We start this week off with a tough email.

There's no great way to introduce the topic other than to just read the story that came in from a listener, a woman named Belinda.

Good day, Pastor John.

She writes, I find myself in a place of confusion about life, and my question is whether there's a point to praying for God's protection over our lives. For example, protection from accidents when going on a car

trip, protection from disease, or from criminals, or from being injured in athletics, when we know

that this earthly life is full of suffering and hardships. I've been reading that God isn't in the business of intervening in every event in our lives.

I used to believe that my family and I were generally well protected by God.

I would sing over my young children at night the benediction.

The Lord bless you and keep you.

And life was pretty good.

When my almost five-year-old daughter died by drowning in our swimming pool a few years back, I stopped singing that song. And since then,

I feel insincere praying for the Lord's protection. It didn't help my faith when we were robbed of our

valuables at gunpoint three years ago either. I do still actually pray numerous times for God to

keep my family safe and healthy, but I don't know if there's a point to these prayers. He didn't

protect my daughter from drowning. He didn't protect us from criminals.

My elderly parents have been burglarized and scammed, and I have no guarantee that my family and I will be spared trials in the future.

What, why, how should I be praying regarding the topic of protection when it feels so utterly pointless. Well, let's start with those three questions. What should I be praying regarding protection? Why should I be praying for protection?

How should I be praying for protection? All three of these are, she says very explicitly, under the emotional shadow of this statement.

Why, what, how, when it feels so utterly pointless.

So I'm going to come back to that statement of feeling pointless at the end,

because that's a shadow that is shaping everything. But she did ask why and how, and I'm going to

take them one at a time. What should we be praying regarding the topic of protection?

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