WEEKLY COMMENTARY: When God Seems to Not Answer Our Prayers ----- Do We Stop Praying?

Many people agonize over the issue of unanswered prayers.  I know that for some people, past prayers unanswered form a barrier that blocks any desire to keep company with God.  What kind of companion, who has the power to save a life or heal a disease, would sit on the sidelines despite urgent pleas for help?  In a sense, every war, every epidemic or drought, every premature death, each birth defect, seems to contradict the teasing sense that prayer can resolve it.

I had reason to really think about this a while back when a neighborhood family was in crisis.  Their 14-year-old daughter had been diagnosed with a brain tumor.  We all prayed for the child's recovery, or at least for some kind of remission.  It was not to be.  In two short months the child was gone.  Her mother, Kate, was particularly swept up in grief, and I attempted to help her work through it.  She wanted to understand why her fervent prayers had gone unanswered.

I told Kate that even after confessing in our prayers things we have done wrong and feel guilty about, and asking God's forgiveness, our prayers do not work according to a fixed formula.  It is not ---- get your life in order, then say the right words, and the desired result will come.  If that were true, Jesus would never gone to Golgotha and the Cross.  Between the two questions: "Does God answer prayers?" and "Will God grant my specific prayer for this sick child or for this particular injustice?" lies a great deal of mystery.

I said to Kate that God is not a jolly grandfather who satisfies our every desire.  Certainly for the parents who have lost a child, their wish would have been for the child to live.  They would have pleaded with God, but seemingly the request was denied.

Nor is God, I told Kate, a calculating merchant who withholds his goods until we produce enough good works or faith, to buy His help.  God does not hand out merit pay.

Then I suggested to Kate that Pastor David Mains had a handy checklist for making sure our prayers initially are on target:

          1.) What do I really want?  Am I being specific, or am I just rambling about nothing in

                    particular?

          2.) Can God grant this request?  Or, is it against God's nature to do so?  (Like a

                    prayer that I will win the lottery.)

          3.) Have I done my part?  Or, am I praying to lose weight when I haven't dieted?

          4.) How good is my relationship with God?  Are we on speaking terms?

          5.) Do I really want my prayer answered?  What would happen if I actually got that

                    girlfriend back? 

Remember, I said to Kate, we have been taught a human's rationale for successful prayer, and God may have His own ideas.

I pointed out to Kate that some prayers go unanswered because they are simply frivolous.  But that clearly her prayers had not been of this type.  I was talking about a prayer like: "Lord, please give us a sunny day for the soccer match."  This trivializes prayer, especially when local farmers may at the same time be prying for rain.  A last-ditch plea: "Help me get an 'A' on the next test," will likely not succeed if the pray-er has not studied.  Likewise, a chain-smoker has no right to pray, "Protect me from lung cancer."

Kate agreed that my examples of  frivolous unanswered prayers were actually self-serving and not in accordance with God's nature.  That they put the focus on our things, not of the things of God.

We talked about some prayers being really impossible to answer, although prayers for Kate's daughter did not seem to fit here.  If a dozen people pray to get the same job, eleven must ultimately come to terms with their unanswered prayer.  And if two "Christian" nations wage war against each other, citizen prayers on the losing side would not have been answered to the satisfaction of the person praying.

What would happen if God granted the wish in EVERY prayer?  If you think about it, in effect God would be abdicating.  He would be turning over to us all the world's problems to solve.  History shows how we have handled the limited power already granted to us.  We have fought wars, committed genocide, fouled the air, destroyed the forests, established unjust political systems, allowed concentrated pockets of superfluous wealth and grinding poverty.  What if God gave us automatic access to supernatural power by granting all of our prayers?  What further havoc might we produce?

But often there is no logical explanation of unanswered prayer.  Author Philip Yancey has given much thought and writing to the nature of prayer.  He says we must place our faith in a God who has yet to fulfill the promise that good will overcome evil, and that God's purposes will, in the end, prevail.  To cling to that belief, he says, may represent the ultimate rationalization ------ or the ultimate act of faith.

Yancey also says that often we may be looking in the wrong places for answers to our prayers.  Yancey suggests that perhaps the real purpose of prayer is to change US ----- change how we see our lives, how we relate to others, and how we see our future.  And, importantly, that this occurs gradually and without much drama.  He believes that the catalyst for our spiritual growth is our prayer journey, not merely whether we receive from God what is asked for in each of our prayers.

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These thoughts are brought to you by CPC's Adult Spiritual Development Team, hoping to encourage you to pursue some personal spiritual growth this Spring at CPC.

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