“Blessed be God, which has not turned away my prayer, nor his mercy from me.” Psa 66:20:
“Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.” Heb 4:16
“Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path ... The unfolding of your words gives light; it gives understanding to the simple.” Psa. 119: 105 & 130
Does God really answer prayers? Does God always, sometimes, maybe, or never answer prayers? On the face of it, difficult questions and issues that have no clear-cut answers. In the middle of the conflicting and differing views, and while life’s troubles, diseases and the many needs do neither lull us to sleep nor fortify our belief that God answers our prayers, we witness and experience the assault of the atheist, the deist, lukewarm believers and the doubting Thomases, to whom prayer is a paradox. They claim that since God is omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient and has a plan for us, our prayers cannot change his plan for us.
On one hand, the misconception is rooted in our wretched ignorance of the scriptures, our unawareness of the guidelines, our brushing away the pre-requisites, our non-acceptance of failure, illness, aging and death, which are an integral part of human destiny, where God never promise to exempt us from, and finally our unwillingness to submit to God’s will and plan in our life; while on the other hand, the paradox stems from the fact that when we pray, we consciously and/or unconsciously, demand so to speak, that God, as we think he promised, answers our prayers in a specific, tangible and concrete way as if it was a doctor’s prescription to a pharmacist “dispensing as prescribed”, no generics, no alternatives and without delay, requirements and/or prior qualification.
“When Jesus heard, he said unto them: they who are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” Mar 2:17. While outwardly and verbally believing that Jesus, the doctor, is all knowing, all powerful and all loving God, many consider Jesus, the pharmacist, as lying and incapable of fulfilling and dispensing his many declared and straightforward words, where He seemingly, in an unconditional and solemn promise, says:
“If you shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it...” John 14:14
“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: For every one that asks receives; and he that seeks finds; and to him that knocks, it shall be opened.” Matt. 7:7-8
Thus echoing many of the Old Testament passages, among others: “I called upon the Lord in distress: the Lord answered me...” Psa. 118:5, “In the day when I cried, you answered me …” Psa. 138:3 “Call unto me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you know not.” Jer. 33:3 and “Then shall you call upon me, and you shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken unto you.” Jer. 29:12
