Unanswered Prayer

If you are like me, then you have experienced more than once the "trying of your faith" waiting on an answer to prayer. If something is trying, it usually refers to something that is hard to endure. Waiting is hard. It runs counter to who we are. We don't want to wait on anything. Waiting for an answer to prayer is even harder.

Maybe patience is the word I'm looking for. You have heard the phrase … "Having the patience of Job." Well, most of us don't have it when it comes to prayer. Why should we need it? After all, who are we talking to when we pray? God, right? So, why should we have to wait? I mean, He's God! If He wanted to, He could zip the answer right back to us with no waiting.

But He seldom does that. Why? Because the trying of your faith … works … patience. It doesn't build patience; it causes you to exercise it. God is patient; no … that's one of His attributes. God is love. God has patience. God is patient with us. He proves it every day as He works with us.

I want to look at a portion of scripture that might help us understand a little better why it seems as though God leaves some of our prayers unanswered.

Could it be that we give up too soon on God?

Daniel 10:12-13 … "And he said unto me, Fear not, Daniel; for from the first day that thou didst set thy heart to understand, and to humble thyself before thy God, thy words were heard, and I am come because of thy words.
But the prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me one and twenty days; and behold, Michael, one of the chief princes, came to help me …"

In the scripture above there is a practical truth that may be of use to us, and that truth is … the answer to prayer is often delayed … not by any degree of unwillingness on the part of God to answer it; nor by any purpose not to answer it, or even by the intention of trying our faith, but … by the necessary arrangements to bring it about. It may be of such a nature, such as the changing of a man's will, that it cannot be answered all at once.

During the whole three weeks, twenty-one days in which Daniel was in fasting and prayer or as he called it … mourning … which is what fasting and prayer can sometimes feel like; an angel (most likely Gabriel) had been dispatched from Heaven with the answer to his prayer. In fact he was sent … the first day he began to pray … but he had been delayed during all that time by some type of opposition that had met him in Persia.

It required all of the twenty-one days to overcome whatever obstacles existed there in Persia that opposed Gabriel making the arrangements which were necessary to secure the answer to his prayers. Daniel, not knowing that arrangements by God were in progress, or that an angel had already been sent to secure the answer to his prayers, was allowed by God to continue praying for the answer the whole time believing his prayers would eventually be answered.

So, how many arrangements may there be in progress designed for the single purpose of answering our prayers of which we know nothing about. How many people may need to be involved to bring about the answer? What obstacles may be in a process of removal unknown to us; what changes may need to be made or what influences exerted while we pray, including praying right on through many types of discouragements, even to the point of trying our faith and patience?

We may be required to pray for a much longer period of time than Daniel experienced before all the arrangements … according to God's Sovereign Providence … come together for us to receive the answer to our prayers. Depending on what it is, the things to be done may extend far into future months or years. People in government may have to be voted out of office; jobs or addresses may need to be changed.

It requires time to make important changes; to influence the minds of men; to remove obstacles; to put in operation agencies that will secure the thing desired. There may be some obstacle to be overcome. There may be some plan of evil to be hindered. There may be some medical treatment to be used which is not now in existence, and which is to be created.

Prayer is not always just operating in the physical realm. The Apostle Paul said in Ephesians 6:12 … "For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places."

John Wesley spoke the truth when he said … "The spiritual realm is dark unto us … but we lie open to it."

With Daniel, the opposition of the "Prince of Persia" could not be overcome at once, and it was necessary to bring in the agency of a higher power … that being Michael, the archangel … to effect the change. This could not be done in a moment, a day, or a week, but it took the long delay of three full weeks, twenty-one days before Daniel had an assurance that his prayers would be answered.

So it often happens now.

Take for example … we pray for the salvation of a loved one; yet there may be obstacles to his conversion, unseen by us, which are to be patiently removed, even perhaps by another's influence, before it can be done. Satan may have secured a control over his heart, which, is to be broken gradually, before the prayer will be answered.

We pray for certain laws like abortion to be changed; yet these laws may be so tied to the will of men, that they cannot be done away with quickly. Time may be needed for a change in their hearts.

Did this not happen with the evils of slavery? How many prayed for how long? What about W.W.II? Again, it took time for change. God has given men, even evil men … a free will … to do as they choose.

Of course I must add this disclaimer about the power of the evil one …

Things have changed from Daniel's day, ever since Jesus came and defeated the devil.

The Apostle Paul, speaking about Jesus, wrote this in Colossians 2:15 … "And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a show of them openly, triumphing over them in it."

The lesson then, which is taught in Daniel, is this. God hears and answers prayer … although the answer to prayer … seems long delayed.

Have patience in prayer and have faith in God, for He will answer.