By Rick Warren
“Stay alert and be persistent in your prayers” (Ephesians 6:18 NLT).
Why should you remain persistent in your prayers when you don’t get an answer? Here are four reasons.
Persistent prayer focuses your attention.
When you pray a prayer request over and over, it’s not to remind God.
He doesn’t need to be reminded! It’s to remind yourself that God is the
source of your answer and all your needs. If every prayer you ever
prayed were instantly answered, two things would happen. First, prayer
would actually begin to hurt you because sometimes we pray for things
that are not God’s will, or we make mistakes because we see with a
limited perspective. Second, you’d never really develop a deep
relationship with God, because he would become just a vending machine.
If every time you prayed you instantly got results, all you’d think
about is the blessing. God wants you to think about the Blesser.
Persistent prayer clarifies your request.
A delayed answer gives you time to clarify exactly what you want and to
refine your prayers. When you pray persistently to your heavenly Father
and you say something over and over again, it separates deep longings
from mere whims. It says, “God, I really care about this.”
It’s not that God doesn’t want to answer your prayers. He does. It’s just that he wants you to be certain what you really want.
James 1:3-4 says, “When
your faith is tested, your endurance has a chance to grow. So let it
grow, for when your endurance is fully developed, you will be perfect
and complete, needing nothing” (NLT). The only way you can grow to
spiritual maturity is to have your faith tested. One of the ways God
tests your faith is by delaying some answers to your prayers.
Persistent prayer prepares your heart for the answer.
When you make a request of God, God almost always wants to answer in a
greater way than you’ve prayed. Sometimes God denies your prayer request
because you’re thinking and asking too small. He wants to give you
something bigger and better. But first, he has to prepare you for it. So
God uses delays in answering prayer to help you grow, to help you get
ready, to help prepare you for a bigger and better answer.
Remember, “God can do much, much more than anything we can ask or imagine” (Ephesians 3:20 NCV).
Talk It Over
What is something you’ve been praying about for a long time? How might you need to refine your request?
If God is testing you right now by delaying an answer to a prayer, how
can you demonstrate your willingness to grow and accept his will and
purpose for you?
Think of something that you prayed for over the years that God has
never supplied. How have you seen that his denial was actually a
blessing in your life?
No comments:
Post a Comment