Wednesday, September 10, 2014
A Garth Brooks song of a few years back drew my interest from the first time I heard it because it promoted the eternal truth that sometimes the best thing that can happen to us is for God not to answer some of our prayers. That thought came back to me recently when I became aware that some people I love dearly were praying that the Lord would not answer a particular prayer of a loved one. In their case, the Lord answered their prayer by not answering the other. FYI, are you aware that many times when you pray that God will do something specific for you that there are others who, at the same time, are asking Him to do the opposite? It is very human to always pray for something that we truly desire and there is absolutely nothing wrong with it. However, we must never forget to ask that God’s will be done, even if it means that we’re not going to get what we really prayed for.
In the song in question, the man in it’s story speaks about running into an old high school flame. He recalls the times back then when he would pray each night that God would make her his own and how he promised Him that if he answered that prayer, he would never ask for anything again. Now many years later, he realizes this girl was not the angel he had thought she was many years before, and as he turns and sees his wife by his side, he thanks God for not having answered his foolish prayer of the past, saying, “Some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.”
Many Christians have been perplexed upon reading the account of one of the Apostle Paul’s unanswered prayers. He prayed that God would free him from a tormenting thorn in the flesh. He wrote: “Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” (2 Corinthians 12:8-9) Some will dwell on the fact that God did not answer his prayer and fail to see that the Lord gave him something better than just a one time healing. He gave him the grace to not only handle this thorn in the flesh but to be able to endure all the other trials he would face later on. Child of God, here’s the bottom line: God answers each and every one of our prayers. Sometimes He will answer by saying “no” or “not yet”, and we may not always like those answers, but He will always do what is best for us. You may not see it now, but in the end you will see that He indeed answered all our prayers. You may even declare someday like the guy in the song that “Some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.”
Memory verse for the week: (John 4:23) “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.”
