WHY DOESN’T GOD EVER ANSWER MY PRAYERS?

There are conditions to God’s answering prayers.  The primary one being that a person be a believer that God is and that He rewards those that diligently seek Him.  In other words it is vital that a relationship exists between the believer and God the Father through Jesus Christ our Lord.  One exception to this general rule occurs when someone has decided he wants to know God, or wants to be saved, and even though a well-defined relationship may not yet exist, God hears and responds giving the seeker opportunities to find and choose Him.  Once a person believes and relies upon Jesus, God does hear the prayers proceeding from our hearts and does respond.  But the response may not be what or when we expect.  And sometimes, God does have to say “No” for our own good.

  When one petitions God, he is appealing to a Sovereign God.  He is not our bellhop or servant.  And from His vantagepoint, we may be asking for something that may actually harm us or others that we love. Sometimes, perhaps inadvertently, prayers tend to ask for comfort, power, prestige or riches.  God warns those who pray with such motivation, that their prayers are not answered because they pray amiss for things to consume upon their lust, and they should not expect to receive anything from the Lord.

There are three important antecedents rooted in a believer’s attitude that determine an effective prayer life with God.  First, God rates the prayer of a righteous person highly.  This pertains to the believer’s attitude toward God versus his attitude toward the world.  One will go farther in his conversation with God if he is trying to understand and live within His will.  Second, when one prays, he should be so certain that God hears that he will pray as if he has already received his answer.  Start a prayer with the attitude that God will probably not hear or respond anyway, and the believer, if he really is one, has not even established contact with God.  He is a doubter, not a believer.  Third, a believer is admonished as he prays to God to do so with thanksgiving.  As a believer gratefully remembers what God has already done and is doing, he begins to unify with God in their true relationship to each other with God as a loving, forgiving, giving, merciful, powerful and all-knowing Father and the believer as the recipient of innumerable gifts and blessings.

As one prays, he should remember that God has a purpose for each believer’s life.  If a believer surrenders his life to Jesus, the Holy Spirit will begin to mold him into the image of Jesus.  If a prayer interferes with God’s plan at the time of the prayer, His answer may not be “No,” but rather “Wait” or “Later.”

A believer may receive a positive answer to his prayer, but He may miss it because He expects a preconceived response while God chooses another method.  This is one reason why giving thanks is so important.  Thanksgiving may remind the grateful believer that his prayer was indeed answered.

God’s promises are sure.  He has promised to hear our prayers.  But we do need the power of the Holy Spirit to guide us in asking for responses in the will of God, and the Holy Spirit even has to sort through our prayer for what we really want in order to present our petition to God.  The power that created our universe, our Heavenly Father, knows what we need even before we ask and He may already have answered our petition. We may need merely to open our spiritual eyes to see what He has done or what He is in the process of doing.

One class of prayers that so often impacts us negatively in our relationship to God involve those that petition God to spare the life or relieve the suffering of a loved one.  As hard as it may be to understand, God does have a timetable, and we all have to die sometime.  That too is a promise.  And suffering is a tool God sometimes uses to achieve changes or build patience, character and Godly dependence in a person’s life.  It is within the nature of man to focus on one obvious hurt, time of distress, or disappointment as the defining time of his relationship to God.  It’s a lot like a child who, not receiving his way in some matter, states emphatically to his parent, “I never get to.........!”  We may have received answers to many prayers, but because we interpret an event, or the lack thereof, as an apparent failure by God to act on our behalf, we conclude that God never answers our prayers.

Another class of prayers involves loving our neighbor as ourselves and sharing the gospel of Jesus in particular.  This coincides with God’s desire for us because that is what Jesus would do.  Prayers offered selflessly, sincerely, and in keeping with God’s will for saving the lost are likely going to receive an answer.  The experience of knowing that God has answered a prayer brings a joy and sense of excitement that satisfies our deepest longings to communicate with God.