InterVarsity Press

Conversations: No Answer to Prayer

Gerlie:

I believe that God changes lives, but why do my prayers to be changed go unanswered? I feel that I am still in darkness. I pray to be used but get no answer at all. Why?

Ruth:

There is a lot of confusion about this subject. How can there be an all-powerful God who doesn't respond to my specific prayer?

Too often we become self-centered in our Christian lives. I know I do. I think about my own needs and problems more than I do anyone else's.

The Christian faith, however, is one that is self-giving rather than self-serving. And, God uses us to answer our own prayers for others.

The great missionary Hudson Taylor was praying for a poor family one day, when he remembered that he had a half-crown coin in his own pocket. He realized that he couldn't pray for God to rain down half-crowns from heaven when he had one in his own pocket, so he got up from his knees and gave that coin (all the money he had at the time) to the family.

I think that's how God answers prayers today—by prompting us to give of ourselves to others and to not think just of our own problems.

I have a friend whose wife died recently. He tells me that during her terminal illness they never asked God to heal her, but asked rather that God would give them the grace to face whatever was before them.

Books have been written on the subject. I'm only barely touching the surface.

But I hope this helps.