The Problem of Jesus' Prayer Promises and Our Limited Prayer Success

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Berserk

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If you read my "Life Journey" thread, you might get the impression that my prayer life is a life of continuous miracles in answer to prayer. That impression would be false because that thread shares the highlights of my life in the Spirit. In truth, it seems like most of my prayers go unanswered, at least so far as I can see. I have learned by experience that we can't just TRY to believe God's promises because the very concept of "trying" implies an unconscious belief that we our faith will probably fail. This thread is intended to inspire discussion on the apparent problem of unanswered or ineffective petitionary prayer.

A major reason why thoughtful skeptics reject Christianity can be succinctly expressed in this sentence, "Experience shows that Christianity just doesn't deliver on its promises." Consider how rarely most Christians have experienced or known people who have experienced indisputable miracles in response to petitionary prayer. Yet Jesus provides many glorious promises about how God always answers petitionary prayers offered up in faith (Mark 11:22-25; Matthew 7:7-8: John 14:13; 15:7; 16:23; cp. 1 John 5:14). Indeed, Jesus praises faith for healing when He encounters it, even among Gentiles (e. g. Matthew 15:28; Luke 7:10). This praise seems to imply that we can somehow successfully pursue or develop miracle-working faith. Indeed, Jesus issues this challenge:

"The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and, in fact, WILL DO GREATER WORKS THAN THESE because I go to my Father (John 14:12)."

Many evangelicals who claim these promises are discouraged by the unimpressive results and must battle the doubts that result from prayer lives that don't seem to measure up to Jesus' promises. For example, how many people do you know have been healed through prayer of blindness, deafness, congestive heart failure, Type-1 diabetes, and crippling disorders that confine them to wheelchairs?

These frustrated or confused prayer warriors feel compelled to rationalize the disconnect between Jesus' promises and the discouraging reality in at least these 5 ways:
(1) It just must not be God's will for me (citing 1 John 5:14).
(2)I guess God's answer for me is always the same as God's answer to Paul's request for removal of his "thorn in the flesh:" "My grace is sufficient for you; for my strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor. 12:5-8)."
(3) God responds to the need behind my request, not to the literal request (Romans 8:26).
(4) Perhaps God denies me my requested miracle because of unconfessed sin (James 5:16) or because of grudges I hold, consciously or unconsciously, towards others (Mark 11:24-25).
(5) Perhaps miracles were primarily intended for the apostolic age to help spread the faith, even though the Bible teaches that God "is the same, yesterday, today, and forever."

How should we react to these prayer dilemmas? What can we do to develop a more effective life of petitionary prayer?
 

Berserk

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In Pollyanna discussions of the power of prayer, there is an urgent need to keep it real. So I'm going to share 2 personal stories in which troubled believers tried in vain to cling to their belief that the God of grace loved them. This post shares the first account.

(1) I was asked to befriend David, a schizophrenic Christian who lived by himself in a remote little cabin in the country. David loved the Lord, but heard voices that told him church people were against him, and so, attending church was too painful for his paranoia. He loved studying and quoting the Psalms and not only closely identified with King David, but actually believed he was King David and that when I talked about King David, I was talking about him! The psychoactive drugs prescribed for him were destroying his kidneys and he therefore needed to come to town for dialysis 3 days a week. I visited him at the dialysis clinic weekly and often talked to him by phone. We often prayed together for his healing and for his reassurance that God loved him. I finally got him to recognize that he was not actually King David. Then we got him transferred to an assisted living facility in town, where it was more convenient for me and other Christians to visit and where I hoped loving caregivers could serve as a healing influence. So I thought we were making progress, but I was wrong.

David could not tolerate the nice caregivers who took him to the cafeteria in his wheelchair because he was convinced they meant him harm. Caring Christian visitors thought he might be demon-possessed, and so, they mistakenly tried to exorcise him with catastrophic results: his King David delusion was now replaced by the far more serious delusion that he was Satan himself! He remained comfortable talking to me, knowing that I loved him and seemed to respond well to my reassurances about the loving staff and his other Christian visitors. But that reassurance only lasted briefly and his paranoia intensified as his Satan person continually vilified and insulted him. David could no longer believe God loved him because God did nothing in response to his and our prayers. His deteriorating organs finally took his life.

