Prayer

When Jesus died on the cross the immense curtain that separated off the Holy of Holies was torn down by God to show that everyone now had direct access to God.

Is there a right and wrong way to pray?

It is popular in our churches teaching today to say that we can pray to God any how and any way. This is true to some extent. God has done away with the Holy of Holies where only the priest could go once a year to minister on behalf of his people. Even then he could only enter when ceremonially washed and with certain sacrifices. When Jesus died on the cross the immense curtain that separated off that special place was torn down by God to show that everyone now had direct access to God. We can all pray to God because of Jesus. We sometimes forget, however, an important point which leads to all kinds of grief for praying people. Jesus dying gives us freedom to pray to God because Jesus dying gives us a way to be righteous. Look at verse 16 from James 5? “The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective.” (italics added) The Old Testament is oozing with examples of God saying “I will not listen to their cry” (Jeremiah ch14 v12) Why? - because they are persistent and unrepentant in their sin. There is no righteousness.

What does this mean for us? It would not be quite true to state that we can only pray when we are in a state of righteousness. If this were so we could never pray for forgiveness nor make the initial request which causes us to be saved in the first place. The answer is given in Deuteronomy 4:29 “...you will find Him if you look for Him with all your heart and with all your soul.” These words are more familiar to many when Jesus reiterated them. This is not something of the Old Testament which was done away with by Jesus’ cross.

Many non-Christians profess to pray too, but my reading of the scriptures leads me to believe that God does not hear all of the prayers that are spoken (you may disagree with me). He is more than capable of hearing everyone’s prayers—even if we all speak at the same time—but the attitude of our heart is all important (Remember Jeremiah 14 v12 quoted above). There is a right and a wrong way to approach prayer.

The thorny question of unanswered prayer

We turn now to the subject of unanswered prayer. This can be an area of deep hurt for some. Please do not read, from what I have said above, that if your prayer has not been answered that I am saying your heart is not right with God! I can see that some may jump to this conclusion without looking patiently at other possibilities. It is to these we turn now.

Richard Foster in his book ‘Celebration of Discipline’ suggests that we should look for blocks to prayer in the same way that we look for reasons why our TV doesn’t work if it doesn’t. There’s lots to check.

God has taken all the initiative in making a way for us to be in a loving relationship with Him. I promise you He is not going to turn away now for no good reason as He is so heavily invested in us!

Our hearts

We have already looked at the attitude of our hearts. To summarise, the Bible says, “The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are attentive to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.” 1 Peter 3:12. This is a pretty sobering verse. Please remember that God is a God who loves to hear us. There is never a time that God thinks, “Oh, there is one of my children trying to speak to me but I shall ignore them”. God has taken all the initiative in making a way for us to be in a loving relationship with Him. I promise you He is not going to turn away now for no good reason as He is so heavily invested in us! So, yes, we should begin with examining our hearts.

Mistaken?

Another thing to be sure of is that we are not just mistaken. Maybe God has answered our prayer but in a different way than we expected.

God's will

Next, 1 John 5:14 teaches us “that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us”. I don’t always think I know what God’s will is. I hear from other Christians that this is their experience too. Let us seek out God’s will on a matter (through more prayer, Bible Study and though gaining advice from other Christians) and pray in line with it.

Answered but delayed

Daniel 10 tells of another possible reason for delays in answers to prayer. In the passage we are told that Daniel prayed and God immediately answered by sending His angel to Daniel. The angel became embroiled in a battle with one of Satan's angels and was delayed. God acted instantly but the answer was held up. We do not always have a full picture of what is going on in the unseen world, so we should not lose confidence but stick with it. Sometimes we need to pray again and again. Jesus told parables encouraging persistence in prayer. Luke 18: 1-8 gives a story along these lines.

Keep praying. Do you really want what you prayed for or was it a whim?

Growth

The IVP New Bible dictionary sheds another light on delays in answers to prayer. It states that “God’s delays in answering prayer are not due to indifference but to love that desires to develop and deepen faith which is finally vindicated.” In the same way we know that it would spoil a child to always have whatever they want “right now” all the time, so God cares that we grow well and are not spoilt. Keep praying. Do you really want what you prayed for or was it a whim?

Lessons to learn

It may be that there are lessons for us to learn and we should keep checking back with God if we are discouraged in prayer. It maybe that we will never know the reason for an unanswered prayer but let me encourage you again to keep your heart in line with God and then you will know that you have every reason to trust that God has heard you. “You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. I will be found by you…”Jeremiah 29:13-14