Getting Answers To Your Prayers

Have you prayed to God for something and have not received an answer? There are many, many scriptures that direct us to pray and ask God for the things that we need and desire. But there are also instances where the answer does not come according to our timetable.

Some say that if you do not receive, then for some reason God does not want to answer your prayer. "Maybe it is because you are not good enough," they say, or, "You're petition is too selfish or greedy." But scriptures do not support that kind of rationalization.

There is a parable in the gospel of Luke that sheds some great understanding on the topic of prayer. It is important to understand that the purpose of a parable is to focus on one point. In other words, there may be a number of details to the story, but the parable makes one important point.

Jesus spoke many things in parables and their meanings were hidden to those who did not believe. But those who had eyes to see could understand his parables. At times the disciples would ask Jesus to explain the meaning of a parable, and, in the case of the parable in the gospel of Luke 18, we are told the meaning of the parable even before we read it.

I was talking to someone once who was adamant about a certain parable, saying that it was a true story. I tried to reason with him that a parable is a figure of speech, and that the story was told to make a point, but that the story itself was not true. He would not be persuaded.

The story in Luke 18 about a widow woman who was treated unfairly is told to make a very important point. The point of the parable is that we ought to always pray, and not faint. In other words, continue in prayer and be persistent. Seeing and understanding that one point can change your prayer life.

In the story, the widow woman was relentless in petitioning an unjust judge, who didn't care about people or God, but finally got tired of her bugging him. He then, to get her out of his hair, granted her petition. Jesus said that if an unjust judge who didn't regard people or God could grant a petition, what about God, Who hears the cries of His people?

Now God is certainly not an unjust judge, not regarding people. Prayers do not have to be only for an injustice. Those are elements in the story, but not for comparison; they are not the point of the parable.

The point of the parable is very easy to see and understand, because we are told of its meaning before we even read it. We ought to always pray and not faint. In other words, continue to be persistent.

George Muller, who lived in England in the 1800's, kept a journal of all of his answered prayers. His life, and what he did for the orphans, was a real testimony of praying and believing God. He really tried to show people that you could pray and ask God and God would answer you.

He said, "I live in the spirit of prayer. I pray as I walk, when I lie down and when I rise. And the answers are always coming. Tens of thousands of times have my prayers been answered. When once I am persuaded that a thing is right, I go on praying for it.

The great fault of the children of God is, they do not continue in prayer; they do not persevere. If they desire anything for God's glory, they should pray until they get it."

That quote sounds a lot like the parable in Luke 18 doesn't it? There are times in our lives when an answer to prayer does not seem to be lining up with our timetable. In those times, we ought to remain persistent in our prayer.

There are those who just pray once and if they don't get an answer that moment, or, right away, they just forget about it. Some even go so far as to say, "Well God must not want to answer that prayer." I wonder if those who say that have actually heard God telling them that He didn't want to answer that prayer; if not, how do they know?

The Bible is full of exhortation to us to pray. The Bible also states that God's ears are open to our prayers. If God did not want to answer our prayers, why is there so much ink about it in the Scriptures, and why would God want us to waste our time asking?

We can see documented in both the scriptures as well as other people's lives that God does indeed answer our prayers. If we are persuaded that a thing is right, we ought to go on praying for it. We ought to continue and persevere in our prayers to God, expecting an answer.

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