Reading Time: 4 minutesPastor Price didn’t mean it in that trite, sanctimonious, ‘Sometimes he says yes, sometimes he says no, sometimes he says wait a while,’ way. He meant God always said “Yes,” to his prayers, God always gave him what he asked for when he prayed. When I heard it I thought, ‘I wish God always answered my prayers.’
Reading Time: 3 minutesHere’s a nice testimony of answered prayer, from Ms. Martha, recorded in real time.
Reading Time: 6 minutesSince we imagine that God’s “Yes,” is the only obstacle to our prayer being answered, our entire prayer effort is focused on getting God’s Yes. We dream up all manner of schemes for getting God to Yes. We try begging, or crying, or bargaining, or asking a million people to pray with us. We try asking over and over and over and over and over again, in hopes of getting God to Yes…
Reading Time: 5 minutesSometime after I saw that Jesus really meant what he was saying in Matthew 7:7-8, I was again meditating on it, trying to figure it out, trying to understand it, trying to understand how it worked:
“Ask and it will be given to you… For everyone who asks receives…”
Just going over it again, and again, repeating it to myself, thinking about it. As I was doing this, I think I might have been upset by an unanswered prayer, I thought, ‘But this, obviously, isn’t true.’ I talked to Jesus about it, “Jesus what you’re saying here is obviously not true. Lots of people ask and as far as they can tell it’s not given to them. Most people ask and don’t receive…
Reading Time: 7 minutesJesus was saying that God would give me what I asked for when I prayed, that God would do that for everyone, God would give everyone, what they asked for when they prayed.
Reading Time: 7 minutesHere’s how I like to think about it. I imagine going before God to make a request, to submit my prayer. I’m waiting for my turn in an antechamber outside God’s throne room, there’s a tall, wide, doorway open to God’s throne room. As I look through the doorway I see God’s throne a ways off. Then I see, carved into the stone above the doorway, these words,
“Ask and it shall be given you… for everyone that asketh receiveth.”
Reading Time: 4 minutes“God always answers my prayers,” that’s what Pastor Price said and he didn’t mean it in that trite, evangelical, I’m so special, “God answers all prayers sometimes he says yes, sometimes he says no, sometimes he says wait a while,” way, he meant God always gave him what he asked for.
Reading Time: 8 minutesI didn’t know what to make of Jesus’s statement. I didn’t know how to reconcile, “for everyone who asks receives,” with reality. It seemed obvious that it wasn’t true. Was Jesus lying, was he mistaken, were these not really his words, was the Bible not really God’s Word, did these words not mean what they appeared to mean? So I put it on the shelf. From time to time I’d come back to it and try and understand.
Then one day I saw it.
Reading Time: 13 minutesBut Jesus and the Bible talk about answered prayer like it’s a sure thing, a certainty, something that is extremely reliable. Here’s Jesus:
Reading Time: 2 minutesHere’s how I like to think about it. I imagine myself going before the throne of God to make a request, to submit my prayer. I’m in an antechamber outside the throne room, and there’s a doorway leading in to God’s throne room. As I look