How often do we doubt God’s willingness to meet our needs or give us the desires of our hearts? Perhaps we don’t believe because we are fearful He will refuse. Fear limits believing. It limits God’s power working in our lives.
“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened” (Matthew 7:7-8).
Through prayer, we can bring our deepest desires, hopes, and dreams before God, trusting that He will hear and answer us according to His will. Many people have prayed for things God’s Word has promised them, but they have never seen them come to pass. In an attempt to reconcile God’s promises with their experiences, many have said that God sometimes says no or that His promise doesn’t apply to them. But that’s not what this verse says. It states that everyone who asks receives. How can this be?
The answer lies in the fact that God is a Spirit (John 4:24), and He moves in the spiritual, or unseen, realm. When He answers our prayers, the answers come in spiritual form. Whether or not they ever move from the spiritual realm into the physical realm depends not on God’s willingness to answer us but rather on whether or not we receive.
The enemy will do everything He can to cause doubt, fear, and unbelief in God’s truth. He wants you to become complacent about your request and give up. He will lie and say God’s promises are not true for you. He will play havoc with your emotions. But faith defeats fear. It defeats his lie. Faith is proof of spiritual things, not physical things. With faith, you have visible proof of unseen things (Hebrews 11:1). Faith does not make God move. It only appropriates what God has already provided by His grace. Often, you must forcefully come against the enemy and take by faith the truths of God’s Kingdom (Matthew 11:12).
Remember that Jesus said, “Do not fear, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom” (Luke 12:32).
“And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive” (Matthew 21:22).
This verse, Matthew 21:22, has to be taken into consideration with the previous verse, which says that having faith without doubting is essential to receiving what you ask for in prayer. There are also other things God requires to answer our prayers. What we ask must be consistent with God’s will (James 4:2-3, 1 John 5:14-15), and we must forgive (Mark 11:25-26). God will not answer any prayer that does not meet His requirements.
“Therefore I say to you, whatever things you ask when you pray, believe that you receive them, and you will have them” (Mark 11:24).
This verse clarifies one of the main differences between a God-kind of faith and a human faith. A natural, human faith, which everyone has, believes only what it can see, taste, hear, smell, or feel. God’s kind of faith believes in things that are not seen (Romans 4:17, Hebrews 11:1). When Jesus spoke these words, He was making this God-kind of faith a prerequisite to receiving answers to prayer. You must believe that you receive your answer “when you pray,” not when you see what you prayed for. This verse indicates the thing you pray for “shall” come to pass. This “shall” could be in an instant or over a longer period of time, but the word “shall” implies the future.
The Lord answers our prayers that meet His requirements: we ask His will, have faith and not doubt, and not harbor unforgiveness in our hearts. When these are met, He moves instantly to answer our prayers, but He moves in the spiritual realm. His work on our behalf is not always immediately evident to our physical senses. By faith, we must believe that He is answering our prayers before we see any physical evidence. Believing when we see an answer is not faith (2 Corinthians 5:7), but doubting. And doubt will keep us from receiving the things we asked of the Lord (James 1:5-7).
Faith is our evidence (Hebrews 11:1), not what we see.
Now this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us, whatever we ask, we know that we have the petitions that we have asked of Him (1 John 5:14-15).
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