When the Answer Doesn’t Look Like an Answer

• By candidasullivan
• September 8, 2026
• No Comments

There is something so beautiful about returning to Jesus during our trials. We can bring Him every heartache, disappointment, and uncertainty. In ourselves, we might not know how to overcome them. But if we know Jesus, we know who can help us.

We learn things through hardship that comfort could never teach us. I know how hard it can be to go through seasons of struggle. But what if the struggle is necessary to reach the blessings? 

I remember how I felt the night I fell. My hand and elbow throbbed along with my heart. I felt abandoned by God. Why didn’t He stop it all? He could have caught me. He could have helped me regain my balance. But He allowed me to fall. 

My life was already hard. I was struggling greatly every day with pain. I had been praying for relief, but I got even tougher circumstances. In that moment, I didn’t understand it all. I judged God’s work and His love for me based on what I felt. I couldn’t see what He was doing for me. 

If God had given me what I had asked for and the immediate comfort I longed for, I would have missed the biggest blessing and answered prayer. I would have missed my miracle. 

But as I sat in the doctor’s office and heard words of hope, everything changed. I could see my situation with a new perspective. 

At the time, the fall felt like another thing going wrong. But God used what hurt me to lead me toward the help I had been praying for. What looked like another setback became part of the path to my answered prayer. Just because we don’t see God working doesn’t mean that He isn’t. 

Romans 8:28 KJV

²⁸ And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

His way is better than ours. 

Therefore, I want to pursue the One who gives me what I need. 

Looking back, I can see what I couldn’t see that night. God hadn’t abandoned me. My story wasn’t over. What looked like another setback became part of the road that led me toward an answered prayer.

That’s why I want to keep returning to Jesus. I don’t have to understand everything He’s doing. I don’t have to know how He will make a way.

I don’t have to know how if I know Who.

When circumstances make me question God’s goodness, I want to remember all the places where I couldn’t see Him working—until suddenly, I could.

Sweet friend, don’t judge the whole story by the chapter you’re hurting in.

God may be doing something you cannot see yet.