Have you ever felt swallowed up by life? Maybe you were surrounded by depression, conflict, worry, or guilt—and you felt hopeless.

I hope you’re not feeling that way right now, but at some point you will be. You might lose a loved one, your job, or your health.

When you’re faced with a hopeless situation, think about what Jonah did.

After Jonah had run from God’s mission for his life, God prepared a great fish to swallow him up. As he sat in that great fish, Jonah looked up to God.

In fact, the entire second chapter of the book of Jonah is a record of Jonah praying while he sinks into the ocean and gets swallowed by a giant fish. It’s a lesson to us that when we’re feeling overwhelmed, we need to look up to God in prayer.

From the very first verse of the chapter, you see Jonah turning to God: “From inside the fish Jonah prayed to the Lord his God” (Jonah 2:1 NIV).

Some problems in life will never go away unless we learn to look to God in prayer.

In Mark 9, some of Jesus’ followers had been trying to drive a demon out of someone, but they couldn’t. They asked Jesus why.

Jesus responded: “This kind can come out only by prayer” (Mark 9:29 NIV).

Some problems are so deeply rooted that only persistent prayer will solve them. It’s not about just a one-time prayer. If you only care about something enough to pray about it once, you don’t really care about it. If you truly want to see something happen in your life, you will pray about it over and over.

God wants to see whether you care about it enough to keep praying until he answers. He’s more interested in building your faith than he is in immediately answering every little prayer.

If you’re feeling hopeless today, look up to God and keep praying. Never give up!