Seeing Our Prayers Answered
Everyone wants their prayers answered. God encourages us in His Word to come to him in prayer with our problems, issues, and concerns. It’s not that God doesn’t already know what we are dealing with in life, He knew about it before you did! The act of coming to God in prayer, asking for his help to meet our needs, is a sign that we have realized that we need Him. It’s saying, “Lord, I can’t do this alone, I can do nothing without you, and I have to have your help with this.”
Scripture tells us that after we pray we should “wait expectantly” (Psalm 5:3), and that God “hears and answers our prayers” (Psalm 116:1). Mark 11:24 tells us that we can have what we ask God for and 1 John 5:15 tells us that God will give us what we ask for. Sounds pretty good right?
But what happens when we pray and nothing happens? Did God lie? Did he not hear us? Does he not care?
No, you can be sure that God can’t lie (1 Samuel 15:29), God did hear (Proverbs 15:29), and God does care (1 Peter 5:7). So what happened then? Most of us are familiar with what the Bible says about how to pray, such as pray to the Father in the name of the Son (John 16:23), ask the Lord for what you need (Mark 11:24), and pray prayers that are in line with God’s will (1 John 5:14). Maybe we did all those things, and our prayers still see no results. It’s easy to think, “Ok, God just doesn’t want me to have that”, or “God is keeping me in this problem to teach me something.” But, that’s not scriptural. God’s Word tells us that our prayers should move mountains (Mark 11:22)!
Don’t blame God for unanswered prayers. Even if we think we did everything right, we have missed it somewhere.
Let’s look deeper into God’s Word and look at some possible hindrances to seeing our prayers answered in our lives. Let’s read Mark 11:20-25 (NKJV):
20 Now in the morning, as they passed by, they saw the fig tree dried up from the roots. 21 And Peter, remembering, said to Him, “Rabbi, look! The fig tree which You cursed has withered away.”
22 So Jesus answered and said to them, “Have faith in God. 23 For assuredly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that those things he says will be done, he will have whatever he says.24 Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them.
25 “And whenever you stand praying, if you have anything against anyone, forgive him, that your Father in heaven may also forgive you your trespasses.
1. Faith is Now – Believe that you receive when you pray. The first hindrance can be seen in Mark 11, verse 24: “whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them. ” So this scripture tells us that when we pray, we have an action to do. We have to “receive” the answer to the prayer. When I pray for healing, I have to in that moment receive my healing. I can’t just pray and then think “some day God will provide me with the healing I am asking for.”
That is not faith. That is HOPE. Hope is always looking into the future. Hope does not move God, faith does. Faith is NOW and it requires action. When I ask for a glass of water, and someone hands it to me, I have to reach my hand out to take it or receive it. It’s the same way when we pray. Ask the Lord for what you want/need, receive it into your life, and thank Him for it as if you have it in your hand right now!
2. Your words. Let’s look again at Mark 11, verse 23 to see another possible hindrance. In this verse, Jesus uses the word “says” three times. He tells in this verse that we “will have whatever (we) say”. So the question is, what are you saying? Maybe you pray and believe you receive what you ask for, but then you talk to a friend and “say” the exact opposite. For instance, I may pray and ask the Lord to heal me, and even believe that I receive that healing, but then I go over to my sister’s house and all I can talk about are my symptoms and how I don’t think it will ever get better. I can undo my prayers with my words. Your words are powerful. Line your words up with what The Word says, and boost your faith.
3. Unforgiveness. A third hindrance to answered prayers can be seen in Mark 11, verse 25. In some Bibles, this verse is separated from the other above verses with a new heading. But, don’t be fooled, this is part of the same teaching from Jesus on effective prayer. It is an important principle in getting your prayers answered. In this verse, Jesus tells us that when we “stand praying” or when we are in the middle of our prayers, if we have anything against anyone we should forgive them. Jesus would not tell us this if it was not important. Unforgiveness can and will block your prayers from being answered as it hinders our faith. God commands us to forgive (Ephesians 4:32), and to hold onto unforgiveness in our hearts is sin.
God wants us to pray and ask Him for what we need. He wants to answer our prayers. But, as we have seen, there are things we may be doing that hinder our own prayers. Ask the Holy Spirit to reveal to you how these hindrances may be at work in your prayer life.
For a list of scriptures on Prayer click here.
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