Prayer: What Silence Did to Me

David didn’t learn to pray on a throne; he learned in a cave—cold stone, silence, nothing but his own breath echoing back to him. My cave has taken many forms over the years. It was the cell where I spent four long years, where the silence pressed in and every day felt heavier than the last. And even after prison, life has felt like a series of new caves—different walls, same echo. Each one has forced me to confront what I really believe about God, about people, and about myself.

I used to love prayer. I would kneel and talk to God like He was right there—real, present, listening. It wasn’t ritual; it was conversation. I felt close to Him, heard and known in a way that felt personal and steady. But after prison, something in me cracked. I came to believe that God answers prayers through people. And for a time, it felt like that was exactly what was happening. Lawyers came into my life who saw me not as a label or a headline, but as a human being. They understood the injustice. They had the skill, the connections, and the ability to change everything. We made real plans. There was tangible hope. I remember thinking, this is it. This is God finally moving. But life moved on. They got busy. Priorities shifted. Good intentions faded into silence. You can only get that close to an answer that would change your life so many times before something inside you starts to fracture.

Then another cave opened. About four years ago, I fell hard for someone I believed I would marry. We loved the same wild things—motorcycles, marathons, and a faith that felt alive and shared. We prayed together about our future. We both felt peace about it. It seemed aligned, grounded, real. But free agency is real too. Outside voices crept in. Doubt grew. Fear won. She stepped back. Nothing dramatic changed except her choice—but that choice changed everything for me. That was when I fully realized I cannot control how people respond, even when I believe God is moving. When answers to prayer depend on human will, prayer starts to feel fragile.

And for me, prayer is not casual. It is intimate. It is supposed to be a conversation between a child and his Father. The word “Father” is sacred to me. It represents duty, sacrifice, presence. A father earns that title by showing up—by protecting, guiding, loving, staying. It is not a biological label; it is a responsibility lived out over time. I don’t even allow myself to claim that title anymore. I lost it long ago. But my earthly father, Donald Pedersen, embodied it. He was the one I could turn to no matter what. I knew he would support me, love me, defend me. He would move mountains if he needed to. That is what “Father” means in my mind.

So when I am asked to pray to a Heavenly Father, it is difficult to use that same intimate language. I know the doctrine. I know I am a son of God. But the closeness I had with my dad is not something I easily transfer to heaven.Without that closeness, my cave feels different from the one I imagine when I read David’s prayers. His words suggest that even in fear and isolation, he could still reach toward a relationship with God.

I often struggle to reach at all.

The silence feels colder without that sense of connection. The echoes feel deeper. The space feels wider.

The truth is, I rarely pray now. I speak at dinner with my wife—simple, safe words. Bless the food. Keep us alive. Nothing vulnerable. Nothing exposed. I still want the connection I once had. I miss it. But opening myself again to that level of intimacy—and risking more silence, or another almost-answer that collapses—feels heavier than staying guarded.

So this is where I am. Not resolved. Not restored. Just here. In the cave. Without the closeness David seemed to carry, and without pretending I still have it. The silence is real. The loneliness is real. And the echoes are mine alone.

Part of what made that silence so painful was the bargain I did not realize I had made.

I had believed that sincere prayer would create closeness. That faithfulness would bring direction. That if I kept reaching, eventually something would reach back.

When that did not happen the way I expected, I was not only grieving the silence. I was grieving the collapse of the transaction I thought faith had promised.

No Transaction

We grow up believing life is a trade.

You study, you get good grades.
You work hard, you get paid.
You’re kind, you get kindness back.
You pray, you get peace.

Do this. Get that.

School reinforces it. Bosses reward it. Church language way too often wraps it in holy words. And we accept it because it feels fair. It feels orderly. It feels like the world makes sense.

But it doesn’t.

There is no transaction.

No Transaction: David Chose

David did not seem to reduce faithfulness to a simple deal.

When the prophet came, David wasn’t even in the room. His father presented seven brothers first. David was still out with the sheep — forgotten in the field. A shepherd. The overlooked one. The nobody.

Yet when Goliath stood screaming, David stepped forward. Not because a crown was promised. Not because he saw a throne waiting. He stepped forward because someone had to.

He served Saul. Played music to calm a tormented king. Fought his battles. Bled for him. And when Saul turned on him—when the spears started flying—David didn’t cash in a moral receipt.

He ran.

Caves. Dust. Hunger. Isolation.
The kind of nights where you can hear your own breathing echo off stone.

Twice he could have killed Saul. Twice he had justification. Twice he had witnesses who would’ve applauded it.

He didn’t.

Not because it would earn him something.
Because it would cost him who he was.

He didn’t stay good to get a reward.
He stayed good so he wouldn’t lose himself.

And when suffering came, David did not always understand it quietly. He questioned, grieved, protested, and sometimes sounded abandoned.

But he kept bringing the pain into the relationship.

He did not treat goodness as a receipt he could hand God in exchange for protection. He kept walking—barefoot, bleeding, and still reaching.

No Transaction: Saul Failed

Saul often seemed to act as though being chosen came with guarantees.