David's tragic demise shook my faith in Jesus' faith promises and I could no longer tolerate glib sermons and reassurances about how the future is as bright as the promises of God. Frankly, I now don't know how to reconcile Jesus' promises about answers to prayer with the harsh reality of David's failed effort to cling to the grace of God and to continue believing God still loved him through all this suffering. How would you respond to his plight?
 
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Nancy

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In Pollyanna discussions of the power of prayer, there is an urgent need to keep it real. So I'm going to share 2 personal stories in which troubled believers tried in vain to cling to their belief that the God of grace loved them. This post shares the first account.

(1) I was asked to befriend David, a schizophrenic Christian who lived by himself in a remote little cabin in the country. David loved the Lord, but heard voices that told him church people were against him, and so, attending church was too painful for his paranoia. He loved studying and quoting the Psalms and not only closely identified with King David, but actually believed he was King David and that when I talked about King David, I was talking about him! The psychoactive drugs prescribed for him were destroying his kidneys and he therefore needed to come to town for dialysis 3 days a week. I visited him at the dialysis clinic weekly and often talked to him by phone. We often prayed together for his healing and for his reassurance that God loved him. I finally got him to recognize that he was not actually King David. Then we got him transferred to an assisted living facility in town, where it was more convenient for me and other Christians to visit and where I hoped loving caregivers could serve as a healing influence. So I thought we were making progress, but I was wrong.

David could not tolerate the nice caregivers who took him to the cafeteria in his wheelchair because he was convinced they meant him harm. Caring Christian visitors thought he might be demon-possessed, and so, they mistakenly tried to exorcise him with catastrophic results: his King David delusion was now replaced by the far more serious delusion that he was Satan himself! He remained comfortable talking to me, knowing that I loved him and seemed to respond well to my reassurances about the loving staff and his other Christian visitors. But that reassurance only lasted briefly and his paranoia intensified as his Satan person continually vilified and insulted him. David could no longer believe God loved him because God did nothing in response to his and our prayers. His deteriorating organs finally took his life.

David's tragic demise shook my faith in Jesus' faith promises and I could no longer tolerate glib sermons and reassurances about how the future is as bright as the promises of God. Frankly, I now don't know how to reconcile Jesus' promises about answers to prayer with the harsh reality of David's failed effort to cling to the grace of God and to continue believing God still loved him through all this suffering. How would you respond to his plight?
I am sorry about David, not encouraging when prayer goes unanswered. All the things you mentioned in the OP:
"(1) It just must not be God's will for me (citing 1 John 5:14).
(2)I guess God's answer for me is always the same as God's answer to Paul's request for removal of his "thorn in the flesh:" "My grace is sufficient for you; for my strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor. 12:5-8)."
(3) God responds to the need behind my request, not to the literal request (Romans 8:26).
(4) Perhaps God denies me my requested miracle because of unconfessed sin (James 5:16) or because of grudges I hold, consciously or unconsciously, towards others (Mark 11:24-25).
(5) Perhaps miracles were primarily intended for the apostolic age to help spread the faith, even though the Bible teaches that God "is the same, yesterday, today, and forever."

I have responded in all of the above ways when God seems silent concerning a petition. And no, I have never seen the group you mentioned healed. I do believe every healing comes from Him though, even a cut that heals on it's own as He has given us certain properties in our bodies, or a broken bone healing but, the more organic healings I have never seen or known any one who has, or knows someone who knows someone who knows someone who had an arm or leg grown back, or sight to the blind (I tend to spiritualize that one).
It's a tough one for sure brother.
 

Berserk

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What can makes apparent unanswered prayers for miracles so frustrating are the glorious exceptions to the rule. For example, I often pray in vain for a close friend Mike who suffers greatly from congestive heart failure. Yet I know a Catholic man who took his wife with congestive heart failure to the grave of an Italian saint and asked the saint to pray for her healing and the miracle occurred. Yet I'm unwilling to begin asking deceased saints for prayer. So why was she healed and not my friend.

I have a friend with bone on bone deteriorating knees and pray in vain for his healing But I have another friend Dick who, on a tour of Turkey, went to the house of the Virgin Mary just outside Ephesus. He had torn tendons and bad arthritis in his knee. Despite this, he didn't cancel his tour and was scheduled for surgery as soon as he returned. A Turkish woman saw him limping badly and urged him to fill a plastic bottle with healing water from the nearby spring. Neither he nor his wife believed in the healing power of this spring, but filled the bottle just to be polite. Later in his hotel, he comlained abut the knee pain and his frustrated wife urged him to pour the water on the knee. He replied, "Why? It's just water!" and she said, "I know, but what do you have to lose?" So he did so and felt better, but attributed this to a placebo effect. When his orthopedic surgeon operated on him, he found that the MRIs and X-rays were wrong; Dick's knee had been completely healed! The surgeon was apparently afraid of a lawsuit. Again, I have never believed in healing Marian springs. Why was Dick healed and not Mike. I have no answer.
 
