Pastor's Corner

Posted in: Pastor's Corner
Pastor Doug Morton - Does God Answer Prayer?
By Pastor Doug Morton
Aug 14, 2008 - 2:22:49 PM

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Did you hear the one about the Atheist Dial-a-Prayer? You dial the number and no one answers!

Sadly, many Christians also believe no one answers their prayers.   They are among the disappointed ones.  Maybe you are one of them. You’ve prayed to God and he didn’t seem to answer.  

When people tell me that God didn’t answer their prayer, I think, “He probably did. You just didn’t like his answer.”  We need to realize prayer is not magic.  It’s not some incantation through which we can bend God’s will towards ours.   Prayer stems from a relationship a person has with God.  It is a child of God talking to his or her heavenly Father, just as a child talks to a loving and caring earthly father.   Most of all, prayer is a person coming to God through faith in Christ, and knowing God will listen because God has totally forgiven and accepted him or her in Christ.

God also has more than one kind of answer to our prayers.  A little boy asks his mother for a butcher knife.  “No.” she replies, “I love you too much to let you get hurt!”  Some of our prayers receive that kind of answer from God.  “No, that would not be beneficial to you or to others.”  However, like children, it is easy for us to get upset when God says ‘no.’ We may even complain and say, “God didn’t answer my prayer.”

A son asks his father for a hunting rifle.  The father replies, “You will have to be patient son, and wait until you are older and more mature. When that happens, I’ll get you one.”   “Wait’ can also be God’s answer to us.  However, we have difficulty waiting for anything, particularly in our “I-want-it-now” microwave society.  

Parents who love their children love to give them good things.  God is our heavenly Father who loves to say “Yes,” when what we pray for is within his good and gracious will for us and others.  Jesus speaks about how our heavenly Father will “give good things to the ones who ask him.”  However, not all things we ask for are good for us, even though we may think so.

The proof that God wants to answer our prayers and give us what is good, is found in his gift of Jesus for us at the cross.   God came himself in the person of Jesus.  He took upon himself the very judgment our sins deserved and, in doing so, brought us the total forgiveness of all our sins. We didn’t deserve him doing this for us.  We didn’t even ask him to do it.  He simply did it because he loved us.  Through faith in Christ we go to this God in prayer.  He promises to listen.  He will give an answer.  We may not always like his answer.  We may not always agree with it.  However, his answer will always be for our ultimate good, whether it be, ‘yes,’ ‘no,’ or ‘wait.’  Often, only hindsight will reveal the wisdom behind his answer.

Go ahead.  Go to God through faith in Christ and talk to him.  Because of Christ he will answer.  Just remember his three different answers.  All three are valid.  All three are given by a God who has proven his love for you in Christ.  The fact is, unlike the Atheist Dial-a-Prayer, the line on the other end is never silent for the one coming through faith in Christ.  God is there.  He is ready to listen.  He has an answer.  Are you ready for it?

Pastor Douglas Morton is pastor of St. John’s Lutheran Church, Marengo.  His email is pastor@forgiveninchrist.com.   The Bible verse for the above article is from Matthew 7:11.



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