Answered Prayer Certainties Part II
If you read this column a couple weeks ago, we talked about a certainty that exists in an uncertain world. That was eternal life. We can have eternal life, and that life comes through Jesus Christ. I John 5:12 “Whoever has the Son has life.” God says it, so it is true.
This passage actually lists 4 more things that we can be confident about. Each of these starts with the phrase, "we may know." We can be confident if we know and are convinced of its truth. So the next one says 1 John 5:15, "we know that we have the request we have asked from Him.” There is a certainty of answered prayer. It's not a magic wand, though; there are constraints. I John 3:22, "and whatever we ask we receive from Him because we keep His commandments and do the things that are pleasing in His sight." You can't just ignore God and who He is. He tells us in the Gospel of John that we will keep His commands if we love Him. If God is supreme, then it only makes sense that we should obey Him. What He tells us to do is always consistent with who He is. That means we need to know Him, who He is, and what He tells us. Being obedient to Him is a prerequisite to answered prayer.
Similarly, then, is having our hearts right with Him by not harboring sin. Psalm 66:18 says, "If I regard wickedness in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." Practicing and leaving unconfessed sin in my life is a hindrance in having my prayers heard and then answered. God hears and answers when I am in sync with Him. The first part of John 15 is about joining Him in a deep relationship. At least 6 times, Jesus says, "Abide in Me." He also says I'll abide in you. It's a unique relationship, but it produces an understanding of what we should pray for that will give us certainty in knowing He will answer.
If we take a more detailed look at our original text, we will see that this is at the core of knowing our prayers will be answered. I John 5:14, 15, “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.” This may not be what you’re looking for. You may want what you want and not what He wants. That is not how this works. God wants you to be more like Him, and that starts when you ask for forgiveness of your sins because Jesus took your sins on Himself when He died on the cross. At that point, God begins to make a new person that takes on the characteristics of Jesus. II Corinthians 5:17: "Therefore if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creature; the old things passed away; behold, new things have come." It's in this new creation that God makes of us that we can know that we have answered prayer as we have joined with Jesus to desire the same things He does.
As God forgives our sins and gives us eternal life through Jesus, He changes us to be more like Him. Through that process, we begin to pray in a way that reflects Him and His desires so we can be confident that He will answer our prayers.
Pastor Lynn Rettig
Musselshell Community Bible Church
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