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GRACE ambassador

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This thread is intended to inspire discussion on the apparent problem of unanswered or ineffective petitionary prayer.
David's tragic demise shook my faith in Jesus' faith promises and I could no longer tolerate glib sermons and reassurances about how the future is as bright as the promises of God.
I know a Catholic man who took his wife with congestive heart failure to the grave of an Italian saint and asked the saint to pray for her healing and the miracle occurred. Yet I'm unwilling to begin asking deceased saints for prayer. So why was she healed and not my friend.
Why was Dick healed and not Mike. I have no answer.
God's Answer, According to Distinctions of prophecy and Mystery?:

IF Satan is "allowed to inflict" us, as seen in Job, then why could he
not Also Remove those afflictions, in order to deceive us?

Therefore, under "prophecy and the law" Christ Said To Israel:

"The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and, in fact, WILL DO GREATER WORKS THAN THESE because I go to my Father (John 14:12)."

Many evangelicals who claim these promises are discouraged by the unimpressive results and must battle the doubts that result from prayer lives that don't seem to measure up to Jesus' promises.
Thus to solve this confusion, and in order to "live in the Correct Dispensation of God's
GRACE Today, we Must:

Rightly Divide (2Ti 2:15) [the above] From “Things That Differ” (online)

Under Grace And Mystery, for us, The Body Of Christ, Today, we find this:

Grace Word For our infirmities!

Precious struggling friends, I sincerely hope and pray these were helpful
and Encouraging.

Grace, Peace, And JOY...
 

dhh712

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If you read my "Life Journey" thread, you might get the impression that my prayer life is a life of continuous miracles in answer to prayer. That impression would be false because that thread shares the highlights of my life in the Spirit. In truth, it seems like most of my prayers go unanswered, at least so far as I can see. I have learned by experience that we can't just TRY to believe God's promises because the very concept of "trying" implies an unconscious belief that we our faith will probably fail. This thread is intended to inspire discussion on the apparent problem of unanswered or ineffective petitionary prayer.

A major reason why thoughtful skeptics reject Christianity can be succinctly expressed in this sentence, "Experience shows that Christianity just doesn't deliver on its promises." Consider how rarely most Christians have experienced or known people who have experienced indisputable miracles in response to petitionary prayer. Yet Jesus provides many glorious promises about how God always answers petitionary prayers offered up in faith (Mark 11:22-25; Matthew 7:7-8: John 14:13; 15:7; 16:23; cp. 1 John 5:14). Indeed, Jesus praises faith for healing when He encounters it, even among Gentiles (e. g. Matthew 15:28; Luke 7:10). This praise seems to imply that we can somehow successfully pursue or develop miracle-working faith. Indeed, Jesus issues this challenge:

"The one who believes in me will also do the works that I do, and, in fact, WILL DO GREATER WORKS THAN THESE because I go to my Father (John 14:12)."

Many evangelicals who claim these promises are discouraged by the unimpressive results and must battle the doubts that result from prayer lives that don't seem to measure up to Jesus' promises. For example, how many people do you know have been healed through prayer of blindness, deafness, congestive heart failure, Type-1 diabetes, and crippling disorders that confine them to wheelchairs?

These frustrated or confused prayer warriors feel compelled to rationalize the disconnect between Jesus' promises and the discouraging reality in at least these 5 ways:
(1) It just must not be God's will for me (citing 1 John 5:14).
(2)I guess God's answer for me is always the same as God's answer to Paul's request for removal of his "thorn in the flesh:" "My grace is sufficient for you; for my strength is made perfect in weakness (2 Cor. 12:5-8)."
(3) God responds to the need behind my request, not to the literal request (Romans 8:26).
(4) Perhaps God denies me my requested miracle because of unconfessed sin (James 5:16) or because of grudges I hold, consciously or unconsciously, towards others (Mark 11:24-25).
(5) Perhaps miracles were primarily intended for the apostolic age to help spread the faith, even though the Bible teaches that God "is the same, yesterday, today, and forever."

