don't know if I'm living the life of Jesus at all." So I think once you do begin to serve others, boy, then your prayers begin to be more about them than it is about you. You begin to see God work in their life instead of you just consume with what God's not doing in your own life. It changes your trajectory on everything. Generosity of time, of treasure, of talent, that's a game changer.

Peter Englert: Last two questions because just again, I love when conversations go in a direction I don't think. We're talking about Gen Z and millennials, I'm like an old millennial, so not to give away my age, but-

Rusty George: Oh, I'm sorry.

Peter Englert: It's okay.

Rusty George: You couldn't be cool like us Xers.

Peter Englert: Oh yeah. Well, Aaron reminds me of that all the time.

Aaron Mercer: I'm kind of in the bridge, the bridge between the two.

Rusty George: Oh, okay.

Peter Englert: So one of the things that just I'm kind of leaving with the impression of this conversation is, and even as I've been to your church website and just like, there's not a lot of new stuff there, like yeah, you're doing a podcast, but you're talking a lot about relationship and leadership and work and I think even the impression that I'm leaving is we have a ton of people that are deconstructing their faith, that are doubting the church. Sometimes they're okay with of Jesus. Sometimes they're not.

Peter Englert: And in essence, you're kind of saying if you're really deconstructing, if you're really doubting, tell me about your community because there's something missing there that you are not committed to. So I noticed that your church has rooted. I noticed you're talking about coming in person and you're still invested in digital. And I think even what you're kind of pushing with this question, why doesn't God answer my prayer? It's like, you can't have all the benefits of Christianity and spirituality as a lone ranger, you have to have some community and that takes work. That takes, I don't want to go to small group tonight. I don't know. That's kind of what I'm leaving with. Is that kind of what you're saying?

Rusty George: Yeah. And that's been a slow learn for me. I am an introvert by nature. And so even though I'm a pastor and I stand up on a stage and talk to people, that's easy. They're not talking back. I get to say what I want and leave. So it'd be really easy for me just to put myself into office or a cave somewhere and just be done with everybody. And I talk a lot about this and it's a lot of my own personal journey with this and a book that I did previously called Better Together where I just got so consumed with me, I didn't see what God was doing. And what I would tell people who are deconstructing their faith, great. Deconstruct your religion. Let's start there. Because a lot of us grew up with something that Jesus never intended.

Rusty George: In fact, when you look at the scriptures and all the things that we read about that Jesus says and the things that Paul writes, when he uses the word you, it's not a singular you, it's a plural you, or as we'd say in Kentucky all y'all. It's everybody. So if you're not part of a community of believers, you can't do this on your own. And here's why I can say that with confidence. Because God said we are created in his image and he himself exists in community, the father, the son, and the holy spirit. And Jesus gives us such a beautiful picture of that in John 17 when he prays for the church and he says they exist within us. So it's like the trinity surrounds us. So if he exists in community and I'm made in his image, why would I think I exist better as a lone ranger?

Rusty George: I need other people, even if they annoy me, even if I go to a small group and I think these guys are a bunch of morons or they don't know near what I know or nobody challenged me tonight. Not about me. It's about me having an avenue to serve others and lift their faith up. And one day you realize, "Boy, I got blessed all along in this process." So I would encourage your listeners, yes, deconstruct your religion, but build back your faith, not on a book, not on a church, not on a religion, but on an event that Jesus came back from the dead and that changed everything.

Rusty George: And he invites us into a relationship with him and not just him, but his father and the very spirit of God. And we exist in that with the church and Jesus writes to a community and says, we're a kingdom, not a bunch of snipers, not a bunch of assassins. We're a kingdom that's literally changing the world. This is the way the world will be changed. Not through legislation, not through picking the right party, not by finally voting in the right person or even being an American. This is the way we'll change the world. And it happened once, the first century, second century, they literally changed the world before the Bible was even put together by people loving each other. We can do it again.

Peter Englert: Wow. That's a great place to close in the last question. We'll have to save, drop that mic-

Aaron Mercer: Mic drop. There you go.

Peter Englert: So the best part about this podcast is we ask, what does Jesus have to say about this topic about God not answering prayer? So Aaron and I answer, and then you get to pick up the heresy mess that we leave for our listener. Does that sound good?

Rusty George: Okay.

Peter Englert: There we go.

Aaron Mercer: He usually has me go first because I'm the most... You guys are the pastors, I'm the one who gets myself in trouble probably.

