Have You Felt Like Giving Up Lately?نموونە

Will God Ever Answer My Prayer?

Have you ever asked that question? Is there one special matter you have been praying about for a long time with no apparent answer in sight? Are there times when you wonder if the answer will ever come? If you must answer yes to the above questions, you are in good company. You are not some strange kind of Christian, suffering chastisement from the Lord. The delayed answer to prayer is one of the most common experiences shared by even the saintliest of God’s children.

Let me bare my soul to you on this matter of unanswered prayers. You cannot feed your faith only on self-serving promises of healing, wealth, success and prosperity, any more than you can grow healthy and strong eating only desserts. Faith comes by hearing “all the Word,” not just preferred portions.

There are times in the Bible when God could not, or did not, answer no matter how many times it was asked for, no matter how great the faith or how positive the confession. Paul

was not delivered from the affliction that buffeted him, though he prayed diligently for an answer. “Concerning this thing I pleaded with the Lord three times that it might depart from me” (2 Corinthians 12:8).

First, God wanted to see the work of grace completed in Paul. he would not permit his child to become puffed up with pride. But look what it worked out in Paul, proving God was right in not answering his request.

“And He said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Therefore most gladly I will rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Therefore I take pleasure in infirmities, in reproaches, in needs, in persecutions, in distresses, for Christ’s sake. For when I am weak, then I am strong” 2 Corinthians 12:9–10.

Why didn’t Paul preach the message we hear so much today, “You don’t have to suffer infirmities, poverty, distresses, suffering. You don’t have to put up with necessity or weakness. Claim your victory over all suffering and pain . . .”?

More than healing, more than success, more than deliverance from prickly thorns—Paul wanted Christ! Paul would rather suffer than try to overrule God. That is why he could shout, “I glory in my present situation. God is at work in me through all I suffer. In and through it all, I know my present suffering cannot be compared with the glory that awaits me.”

Faith is a gift, not a diploma. Faith should not be a burden or a puzzle. The more childlike it is, the better it works. You need no seminar or textbook; you need no guide. The Holy Spirit will lead you closer to Jesus who is the Word by whom comes faith.