A common mistake we make when we pray for ourselves or others is to limit God through our expectations or the assumptions born of past experiences. While the phrase “God never works the same way twice” is not entirely accurate, He does often work in ways we don’t expect. We’re often caught looking for answers in all the wrong places.

Have you taken your place on the wall?

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Perhaps you’ve heard the famous story of a man trapped on the roof of his house during a major flood. As the flood waters rise and he begins to face death by drowning, he pleads with God to rescue him. After a few minutes, a good Samaritan appears with a lifesaver. The man, however, waves him off. After all, God is going to rescue him. A short time later, an emergency crew in a rowboat appears to get him to safety. Again, the man waves him off. After some time, with the floodwaters still rising, a helicopter approaches with a hoist, but the man waves it off, too. Then, the waters engulf the roof of his house, and he drowns. After he enters heaven, he asks God why He didn’t rescue him. The Lord replies: “I tried to. I sent a man with a lifesaver, a crew with a rowboat, and even a helicopter, but you refused them all.”

The moral of that story: Let’s not demand that God answer in some way that seems logical to us or that necessarily aligns with what we want. Our tendency to limit God comes from our sinful nature that wants to control the outcome of what seems uncertain to us.

God knows what is in our hearts, and often He throws us a curveball.

The curveball is one of the most dreaded pitches in baseball. Pitchers who throw good ones can make the ball travel at the batter and fool him into thinking it’ll come straight at him, only to suddenly change direction and throw him off guard. The idea is, of course, to make the batter anticipate a certain ball trajectory and then miss by reacting too late to the change in direction. Experienced batters know what an opposing pitcher is capable of, and they adjust their stance to anticipate a curveball. The key is to keep your eye on the ball and be ready for anything.

That’s why the curveball has become a metaphor for life’s unexpected twists and turns. And often, the unexpected ways God answers our prayers feel like curveballs. His purpose, of course, is different from that of any baseball pitcher. He doesn’t want us to miss; He wants us to grow in faith and in the knowledge of Himself.

The Bible is full of curveball examples.

Take Moses, for instance. He did what was logical in his eyes when he saw an Egyptian mistreat one of his kinsmen. The result was disastrous – he committed murder and went from prince to refugee. The curveball was forty years of sheepherding in the desert until he lost all confidence in his ability to save his people. And that is when God deemed him ready for the task He had intended for him.

Christmas celebrates another curveball. The Jews expected a Messiah who was a powerful and militant political figure who would come in glory and rescue them from the yoke of Roman occupation. Instead, God sent a little baby, born to an unassuming couple from a town of ill repute in a filthy stable. Apart from a few selected people to whom His arrival was revealed, no one knew the baby would grow up to preach, heal, calm storms, walk on water, and go to the cross to bear the sins of mankind and defeat Satan and his forces and rise again from the dead to reign in glory.

The Bible is full of implications that we should expect the unexpected when we seek God and entreat Him about our cares and the burdens of the world – including troubling news headlines. Here is a sample of texts that lift the veil on God’s curveballs:

“Behold, I will do a new thing, now it shall spring forth; Shall you not know it?”
Isaiah 43:19

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” says the Lord. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.”
Isaiah 55:8,9

“Look among the nations and watch— Be utterly astounded! For I will work a work in your days which you would not believe, though it were told you.”
Habakkuk 1:5

“Your kingdom come. Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.”
Matthew 6:10

“Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him.”
1 John 5:14-15

When we surrender our will to God’s in our prayers, we move from trying to instruct God on how we think He should answer to voicing our expectation of the unexpected. That is how we grow, and growth is what God has in mind when He throws us curveballs. He accomplishes four things in us when He answers in ways we do not expect.

1. We learn to surrender to His will, which is perfect and good, while ours is not. Surrendering to God’s will, which we only know and understand in part, implies that things may turn out differently than what we ask for. For instance, our sense of logic would have us pray for a sick person to get well or a crisis to be lifted. But God’s will may be that the sickness leads to greater dependence on Him and experience of His comfort, and He may want to accomplish things through a crisis that we cannot see or understand.
2. He tests and strengthens our faith. If we limit God to our understanding, we also limit our view of His greatness and power. By expecting that He may answer in ways outside or above our expectations, we push ourselves to see Him as a God Who has no limits and Who acts in wisdom and power far superior to our understanding. The bigger God is in our eyes, the greater our faith in Him becomes.
3. He keeps us focused on Him.  A batter cannot take his eyes off the pitcher and the ball. Continuous communion with Him keeps us focused on God while expecting the unexpected, which is an incentive not to get distracted. That is why Paul warns us to set our minds on the things that are above, not on earthly things (see Colossians 3:2). Keeping our focus on Him not only fuels our faith but keeps us in a state of readiness to receive from Him in whatever way He chooses to give in answer to our prayers.
4. He keeps us on our toes so we stay alert and do not retreat into our comfort zones. That seems cruel, but God does not want us to get comfortable. There is always more of Him to learn and discover, and our spiritual lives must constantly grow. Comfort zones lead to stagnation of faith, which then causes us to slip into unbelief. Sometimes, when we tell people about our mission trips to Africa, which depend on God’s provision and protection, when we go to places very few white people visit, we get the reaction, “I could never do that.” That is barricading yourself in a comfort zone out of fear. God’s curveballs destroy comfort zones so we may learn to depend on His strength in our weakness.

Friends, get ready for a curveball or two in the coming year. God would not be a loving Father if He did not test you, stretch you, grow you in your faith and understanding of Him, or wouldn’t want to make you stronger. See curveballs as a blessing and an opportunity to get to know your heavenly Father better.

As you pray for the nation from week to week, be vigilant against your carnal tendencies to box Him in with expectations of how He will work, instructions on how you want Him to work, or the repetitiveness of past experiences. Joyfully anticipate Him to do new things in His way, and gladly acknowledge that His thoughts and ways are higher than ours.

Has God thrown you “curveballs” before, moving in your life in unexpected ways? Share your testimonies in the comments.

Remco Brommet is a pastor, spiritual-growth teacher, and prayer leader with over 40 years of experience in Europe, Southeast Asia, Africa, and the U.S. He was born and raised in the Netherlands and pastored his first church in Amsterdam. He moved to the U.S. in 1986. He and his wife, Jennifer, live north of Atlanta. When not writing books, he blogs at www.deeperlifeblog.com and assists his wife as a content developer and prayer coordinator for True Identity Ministries. Jennifer and Remco are passionate about bringing people into a deeper relationship with Christ. Photo Credit: RBFried/Getty Images Signature via Canva Pro.