In a couple of weeks I will have the opportunity to teach on prayer again, and the topic will be “How He Answers”. Since the book we are using jumps from passage to passage there is not a specific passage of Scripture that I am to teach from. So that leaves me with seeking the Lord and the passage He lays on my heart. I am not sure on that area yet, but what I have been pondering is how to discuss when God answers our prayers with “no”. I personally know several people who have prayed very good things that you would think the Lord would long to answer with a yes and He did not. How does one handle that? How does one wrap their mind around and all knowing, all good God who does things differently than what we think is good? So that is rolling around in my head these days.
In Beth Moore’s book David, that I said I have been using for my personal time with the Lord, I found an encouraging approach to this subject. On day 80 Beth talks about a difficult event in David’s life when God responds differently than we would expect. She gives these two thoughts we sould consider when in these sittuations: 1. We do not know everything about the situation 2. We need to remember what we do know to be true about God. These seem simple enough to say and hard to actually do when faced with the hard stuff. It is true we do not know everything about every situation, even though we can think that we do. We can never know all the rippeling effects of things we ask of the Lord in our lives and in others! It is also true that we have to remember what we do know about the Lord. God describes himself over and over as being faithful, true, steadfast, holy, gracious, and merciful to name a few. In times when we do not understand what is going on we must cling to what we do know of God revealed to us in His word. That brings me back to one of my favorite things to think on – how thankful I am that we have the written word of God. It truly is amazing! We do not have to guess about God’s character!!! We can trust who He is and therefore find strength to live with His “no”s.
So ponder with me this wonderful, mysterious thing we have in prayer and answered prayer as well. I am looking forward to what the Lord will teach me as I prepare for this next lesson.
Have a great week trusting the one who knows it all and is faithful and true 
