Throne Rights 06 Answered Prayer

Описание: “Prayer,” said the man, “is bunk! Leave that kind of gobbledygook to old ladies, kids, and finks who are frightened of their own shadow. Prayer I can do without!”

I raised an eyebrow. It was rather strong language. But after talking with him for a while I decided I would have to agree with him, that is, if I held the same notion of prayer as he did.
He thought of prayer as nothing more than a religious prop, a sop to ignorant superstition, a last desperate resort when all else had failed. And if that is really all there is to prayer, then we can well do without it!

Needless to say, that man, because he rejected prayer, also rejected the whole Christian religion. He saw clearly what even many Christians fail to see: Christianity stands or falls on its claim of answered prayer.

All religions have practised some form of prayer, but no other faith has ever dared to make the breathtaking claims of answered prayer that the Bible makes.
“Answered prayer!”

That claim stunned the ancient world. It was one thing about Christianity that was truly unique. Never before had the world seen so many ordinary people so vitally in touch with God and so commonly enjoying miracle after miracle of divine provision. This daily demonstration of the reality of answered prayer drew people by their thousands to wor¬ship the living God.

The word of the psalmist was fulfilled “O Thou that hearest prayer, to thee shall all flesh come!” (65:2).

If our God does not hear and answer prayer, then he has no more relevance than the weird gods of the ancient world, whom the psalmist scorned

“Their idols ... are silver and gold ... they have mouths, but they speak not; they have eyes but they see not; they have ears, but they hear not. Those that make them are like them!” (135:15 18).

Once again I say, our faith stands or falls on the reality of answered prayer. If God answers prayer, let him be worshipped; if not, let him be rejected. If our God answers prayer, then we can boldly invite “all flesh” to come to him; if not, then men are wise to scorn us and our religion.

So there is hardly anything more important to the church than learning how to pray and receive an answer from heaven. If we want the world to listen to us we have to show that prayer is not merely a religious exercise, a kind of pious escapism, or spiritual narcotic, but that it is the most real thing in the whole world.

We must show that prayer, because God does answer it, is the very breath of life, the one thing a person can’t do without!

Now this leads me to ask: what kind of prayer does God hear and answer? 

(I) FOUR KEYS TO ANSWERED PRAYER

(A) PRAYER THAT IS BASED ON THE AUTHORITY OF SCRIPTURE

There are two ways to look at scripture: one is to see it as the story of man’s search for God; the other is to see it as the story of God’s search for man.

The first sees the Bible as an expression of man’s mind toward God. The second sees it as an expression of God’s mind toward man.

The first thinks that the Bible is merely a human book, containing many errors; the second finds in the Bible God’s revelation of himself to man, a divine authority, a sure guide to faith.

The first view stifles prayer, while the second strengthens it.

Why? Simply because prayer is essentially an encounter with God. But where and how can a person meet God? The answer: in his word. Here, in the scriptures, God has revealed himself. Here we can meet him face to face. In fact, all human encounter with God has to begin with his word; and all continuing encounter with him stems from that initial meeting (see Ro 10:14 17).

Hence it follows that only those who have a high view of scripture as the word of God, and who immerse themselves daily in his word, can hope to have an effective and continual experience of answered prayer. The kind of faith that is essential to successful prayer can be nourished and set aflame only by scripture. Prayer divorced from the Bible is either an act of foolish presumption or of religious formality. In either case it will be ignored by God.