How should we react to these prayer dilemmas? What can we do to develop a more effective life of petitionary prayer?

We must realize that God is on the throne and we are not. Our prayers are always successful because we are to pray that the Lord's will be done and not our own. God's will is always done. Our will and his often do not match up.

Skeptics believe Christianity does not "deliver on it's promises" because they do not understand what the promise is. I have the impression from reading many non-believers posts that they feel the purpose of Christianity is to have a better more temporally pleasing life here on earth and to get what you want, your personal desires from the senses, in heaven. This is mostly a false understanding, and I fear that unfortunately--from the use of entertainment for the senses to draw the crowds, what I hear is going on in some of those "mega-churches"--this is also what is taught in many of the mainline churches.

I also have the impression that many nonbelievers have the understanding that if God will just show them a miracle that they would believe. This, also, is a false understanding. As the Lord reveals in his word, they have the law and the prophets; if this does not convince them neither would someone who would return from the dead [or any other miracle] convince them. We have the witness of history: how countless miracles performed by God through his prophets and when he was incarnate here on earth convinced no one either.

God does not perform on cue. He has given us the miracle of this creation on earth. Skeptics grasp at straws to create any miniscule of "evidence" that will let their mind rest from their actual knowledge, if they were honest with themselves which they are not, that there actually is a God whom they will have to answer to upon death. They hold on to these straws whilst they entertain themselves into hell, believing this incredibly brief life--which they will be at the end of before they know it--is all they have.

The "Greater works than these" I have been instructed that this means there will be a more expansive (wider-breadth) of works that will be done, not that the works will be greater as in more impressive. This, of course, can't be true because the works are not more impressive than those which Jesus has done on earth. Thus, I feel that the former is the correct interpretation since it does not make God out to be a liar which if it did indeed mean that the works will be even more magnificent in glory than the ones that Jesus had done while here on earth, I feel that we can all conclusively say that that is not true.

There certainly are miracles performed every day; however, they are very rare (just as they have been incredibly rare throughout all of history as witness provides by God's word. If one were to take into the account the breadth of history accounted for in the Bible and take count of the miracles which were done in them, one would see that most were done in a few clusters of time: if I am remembering correctly, this would be during the Exodus and in the Wilderness, during Elijah and Elisha's time, and during the time of Jesus and the Apostles. The rest are sprinkled relatively rarely throughout the great expanse of history. This provides the evidence which is needed to attest to the fact that miracles are a very rare thing indeed). The problem is that most--and I feel correctly so since I think many people do attempt to "fake" miracles--don't believe them and they need them to happen to themselves directly in order to believe in a miracle. That is just not going to happen for most people. So, the fact that the miracles are done on a greater expanse, all over the world than just the area where Jesus walked around in the Middle East, does reflect the truth of God's word.
 
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dhh712

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In Pollyanna discussions of the power of prayer, there is an urgent need to keep it real. So I'm going to share 2 personal stories in which troubled believers tried in vain to cling to their belief that the God of grace loved them. This post shares the first account.

(1) I was asked to befriend David, a schizophrenic Christian who lived by himself in a remote little cabin in the country. David loved the Lord, but heard voices that told him church people were against him, and so, attending church was too painful for his paranoia. He loved studying and quoting the Psalms and not only closely identified with King David, but actually believed he was King David and that when I talked about King David, I was talking about him! The psychoactive drugs prescribed for him were destroying his kidneys and he therefore needed to come to town for dialysis 3 days a week. I visited him at the dialysis clinic weekly and often talked to him by phone. We often prayed together for his healing and for his reassurance that God loved him. I finally got him to recognize that he was not actually King David. Then we got him transferred to an assisted living facility in town, where it was more convenient for me and other Christians to visit and where I hoped loving caregivers could serve as a healing influence. So I thought we were making progress, but I was wrong.

David could not tolerate the nice caregivers who took him to the cafeteria in his wheelchair because he was convinced they meant him harm. Caring Christian visitors thought he might be demon-possessed, and so, they mistakenly tried to exorcise him with catastrophic results: his King David delusion was now replaced by the far more serious delusion that he was Satan himself! He remained comfortable talking to me, knowing that I loved him and seemed to respond well to my reassurances about the loving staff and his other Christian visitors. But that reassurance only lasted briefly and his paranoia intensified as his Satan person continually vilified and insulted him. David could no longer believe God loved him because God did nothing in response to his and our prayers. His deteriorating organs finally took his life.

