A friend brings a question:
Your rent is due. Your heart is right before the Lord. You are not a sluggard. You confidently pray "Lord, Your word says you meet my needs. The rent needs to be paid. I thank You that I receive." Yet, rent day comes and you don't have the rent money, ten days later you still don't have the rent.
Your child is sick. You believe God is a healer. You watch Your child suffering. You go to your prayer closet and tell God "Lord, Your word says You bore this sickness. Your word says You are the Great Physician and the healer. Lord, please manifest healing in my child." Your child gets worse.
Your job is on the line. You need your job to pay the bills. You hear rumors of lay-offs. You pray "Lord, Your word says not to worry. Your word says to cast my care on You. You know our needs, oh Lord. I need this job to pay the rent. Thank You Lord for divine favor." You go to work and get a pink slip.
The first thing I would have to ask you is if these are real life situations, or are they hypotheticals?
If they are not hypotheticals, I would then have to ask you if you think Jesus lied when He said:
"All things, whatever you ask, praying, believe that you will receive and you will have them."
The three examples that you provide are all legitimate requests. They are not outlandish requests or requests originating from the flesh or lust. Employment, a home, and health for your children are certainly within the will of God for all His people.
I would then ask if you believe the following senario as you have suggested it. I have inserted the response you have suggested in blue:
"Your child is sick. You believe God is a healer. You watch Your child suffering. You go to your prayer closet and tell God 'Lord, Your word says You bore this sickness. Your word says You are the Great Physician and the healer. Lord, please manifest healing in my child.' GOD SAYS "NO", and in fact Your child gets worse"
Is this senario that you are suggesting? I could do the same to the other two situations but the effect would be the same. What is wrong with the above story? Is this the image and behavior of God that you are suggesting?
I am fully aware that the situations you suggest are played out every day in every town and church. It happens exactly like you present with two very important differences:
1. Of course God does not say no. He is not in the lying business or the "no" business.
2. There are many variables in life. The will, purpose, and provision of God are not among them. These are what we computer programmers would call a constants. They are static and never change:
James 1:16-17 KJV
16 Do not err, my beloved brethren.
17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning.
The goodness and perfectness of His gifts are not changing things; these are not "variable".
So in the "equation":
"That's why I tell you to have faith that you have already received whatever you pray for, and it will be yours.(Mark 11:24 GW)"
the only thing that is offered as a variable is our belief. God is a constant. The missing faith is the only thing that is variable and preventing you from receiving.
Finally, let me return to my first question.
Are these hypothetical or a real situations?
Do you know for a fact that someone's child was sick, and that the parent prayed believing, and child in fact got worse? Or is this just something you made up as a possilbe senario?
If it was merely a made up situation and we are to assume all of its elements are true...if in fact the parent asked and did believe... there is something terribly wrong because God lied and we are all doomed. Jesus lied when He said that we will recieve when we pray and believe. I of course do not believe this. Jesus and God did not lie. The made up situation could in fact never occur. There is something wrong, and it is not God. It is as I present above. For whatever reason, the parent in the hypothetical situation is not believing. That is the only possible answer.
If it was a real situation, then my response is as above. You are forcing me draw and state a conclusion that I normally do not present because people usually take it the wrong way and most non-WOF folks do not want to hear what I am about to say. They want to see it as an attack rather than a simple evalution of the facts. The devil suggests to them that this is mean spirited, when it in fact is merely a humble diagnosis:
The child was not healed because for some reason that we do not know(you did not say), the parent was not able to believe. I realize in your question you suggest that they were believing. But that could not be. If they were they would have received. Jesus said so. I do not say that from a position of condemnation or criticism. I say it with sadness because I have seen it happen all to often. As I said in the OP, people cannot/do not believe for many reasons, and the purpose of this thread is to eliminate one of them by showing its error: God does not say no.
If pressed further, I can only restate what I have presented in the opening graph. Jesus did not lie. He said if we ask believing, then we always receive. Always. I have to believe one way or the other. Either Jesus told the truth and we always recieve what we ask and believe for... or Jesus lied and God tells us no. I choose to believe Jesus.
The ultimate question and answer that needs to be addressed is this:
What does it mean to believe, and how do we come to believe. Once we discount the possiblity that God says no, then we can attack the true cause of a failed prayer life.... unbelief.
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