LRC, Houston - the weekends-free church in Houston, Texas

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sought counsel because of unanswered prayer. I’m sure someone helped me, put a bandaid on my ego, but generally, no one seemed to have a very good answer. As a young Christian I was gullible enough to buy even the most anal answers, but then haven’t we all been on the learning curve that seems to never end?

Somewhere along life’s journey I began to see the spiritual and intellectual fog dissipate enough that some clarity was coming into view. What I found most helpful though was the realization that I was still living in that Old Testament paradigm. Some habits are just so hard to break, and it’s doubly difficult when the church that you’re being fed from reinforces the excuses.

The four most prominent excuses for unanswered prayer were:
1-There was obviously sin in my life.
2-I was walking in presumption with my prayers.
3-I was living in unbelief.
4-Or it just wasn’t the will of God!

But, wait, aren’t all the promises of God yea and amen?

What I discovered is that so many of the EXCUSES for unanswered prayer were Old Covenant answers coming out of a WORKS mentality, when life is to be lived by and through FAITH! I just needed to be more righteous, do more good stuff, read my Bible more, spend more time in prayer, read a Psalm a day, utter more positive confessions, yaba daba do!

ENOUGH!

Sorry I asked.

And then I found that my relationships with God, intimate times, communion, and union seemed to work better. And I’ll be darned if I didn’t see more answered prayers. And for the prayers that weren’t answered, I like Paul who wanted his ailment taken away, found that which was not answered was only because there was something greater. Like Paul who discovered when he was WEAK that God was STRONG, I too have discovered that even the unaswered prayer is GOOD NEWS!

And they were not unanswered because of some religious ritual not followed!