Prayers That God Answers

Some Thoughts on Praying in Faith

Some of you, like myself, may have experienced the joy of answers to prayer when only God could help. I hope this simple little meditation will encourage and inspire your personal prayers to be ones of expectant faith.

Psalm 81:10: “Open your mouth wide, and I will fill it.”

God invites us to expect when we pray. Expect what? The answers to our personal prayers and petitions. Without unequivocal expectancy included with our prayers, they will not avail to produce the answers God would be pleased to bring to us.

The words, “Open your mouth wide,” imply that God has abundant provision for us. Jesus said, “Seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, and all these things [material provisions] shall be added to you” (Matthew 6:33). Why should we be bothered to “seek” unless we were expecting a definite response?

Unfortunately, some Christians pray and then succumb to the faith destroying attitude, “Well, I’ll believe it when I see it.” But this is obviously not the way of faith. “Now faith IS the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1, emphasis mine). Faith and hope are closely related, and we must continue to hope for the requests we have made if they are to become a reality. If we never opened our mouths physically no food would enter our bodies to supply the nutrition, health and strength we need. Such a simple almost foolish illustration gets across the lesson that we are responsible to do our part to activate the response of God. “Open” requires a decision that is ripe with expectancy. We would not open our physical mouths if we did not expect nourishment of some kind.

God tells us to open our mouths “wide.” Do we believe that God has enough resources to supply us with, or is the bank of heaven running short? The Bible is full from beginning to end of the important principle of conditional promises. God’s promise says, “I will fill it,” but only if the condition or conditions are applied.

All of this indicates that God would be delighted for us to ask big things of Him. Of course, we need assurance that we are expecting things that are according to his will, and we receive such assurance through prayer and listening to His voice in our daily time of communion with Him. We should not let the enemy, Satan, or well-meaning relatives and friends, try to discourage us in our faith for big things. James wrote, “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you” (James 4:8). In other words, my move toward Him in faith will elicit the response of God to move toward me.

It is not complicated. But how many Christians are actively involved on a daily basis in seeking the Lord for big things with expectancy and faith that the answers are coming? Some might say, “But I have prayed a long time for something and it still has not happened.” Jesus said, “Whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them” (Mark 11:24). Notice that Jesus did not promise there would always be instantaneous reception, but implied the possibility of a waiting period. However, instantaneous answers to prayer happened in the ministry of Jesus, and still happen today. But the words, “you will have them” do imply future fulfillment.

Therefore, after we have prayed, we are to believe in faith that God has received our petition in heaven, and that the result will be seen on earth. We could say, as though picturing God working behind the scenes, and in His perfect timing, that the prayer will manifest in actual fulfillment. God has promised, “I will fill it.” We trust not only in the words of our prayer, although very important, but in the One, the only One, who is able to fulfill the request.

PRAYER: “Lord, I am expecting the wonderful blessing of experiencing the answers to my prayers. Thank you, Lord.”