I'm Praying, Is There Anyone Listening

This is a question that I hear quite often, and at times I catch myself asking the same question. Is there really someone listening or am I going mad talking to myself, pouring out my heart to someone, or something imaginary? If there is a God listening to me then why hasn’t my request been fulfilled, why am I still suffering from the same ailment….what am I still jobless….why is my marriage still going south…why am I still suffering from this sin…Why, Why, Why!

I have a good friend I met a year and a half ago. I was his sales support as an agent with my company. I would call on him monthly to see where we could establish a business relationship, and in turn we would develop a wonderful friendship even though we have never met outside of talking on the phone. One day I called on him and during our conversation I learned his son was suffering from Leukemia. The first thing I could think of was praying for his son with him. I would call him back on my cell and asked if I could pray for his son, and learned he was a pastor of a smaller church and worked on the side.

We sat on the phone and prayed for his son’s healing, and everyday he would keep people informed of his progress. In private I would continue to pray for his son and we would talk once a month. Eventually, we could start to see God’s hand of healing in his son’s cancer. A year later his son would fall into remission and life seemed good, until less then a month went by and he learned his wife was diagnosed with early stages of breast Cancer. Just recently I found out his son’s leukemia has come back and now both the mother and the son battle cancer together.

Everyday people are praying for them and pleading with God to heal them as his word promises. Everyday people reach out to God and ask for his mercy on their lives, and strength for them to make it through. My friend has had to deal with these struggles for over a year and a half now, and you would think a man of God would have first dibs on a miracle for his family.

So why hasn’t God answered his prayers, why isn’t his son walking out of the hospital a healed young man showing the world the power of God? That I can not answer, but I can tell you if you were to talk to him today he is a man whose heart experiences fears, pain, doubts, and questions like any ordinary man…..but he still has his faith in God, and trust he is being heard.

You see god promises us so many times that he hears our prayers, and urns to answer our prayers. Take a look at a very small example:

Matthew 21:22: 22 - If you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer."

Mark 11:24: 24 - Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.

Philippians 4:6 - Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God

Colossians 4:2 -  2Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful.

Hebrews: 5:7 -  During the days of Jesus' life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission.

In fact if you were to go to biblegateway.com and look up prayer in their keyword search of the bible you would find dozen’s of pages of reference.

Truth be told there are many different reasons and factors that can lead to an unanswered prayer, and this can be hard to accept because sometimes it takes honesty on our part when it comes to our walk with God. Over the next couple of Blogs we will focus on a couple of these factors such as our obedience, do we truly have faith in God to answer our questions, have we forgiven those who have caused us pain. That’s right; did you know that refusing to forgive those who have transgressed us could hinder God from answering your prayers? We will also look at another factor: our time line vs. God’s timeline and the truth that not all prayers get answered. But before we can look into these we will first start with what is truly something that is prayer worthy. You have to understand what prayer is before one can truly use participate in it. This should be fun.