Peter Englert: I probably do more. You know behind the scenes, but do you-

Aaron Mercer: Sure. Yeah. I just think that this, thank you so much for being with us talking about this today. I think it's a great topic and I'm glad that you have this book here After Amen. I want to check that out some more too. And I really appreciate this object matter, why doesn't God answer my prayers? Again, I think it's something that a lot of people wrestle with and I don't think that Jesus is afraid of people wrestling with that. Certainly in the Bible we see David, you mentioned in the psalms wrestles with it a lot. I have to imagine other people. I'm thinking Moses probably wrestled with it a lot while he was leading the people around on the wilderness. There are lots of other prayers that were made in the Bible and some got nos, some got not yets.

Aaron Mercer: Was it Hannah who prayed for a long time before Samuel was given to her? And there were other prayers and Jesus prayed in the garden of Gethsemane, you mentioned that also. So I think it's something that people wrestle with. I think Jesus cares about it. He wants us to ask the question. It's when we don't ask the question is when we get ourselves in trouble, when we shut off the conversation and I loved how you were trying to give us to tips on how we can reengage the conversation, even if we're hurting and we don't really want to talk. If you care about your family members, you care about... You reengage. Because if you don't talk, you're not going to go anywhere good. So anyways, I think God cares about it a lot to answer your question there, Peter, I just rambled for a while, but Jesus cares about a lot.

Rusty George: That's really good.

Aaron Mercer: So go ahead, Peter.

Peter Englert: No, it's good. I think as I'm reflecting off of this, if you read the gospels Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John kind of the biographies of Jesus, there's these little verses that said Jesus went away to pray and then he met with the crowds. And you probably mentioned this in the book, but I just think that there's that simple rhythm of getting away to pray and then going to the crowds, whether the crowds is your job, whether it's right now I'm in a season with a one year old and four year old and Lucy loves to get up at 5:30 as a one year. And I just think that Jesus lived out this rhythm that, why doesn't God answer any of my prayers, partially because we're not always aware of that it's the prayer, but then it's the rest of the day and what you have to do and just I think I want to impress on our listeners just number one, serving, and then number two community. When you can't feel God personally, you actually need the support of other people and that's really what Jesus modeled and lived out.

Rusty George: Mm-hmm (affirmative). I totally agree. Totally agree. I think you guys nailed it. I think that it's more about the relationship than it is about the answers and the longer you stay in it, the more you begin to see. I would encourage people to write their prayers down because you'll go back and see he answered a lot more than you think he did. So just keep at it. It's the relationship. Set that time him and place. Meet with God, even if it's just 10 minutes. Talk with Jesus. Talk with him in the car on the way to work. Talk with him when you're in the shower. Find places that are holy and sacred for you, where you can be uninterrupted and talk to God and write down what you're asking and see what God does.

Rusty George: I think you'll find two things. One, you don't ask for as many things as you think you do because inevitably you start talking more about how great he is and what he's done. And two, he answers a whole lot more than you think he does because you just weren't noticing in the past. So notice and say thank you and it'll change everything.

Peter Englert: This has been awesome, Rusty. The best place to find you is rustygeorge.com or would you encourage people to find you elsewhere?

Rusty George: Yeah. It's pastorrustygeorge.com and you can get books, resources. If you're a pastor, be happy to send you manuscripts for messages. And we got a deal where you can get books for your church and go through it together. I've even filmed small group studies for your churches where I'll lead your small group for you. It's just plug and play. It's real simple. And I do that because I have benefited so many times from other people doing that. So let me share the wealth and hopefully this can help your church. And if you're an individual, you just want to read it on your own, do that, but then pass it on to somebody else and find out what they think. There's questions in the back and talk about it over a cup of coffee.

Peter Englert: I think it was 2017 that we did the Better Together series and you-

Rusty George: Oh really?

Peter Englert: Yeah. And your chapter on confessing was just pretty awesome. So appreciate that.

Rusty George: Oh, well thank you. Thank you.

Peter Englert: Yeah. We'll save this clip and throw it in your podcast too or something like that. But anyways.

Rusty George: Okay. I love it. Thanks.

Peter Englert: Well, Rusty, thanks for having us. Aaron and Nathan, thank you so much. If you want to get a hold of us, go to whygodwhypodcast.com, click the subscribe button and we'll send you an email with this episode and a lot of great ones just like this one. Thank you so very much. Have a great day.