Author: E. DeWayne Swann

Isn’t “No” an Answer?
Just a tiny little child
Three years old,
And a mother with a heart
All of gold.
Often did that mother say,
Jesus hears us when we pray,
For He’s never far away
And He always answers.

Now, that tiny little child
Had brown eyes,
And she wanted blue instead
Like blue skies.
For her mother’s eyes were blue
Like forget-me-nots. She knew
All her mother said was true,
Jesus always answered.

So she prayed for two blue eyes,
Said “Good night,”
Went to sleep in deep content
And delight.
Woke up early, climbed a chair
By a mirror. Where, O where
Could the blue eyes be? Not there;
Jesus hadn’t answered.

Hadn’t answered her at all;
Never more
Could she pray; her eyes were brown
As before.
Did a little soft wind blow?
Came a whisper soft and low,
“Jesus answered. He said, No;
Isn’t No an answer?”

The above poem, written by Amy Carmichael, was based on incident that actually did occur in her life when she was three. It turned out to be in the providence of God for her to have brown eyes. She became a missionary to India in the late 1890s. At first her ministry was primarily evangelistic. But along the way she became aware that some parents in India sold their daughters to the temple, where they were used for immoral purposes. God led one such child to her, and through a series of events and a sense of the Lord’s leading, Amy took the child in. Then more stories of other girls (and later, boys) surfaced and more opportunities to rescue and provide homes for these children arose. Amy had to struggle with this, because the Lord had seemed to be blessing her evangelistic work. Was it right to turn from that ministry to give herself to housing and raising children? She concluded that that was indeed God’s will for her life. The ministry grew exponentially and eventually became a whole compound, with housing for children of all ages, the workers who took care of them, and even their own hospital.

As Amy went “undercover” to find details of these children, she would stain her arms with coffee and wear Indian dress so that she could pass as an Indian woman and move freely in Indian society where she never could have as an Irish missionary. This she could not have done with blue eyes — her eyes would have given her away immediately. Neither she nor her mother could have ever known, all those years ago, the Lord’s purpose for her brown eyes, but the lesson of faith stayed with her all her life.

The way God answers prayers is sometimes:

“Wait”
Desperately, helplessly, longingly, I cried
Quietly, patiently, lovingly God replied.
I pled and I wept for a clue to my fate,
And the Master so gently said,
“Child, you must wait.”

“Wait? You say, wait!” my indignant reply.
“Lord, I need answers, I need to know why!
Is Your hand shortened?
Or have You not heard?
By Faith, I have asked, and am claiming Your Word.
My future and all to which I can relate
Hangs in the balance, and
YOU tell me to WAIT?
I’m needing a ’yes’,
A go-ahead sign,
Or even a ’no’ to which I can resign.
And Lord, I’ve been asking, and this is my cry:
“I’m weary of asking! I need a reply!”
Then quietly, softly, I learned of my fate. As my Master replied once again,
“You must wait.”
So, I slumped in my chair,
Defeated and taut and grumbled to God,
“So, I’m waiting… for what?”
He seemed, then, to kneel,
And His eyes wept with mine,
And He tenderly said,
“I could give you a sign.
I could shake the heavens,
And darken the sun.
I could raise the dead, And
Cause mountains to run.
All you seek, I could give, and pleased you would be.
You would have what you want –
But you would never know Me.
You would not know the depth of My love for a Saint;
You’d not know the power that I give to the Faint;
You’d not learn to see through the clouds of Despair;
You’d not learn to trust just by knowing I’m There;
You’d not know the joy of resting in Me
When darkness and silence were all you could See.
You’d never experience that fullness of Love
As the peace of My Spirit descends like a Dove;
You’d know that I give and I save… for a Start
But You’d not know the depth of the beat of My Heart.
The glow of My comfort late into the Night,
The faith that I give when you walk without Sight,
The depth that’s beyond getting just what you Asked
Of an infinite God, who makes what you have LAST.
You’d never know should your pain quickly Flee,
What it means that ’My Grace is sufficient for Thee.’
Yes, your dreams for your loved one overnight would come True,
But, Oh the loss! If I lost what I’m doing in You!

So, be silent, My Child, and in time you will See
The greatest of gifts is to get to know Me.
And though oft’ may My answers seem terribly Late,
My most precious answer of all is still, ’Wait’.”