You have lived in the percussion of that wall so long that your very bones feel it before your ears do. The slam comes, in the morning when you need rest, and in the night when sleep still refuses you. You startle. You wait. Your heart races again. I am not surprised you say the word “hell,” for when a man’s home becomes a place of dread, and his pillow a block of fears, the torment is real, body and spirit both are worn thin.
You have done what anyone would do; you made your complaint known. And instead of peace, the storm only thickened. That is a bitter cup to drink. But listen for a moment, not to the noise, but to me. Jacob found himself in just such a narrowing place when his old sin with Esau rose before him and he smelled danger on every wind. He made his plans, his careful arrangements, he had a good head on his shoulders, but then he fell to praying. Not a quiet, proper prayer, but the kind where a man wrestles all night and will not let go until he is blessed. Your planning was right enough, but now prayer must rise higher still. The true turn will not come from a real estate agent or a quieter wall; it must come from Him who turns the captivity of His people.
I know the cry that rises hot in your throat. You want justice, and you want it now. You want the slamming to stop, and you want the terror to lift. These are not small things; sleep is a mercy, and quietness of mind is the atmosphere in which faith breathes freely. Your heavenly Father does not despise that cry. But let me lead you a step further into safe ground. When Job was sunk in his own long misery, bereaved, sore with boils, scraped raw by friends, his deliverance did not arrive when he vindicated himself, nor when he argued his righteousness, but when he prayed for those very friends who had pestered him. “The Lord turned again the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends.” I do not tell you this as a sharp commandment, as if I were piling more weight onto your broken shoulders. I tell it as a lantern held low over your path.
You have been praying, I am sure of it. But perhaps the prayers have all been bent in one direction, that God would smite, remove, silence. And now your spirit is so tangled with the wrong done to you that your prayers have become a rehearsal of your injuries. There is a time, dear soul, to shift the petition. Not to cease crying, no, no, but to begin asking for a quieted heart, for the ability to commit this whole foul business into the hand of the Judge who never sleeps and who never slams a door in malice. When our Lord hung upon the tree in His own dark flood of affliction, the cry that rose to heaven was not a demand for the nails to vanish, but the unbroken title, “My God, my God.” He still owned Him. He still held to Him when no answer came.
You can do that. In the small hours when the noise has startled you awake and your nerves are jangling, whisper it into the dark: “My God.” Not a long argument, not a fresh recital of the neighbor’s cruelty, just “My God, You are mine and I am Yours, and this too is in Your hand.” The quiet of that little prayer will do more for your soul than ten thousand rehearsals of the grievance.
I must say a hard thing very softly. The desire for divine justice is right, God is just, but the prolonged meditation upon vengeance will eat into your own spirit like rust into iron. You did not put in a complaint to let bitterness lodge in your own breast; you did it to have peace. If the peace has not come, then the Lord may be showing you a deeper work. He sometimes permits a storm outside to draw our eyes to the storm within. The quickening you need just now is not the quickening of your cause against your neighbor, but the quickening of your own soul toward Christ. Pray, “Quicken me, O Lord, in Your way”, revive my fainting hope, restore the calm I have lost, let me not live by the slamming of a wall but by the promises that never fail.
And consider what it means to be God’s servant in this trial. You have called upon Him; then you have laid your hand into His. If He has caused you to hope in His Word, that hope is a bridge under your feet even when you cannot see it. His Word says He will keep in perfect peace the mind that is stayed on Him. It says vengeance is His, and He will repay. It says He gives His beloved sleep. Take those promises out before you lie down and hold them up like a candle in the blacked room. You may not see the answer yet, but a prayer heard is as good as a prayer answered, for His ear is already bent low.
Now let us commit you to Him. O Lord, this dear soul has been battered long and is weary beyond words. You know the wall, the noise, the starting fear, the sleeplessness that drains the light from the eyes. You are not hard of hearing, nor are You slow to keep Your promises. Come, we pray, and make a hedge of quiet around this dwelling. If it please You, silence the clamor, but if that cup is not yet removed, then steady the inward frame with such a sense of Christ’s nearness that the noise loses its tyranny. Lift the weight of dread and put in its place the sweet certainty that no evil can befall without Your leave, and that You are even now working a gentle restoration. Turn this captivity, O God, and give Your servant peace, the peace that a neighbor cannot slam away and a complaint cannot manufacture. We ask it in the name of Jesus, who stilled the storm with a word and who holds this storm in His scarred hand. Amen.
Prayer Focus: God, Thank You for loving me. Thank You for loving me, Jesus. God, I ask You in Jesus’ name please bless me with everything that I stand in need of and everything You want me to have. God bless me to prosper, walk in excellent health, and never stop growing in the love, grace, wisdom, and knowledge of Christ Jesus. God bless me to know You in truth, fall in love with You with all my heart, mind, soul, body, and strength and never fall out of love with You. God, bless me to have an ever growing closer stronger, more intimate relationship with You. Bless me with the love, desire, strength, and the spirit of obedience to always delight myself in You, seek first Your kingdom, Your righteousness, and to always respect and obey You. Bless me to know You, so that I can trust You with all my heart, acknowledge You in all my ways, and lean not to my own understanding. Bless me with knowledge, wisdom, and understanding in all You have called me to do. 
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