PRAYER THOUGHTS: HOW TO GET YOUR PRAYERS ANSWERED

When you spread forth your hands, I will hide my eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not listen; your hands are full of blood.  Wash ourselves; make yourselves clean; remove the evil of your doings from before my eyes; cease to do evil, learn to do good . . . (Isaiah 1:15-17).

The one who asks, "How can I get my prayers answered?" is one who doesn't understand the importance of relationship with God and what it means to pray in Jesus' name.  First, it must be understood that God can respond to the requests of anyone in any way he chooses.  There are many testimonies of desperate sinners who have been answered in miraculous ways when they prayed--God is free to answer in any way he sees fit.  God can answer prayers, "yes" or "no," or he simply may refuse to listen or ignore the prayers of the unrepentant.  How has he been responding to you?

When you can relate to God as "daddy, daddy,"(Romans 8:15) you are well on the way to praying prayers that can be answered in a positive way.  Children know what their dad's values are.  Children, being immature, sometimes make foolish requests of their dads, but they also know this: "And this is the confidence which we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will he hears us.  And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have obtained the requests made of him" (I John 5:14-15).

"Whatever you ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son; if you ask anything in my name, I will do it (John14:13-14).  Praying in Jesus' name is not a way of ending your prayers so that you will get your prayers answered--it is not magic.  Rather, it is first an acknowledgement that it is through the grace of Christ Jesus that we are able to come to the throne of grace at all.  It is also in the character of Christ that we come to our Father too, making our requests to God.  God wants us to ask (James 4:2), but I just happen to believe that he wants us to ask thoughtfully in the character of Jesus.  The answer to one of Jesus' prayers was "no."  The answer to some prayers of yours may be, "no," but you will know that all of your prayers are answered.

Love & Prayers,
Tom