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Discuss why the statement, “God always answers prayer ‘yes, no, or wait’” is inadequate to address the challenge of unanswered prayer in our lives.
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Honestly sometimes our prayers are so ridiculous that God simply does not respond at all. He chooses to overlook them. We think if we pray something, even if it doesn’t line up with the will or Word of God, that the Lord will “listen” and give in to us based on our persistence. This is simply not true. While most prayers get a yes, no, or not now(wait), some get nothing. We only receive from God if our prayers line up with His perfect will or is actually a Bonafide need. So often we get our needs and wants confused and so like a good Father, God listens attentively but does not always answer us. God’s silence is in and of itself a form of answer, whether we can concede that or not.
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It almost trivializes praying. “Here You go God. Here is my prayer. You have 3 options and 3 options only.” God is so much more profound then that.
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Pray should not be burdensome because many will then, start spending their time elsewhere. Unanswered prayer can misrepresent the truth and can cause many woes. So, my remedy is to stay ahead of the game and pray 5 or 10 years out.
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We have to be careful not to give God a script to answer our prayers. We are recipients of His grace and have the privilege of the fellowship of prayer. We need to persevere in our request, if we believe we are in the will of God, but remember that God is sovereign, doesn’t own us anything, He loves us and we do us no harm. Trust God in unanswered prayers.
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We love to believe that we know our prayers are right and appropriate for us and relative to our need and understanding but God looks at the whole picture and it may not make sense to us at all, its just not within our scope of understanding.