Leadership Thought: How Not to Pray for Answered Prayer.

Dear Friend

In my Mother’s Day message, I discussed the power of a praying mother, and how Hannah’s prayer life not only impacted the life of her son ,Samuel, but the destiny of the nation Israel. You can read this remarkable story in 1 Samuel 1.

After  Hannah returns to her hometown, we read in v. 19  the “Lord remembered her.” Now God didn’t forget Hannah; he simply remembers the prayer she offered at Shiloh, the nation’s worship center where she said to God,  “If you will give me a son, I will lend him back to you for life.”

No. the Lord didn’t forget her prayer, because the Lord never forgets our prayers, unlike some of us who pray.

I will sometimes pray about something, and I will pray and pray with great intensity. But after a period, the intensity  of my prayer will diminish until it  becomes  but a distant memory. And then one day it happens. The prayer is  answered, and I act surprised. The Lord says, “Tom, why are you so surprised? Isn’t this what you had been asking me for?"  “Oh, Lord,” I apologize. “I am so sorry, but I forgot that prayer.

Sometimes we think unanswered prayer is the same thing as the Lord saying  “No” to our prayers, and we give up our prayer too soon. The answer “Wait’ is just as much an answer to our prayers as is His ‘Yes.’ Sometimes God wants us to wait for He has something bigger and better in store for us than even the thing for which we were praying. Hannah was wishing for a son, but God was waiting for a prophet. His timing is always perfect.

At my age you would think I would me more than a novice at prayer, but I am not. I am still learning and still growing and still often embarrassed by my feeble efforts.

I will pray for some burden I am carrying, and I will say “Jesus, here is my burden, and I’m giving it to you to carry. “And then as soon I have finished praying, I reach out and take my burden back. And He lets me do it because He knows that if He answered my prayer right there and then that would be the last He would see me. I would wave goodbye and be on my way and that would be the end of our relationship. But God, knowing I need to learn more about persisting prayer, allows me to keep my burden until I have learned the lesson He seeks to teach me.

John Walvoord, former present of Dallas Seminary, told of a mother who prayed for her son’s salvation for 60 years. A week before she died, she received the news she’d been waiting for. She opened his letter to read, “Momma, I gave my heart to Jesus.”

Don’t quit praying. Your answer may be just around the corner.

Yours in faith and friendship,
Tom