Lord, Increase Our Faith, To Pray

It might mean that it wasn’t the right time, or it wasn’t the right thing, or it was contrary to the nature of how God works. You might, for instance, pray for the conversion of someone. But if they don’t want it, if they continue to reject Jesus and refuse to listen to what God has to say, God will not perform a divine headlock on them to force them into the faith apart from the Word of Christ. It might take time. It might take suffering. It might take blessings. God knows what’s best. Trust Him in that. But what if you’re not sure? What if God’s Word isn’t clear on the matter? Go ahead and pray for it. Leave it in God’s hands.

John has two final simple things to give us confidence in prayer. First of all, He hears it! Prayer isn’t like speaking to your deaf grandpa who refuses to get hearing aids. He’s not like talking to a mom on her cell phone. This is a God who HEARS you and is ATTENTIVE to you. He’s attentively listening to you and eagerly waiting for you to speak.

The second thing? And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we also know that we receive the things we have asked from him. John promises that He doesn’t only HEAR, but He also ACTS. He doesn’t say HOW He’ll do it. But somehow He will get it done.

Think of how He had Gideon win a victory in battle with only 300 men, some trumpets, glass jars, and torches - these weren’t typical weapons of war. Yet God worked through them. Sometimes when I’m praying for people of our congregation, I realize that maybe God wants ME to help be the answer to their prayer. So I try to call or text, and see if I can help. You have to understand that God would rather answer the prayer THROUGH you and with you, rather than without you. Then you get to experience the answer to His prayer as well. If you’re going to pray for something when you could be the answer to the prayer, then maybe you could be the reason your prayer is not getting answered. Think of the feeding of the 5,000. The people needed to be fed. Jesus said, “YOU give them something.” They couldn’t do it! But then He still had them handle the bread and distribute the bread, and as they handled it God worked His miracle, through their own actions. Don’t use prayer as a reason not to do anything. God would rather work through you than without you by divine fiat. But even without you, God can get it done and He will get it done when it is according to His will. That’s His promise.

I remember years ago when Star Trek had these communicators through which they could speak with each other, they look like modern day flip phones. Nobody at the time probably thought that such a device would ever work. How wrong they were with modern inventions!

Prayer is not a modern invention. It’s been around since the Creation of humanity. Many people don’t think there’s anyone at the other end. They even say, “We don’t want your prayers.” We pray for them anyway, for we believe that at the end of this tool He puts Himself. He is the One who answers the phone. He’s on call 24/7. He has the power to answer. He has the desire to answer. He gives you the command to USE the tool.