Anointed. Chosen. Elevated. He was head and shoulders above everyone else—literally and figuratively. And somewhere inside that oil pouring over his head, he believed selection meant security.

God picked me. So I must be safe.

When Samuel was late and the army grew anxious, Saul didn’t wait. He offered the sacrifice himself. Perhaps it was not open rebellion at first, but fear—fear of losing control, momentum, and the position he believed he had been given. Fear of losing control. Fear of losing momentum. Fear of losing what he thought he’d earned.

Samuel arrived while the consequences of Saul’s choice were still unfolding and confronted him directly.

Saul did not simply collapse into humility. He explained. He justified. He defended.

And Saul doesn’t collapse into humility. He justifies. He explains. He defends.

It reads as though Saul believed the terms had changed on him—that being chosen should have protected him from instability, loss, and consequence.

I was chosen. I deserve stability. I deserve success.

He didn’t fall because he lost a battle.
He fell because he thought being chosen meant being protected from consequence.

David often treated anointing as responsibility.

Saul increasingly seemed to treat it as something he was entitled to keep.

That difference cost one a kingdom.

No Transaction: What I Had to Unlearn

For most of my life, I thought my relationship with God was a neat formula. If I did the right things—if I prayed, stayed faithful, kept all the rules—then He would protect me, bless me, set me on a steady path. For a long time, that belief kept me going. Then my son was diagnosed—terminal, no cure. And that formula shattered. I hid in my shop, buried in guilt, convinced I had failed or God had. But now, at 46, after all the mess, all the chaos, I see things differently. I’m no closer to a perfect answer, but I’m deeper in the struggle. And I like the person I’m becoming—not because I have it all figured out, but because I am learning to act from conviction instead of bargaining for an outcome. My morals are stronger; my values are grounded. I do the right things because they are right—no ledger, no bargains.

Even now, I can still reach for the old explanation. I can think, If God had chosen differently, my son might have been healed. My dad might still be here.

I don’t know why some suffering is allowed or why some prayers seem to meet silence. I don’t know how much belongs to God’s will, human agency, mortality, or simply a world where terrible things happen.

I don’t know all that God is doing. But here’s the turning point: the moment I stopped asking, “Why did God do this to me?”—the moment I stopped assuming punishment—I was able to show up. I didn’t have all the answers. I didn’t get a pass from pain. But I had a choice. I chose to act—not because I was earning something, but because I could no longer let guilt keep me silent. And that’s what gives me strength now. Not because bad things won’t happen, but because I no longer expect punishment in every heartbreak. Life is a mess, and sometimes good people get hurt, not because God failed them, but because this world throws challenges that don’t follow a formula. And when I accepted that—when I stopped looking for blame—then I could show up, even broken, and still choose to do what’s right, step by step.

The Excuse

I’ve heard the phrase all my life: If God wants it, it will happen.

In Spanish, it’s Si Dios quiere—if God wills it.

Sometimes that language carries humility. It reminds us that we are not in control of everything. But I’ve also seen how easily it can become a hiding place—a way to avoid choosing, risking, failing, or taking responsibility.

I know that temptation because I’ve felt it myself.

Waiting can look like faith from the outside. Sometimes it is faith. Other times, at least for me, it has been fear wearing religious language.

Agency complicates the idea of a simple transaction with God. People can choose differently than we hoped. Good intentions can fade. Doors can close. Prayer does not remove another person’s freedom, and it does not guarantee the outcome I believe should happen.

That realization has not made faith easier. In some ways, it has made it harder.

It means I cannot always wait for certainty before I move. I have to reason, choose, act, and accept that I may misunderstand what God wants—or that the outcome may still hurt even when I act sincerely.

I don’t know exactly where God’s will ends and human choice begins. I don’t know why some prayers seem answered while others disappear into silence.

What I am beginning to understand is that uncertainty does not remove my responsibility.

I still have hands to build with.
A mind to think with.
A life in front of me.

Maybe faith is not waiting until God makes the path unmistakable.

Maybe sometimes it is taking the next honest step while admitting that I still cannot see where it leads.

No Deal

Good isn’t a bribe.

It’s not insurance.
It’s not leverage.
It’s not a guarantee.

It’s identity.

It’s choosing who you are when there’s no payoff.

I believed that when the moment came, I would know how to show up.

But when everything shattered, I disappeared into guilt, fear, and my own collapse.

After the diagnosis, after everything shattered, I was lost. After my incarceration, there was no chance to make it right. No late-night talks. No sitting by his bed. No rebuilding. The door was shut before I could step back in.

But I learned.

I learned that showing up is rarely one dramatic moment. More often, it is a series of small choices made in the life that is still in front of me. I can’t undo the past, but I can still show up in other ways. I can be honest with myself. I can choose humility, even when it aches.

I still breathe.
I still stand.
And every time I do, I reject that old lie—that good is a trade—and instead choose to stand, even broken, even unsure.

No deal.
No reward.
Just showing up.

Barefoot.
Still breathing.

For now, that has to be enough.