David's tragic demise shook my faith in Jesus' faith promises and I could no longer tolerate glib sermons and reassurances about how the future is as bright as the promises of God. Frankly, I now don't know how to reconcile Jesus' promises about answers to prayer with the harsh reality of David's failed effort to cling to the grace of God and to continue believing God still loved him through all this suffering. How would you respond to his plight?

[apologize in advance, original message got deleted]

I would trust that God is merciful--that he took into account the mental disease of your friend which prevented him from knowing that God did love him and that he with the Lord now in paradise, free not only of his mental illness but also free of every sin.

I do not talk of "unanswered" prayers lightly. My husband died unexpectedly and suddenly of a stroke. I prayed for his recovery. It did not happen. I prayed that the Lord's will be done and not my own. My prayer was answered--it was my husband's time to be called home to the Lord to be with him in paradise.

Trials should strengthen our faith because they should make us realize that our happiness is not to be found in this life but in the life that is to come. They should make us long for our eternal home and cling to Jesus amidst the trials of life. I fear however that many churches teach that petitionary prayers should always be answered favorably by God because he wants us to be happy here on earth. The witness of countless believers' suffering in this life should prove that this is evidently not true. Does that make God out to be a liar then? If temporal happiness is what God promises then yes, He would be a liar. The skeptics are spot-on in that conclusion.

I have spoken to some Christians who say that God wants us to be happy. I do not think they understand what they are saying, and I hope they do not mean that God wants us to be happy in a temporal way in this life. Many, many, many (x100,000,000,000,000,000 many) believers lives are/have been filled with suffering. What about them? Is God a liar then when he says he gives us peace which passes all understanding? We who live in the modern western world are living in a very peculiar time in history. Most believers who have lived and are living do not enjoy the comforts and temporal blessings many of us do have (and which I fear some may be clinging to for the happiness that is promised by God).

I tell them this: That God certainly does not want us to be miserable. But, we are to find our happiness in Jesus and in him alone. Even should all the things which bring us comfort and temporal happiness should be taken away from us, we should still possess a peace that passes all understanding in Jesus. I always say that God does not promise us temporal happiness. But he does promise us eternal life in Jesus and that alone, should we have nothing else, that alone should bring us peace.
 
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dhh712

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What can makes apparent unanswered prayers for miracles so frustrating are the glorious exceptions to the rule. For example, I often pray in vain for a close friend Mike who suffers greatly from congestive heart failure. Yet I know a Catholic man who took his wife with congestive heart failure to the grave of an Italian saint and asked the saint to pray for her healing and the miracle occurred. Yet I'm unwilling to begin asking deceased saints for prayer. So why was she healed and not my friend.

I have a friend with bone on bone deteriorating knees and pray in vain for his healing But I have another friend Dick who, on a tour of Turkey, went to the house of the Virgin Mary just outside Ephesus. He had torn tendons and bad arthritis in his knee. Despite this, he didn't cancel his tour and was scheduled for surgery as soon as he returned. A Turkish woman saw him limping badly and urged him to fill a plastic bottle with healing water from the nearby spring. Neither he nor his wife believed in the healing power of this spring, but filled the bottle just to be polite. Later in his hotel, he comlained abut the knee pain and his frustrated wife urged him to pour the water on the knee. He replied, "Why? It's just water!" and she said, "I know, but what do you have to lose?" So he did so and felt better, but attributed this to a placebo effect. When his orthopedic surgeon operated on him, he found that the MRIs and X-rays were wrong; Dick's knee had been completely healed! The surgeon was apparently afraid of a lawsuit. Again, I have never believed in healing Marian springs. Why was Dick healed and not Mike. I have no answer.

I do not know either. I'm afraid you will not receive an answer here and must submit to the Lord's will in this. Why did my husband have to die when countless others have strokes (and he did not even have any health markers which put him at risk for a stroke) and survive? Why did he pass away--in apparently good health--at the young age of 62 when the night before he was feeling and acting just like normal? I have had countless episodes played before me where people have health crises, go the hospital and are released with no major complications. Why was my prayer "unanswered"?

It was God's will. That is the only answer I and any of us will likely get when we feel that God did not answer our prayer (he answers all prayers).

We cannot demand anything from God. God does not owe us anything. We have rebelled against him in sin and he has graciously and mercifully received us into his kingdom through the blood of his beloved only begotten Son Jesus. If this does not demonstrate the love he has for each and everyone of his children, I do not know what will.