Continued from 4/4/2015

2. Ask God for it in faith.

Matthew 7:8 For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him

who knocks, the door will be opened.

Simply put, ask God for what you need. Another “A” in our FAITH acronym

might be “Agree.” It is good to find other people to agree with you in prayer.

Matthew 18:19 tells us, “Again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree

about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven.”

3. Imagine the answer to prayer in your mind.

Imagine it like you already have it. If you are praying for a relationship to

get better, imagine that it is. Your optimistic attitude will help change the

relationship. That is the way God created faith. On the other hand, being

pessimistic, lacking faith, and thinking about negative things, will cause

problems in the relationship. When a person thinks about the negatives of the

relationship, he will be more likely to get angry or do other things that are not

good for the relationship. I have seen this happen many times in my own life

and in the lives of others.

It is important to imagine you have already been given the answer to your

prayer, because if you have faith and you pray in God’s will, you do already

have the answer. I will explain this more in the chapter on Daniel.

4. Thank God for it.

In Mark 11:24 we read, “Whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you

have received it, and it will be yours.” Notice it says “…believe that you have

received it…”. This means that at the moment you ask God for it, you receive

it. However, it may take some time for it to materialize or to become substance

Some translations of Hebrews 11:1 read, “Faith is the substance (my emphasis)

of things hoped for…” Daniel prayed in Daniel 10, but the powerful angel that

came to give him the answer to his prayer was detained by Satan or a demon.

There was apparently a wrestling match in the unseen world. Paul said we

wrestle not against flesh and blood but against the powers in the heavenly

realms. These powers will do everything possible to damage our faith and

prevent us from getting an immediate answer to our prayer.

God could have answered Daniel’s prayer immediately if He wanted to, but for

some reason, He allowed the struggle in the heavenly realms to continue for

days before the angel was able to reach Daniel. Romans 8:28 says that in all

things God works for the good of those who love Him and are called according

to His purpose. God is certainly powerful enough to answer your prayer

immediately if He wants to, but usually He takes some time before He answers

it. God is more concerned about us growing spiritually strong than getting

everything we want right away. Just as our parents did not give us everything

we wanted because they knew it was for our best, God also sometimes does

not give us what we want when we ask for it. Every parent has probably had

a child who wanted to eat ice cream for supper; however, the parent knew it

would not be good for the child and did not permit it.

See the books on prayer.