ANSWERED & UNANSWERED PRAYER

HOW GOD ANSWERS PRAYER

If you abide in Me, and My Word abides in you,

ask whatever you wish,

and it will be given you.

John 15.7

I no longer call you servants,

because a servant does not know his master's business.

Instead, I have called you friends,

for everything that I learned from My Father

I have made known to you.

You did not choose Me, but I chose you

and appointed you to go and bear fruit--

fruit that will last.

Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in My Name.

This is My command: love each other.

John 15.15-17

When we are seeking to obey the commands of Jesus Christ as the Lord of our life, the Father will grant whatever it is that we need for doing so.

The promise is, "Ask, and you will receive."

"Seek, and you will find."

"Ask," "Seek," and "Knock" are found in Luke 11.9-13.

When we do not know what to do in a specific situation, the promise is, "If any man lack wisdom, let him ask of God, Who gives generously to all." (James 1.5)

In Jeremiah 37.1-10, we are told of Zedekiah asking Jeremiah, "Please pray to the Lord our God for us." (v. 3)

In vv. 6-10, Jeremiah brings back God's answer, beginning, "This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: 'Tell the king...'" (In both v. 6 & 9)

In other words, when Zedekiah asked, Jeremiah asked in his behalf. God gave Jeremiah a very specific answer for Zedekiah. The answer to the king came as God's own words were given to the prophet. Zedekiah got an answer directly from God. (Probably not what he wanted to hear, but he got a direct, specific answer from God.)

God stands ready to answer our prayers just as directly, and instantly.

God the Holy Spirit is just as ready to answer our prayers as He did Zedekiah's.

Zedekiah's prayer was answered by God through the prophet Jeremiah.

Our prayers are answered by either a prophet or an apostle. Just this simple:

1. What is your question or problem?

2. Read the Scripture, prophets and apostles, for God's answer.

Incredibly, God the Holy Spirit stands ready to answer any prayer we have if we only "Ask...and Seek...and Knock."

Just as incredibly James points out that we do not have answers "because you do not ask God." (James 4.2)

All our prayers are answered--"Whatever you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive." (Matt 21.22)

The foolish part is, we don't listen; we don't look; we don't seek.

It's like we have unopened mail from God with a complete answer to everything we can possibly ask or even think of (Ephesians 3.20-21; Jer. 33.3), and we never open it to read and see what God has said to us.

We read a single verse or two in a devotional book and then the commentary. We read a paragraph in a lesson book and then the lesson.

We "study" a commentary with a few verses scattered along the way.

We do not read to Bible with a hunger for words that will give life and change life within us.

We "pray for others" and have no idea about what God wants to tell us about others as He sees them and what He wants us to tell them, like Jeremiah told Zedekiah.

And the saddest part is that we do not realize that all God's answers are in the Book He has given us. He has given all we can possibly want, ask, think. Every spiritual gift of the kingdom of heaven is available to us--right now, right here. There are unlimited promises for everything that we need for life and godliness--2 Peter 1.3-4.

God wants us to know and have every spiritual blessing that is in Christ Jesus--here, now, right here, right now--Ephesians 1.3.

How incredible can it be that when we ask God, we do not seek what He has to say in response to us!

Jeremiah did seek, and he found. And he recorded God's answer to Zedekiah so we could understand: God answers prayer--instantly and directly.

For our answers we have to read what God has given to the prophets and apostles. If we read God's words, looking for what God has spoken to others in the past, the Holy Spirit will speak to us from those answers to others just as clearly as He did to Zedekiah.

All possible answers for all people in all generations are available from the Scriptures we have before. God's words are now completely complete for all needs of all generations of all people.

Here. Now. Instantly. Clearly.