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"MondayReflection"
22th April 2025
'John Piper'
founder and teacher of desiringGod.org
"What Do Answers to Prayer Depend On?"
We do not purchase answers to prayer by anything we say or do.
Part of the answer is that they depend on our being obedient children.
I stressed that this does not mean we must be sinlessly perfect in order to have our prayers answered because then the prayer, "Forgive us our sins," would be a self-contradiction.
Jesus did teach us to pray that our sins be forgiven (Matthew 6:12).
We must not presume to think that we can get God to do whatever we want, if our hearts are not set on doing what he wants
Two answers to our question have forced themselves on me.
22 Jesus answered them, "Have faith in God.
23 I assure you that whoever tells this hill to get up and throw itself in the sea and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him.
24 For this reason I tell you: When you pray and ask for something, believe that you have received it, and you will be given whatever you ask for. 25 And when you stand and pray, forgive anything you may have against anyone, so that your Father in heaven will forgive the wrongs you have done."
Mark 11:22-25.
The two words in this text which demand clarification are the words "whatever" and "believe".
And when Jesus says that we must not doubt, but believe that what we say will come to pass, does he mean that, in order to have our prayers answered, we must have undoubting faith that God will give us the very thing we ask?
Let's start with the word "whatever" in verse 24.
There are three reasons why we should not think Jesus intended to give a blank check to us.
The nature of language is such that all words get their meaning from their usage.
If you were invited out to eat and you sat down at the table and said, "I'll eat whatever you have," no one would offer you a pencil to eat, or a straw basket, or a shoe.
They would know that "whatever" meant "whatever you are serving for dinner."
There are texts elsewhere in Scripture which teach that there are things we won't get, even if we ask for them.
James 4:2, 3 says,
"You do not have because you do not ask, you ask and do not receive because you ask wrongly to spend it on your passions."
If James is right, you won't get whatever you ask for, no matter how much you believe you will, if what you're asking for is simply for your own private satisfaction.
Mark 11:25, says,
Whenever you stand praying, forgive, if you have anything against anyone; so that your Father in heaven may forgive your trespasses.
It shows that Jesus did not mean you could pray for vengeance to come on all your enemies.
The right things to ask for are things that accord with God's will.
Now that brings us to the second word "believe,"
The crucial question that rises out of such statements is,
"How is such undoubting faith possible?"
The only answer I can think of is that such undoubting faith is only possible if we know what God intends to do for those who believe.
I have had the flu all week. But I have not been able to pray for healing with undoubting faith that it will happen.
The reason is that I do not know the will of God in regard to my health.
Whenever we are forced to say,
"Yet, not my will but thine be done,"
we are admitting that we have no certainty about whether our specific request will be granted.
And there is no reason to feel guilty about that because faith that has no doubts is only possible where we know, at least in general, what God intends to do for us.
How do we find out what God intends to do in response to faith?
There are two answers.
One is that God reveals much of what he intends to do through the Scripture.
The other answer is that God can reveal his intention apart from Scripture privately to an individual or group.
God has never communicated to me what he intends to do any other way than by the Scripture.
But I think he could, so I will leave open this possibility of how we can find out what God aims to do in response to faith.
The more usual way we discover what God wills to do is by reading his revealed word in the Bible.
If we seek first the Kingdom, all our need will be supplied
Or as Philippians 4:19 puts it,
"My God will supply every need of yours according to his riches in glory in Christ Jesus."
What goal determines Paul's understanding of need?
Paul says in Philippians 4:12,
"I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want."
The promise is that God will supply us with all we need to keep on doing his will and glorifying him.
God works all things for good for His own
This is the greatest and most far-reaching of all the promises in the Bible.
The effect it has on prayer is tremendous.
It means that when our specific requests are denied, God is preparing something better for us.
He never stops working for the best interests of his children.
And therefore, in every prayer we pray we can have complete and undoubting confidence in this,
"God will give me what is best for me in response to my prayer."
Don't ever doubt that.
What man of you, if his son asks of him bread, will give him a stone?
Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent?
If you, then, who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!
That is what God will always give in response to our prayers - good things.
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This is an edited version.
The full article and Bible references are avaiable on request
John Piper
is founder and teacher of desiringGod.org and chancellor of Bethlehem College & Seminary.
For 33 years, he served as pastor of Bethlehem Baptist Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota.
He is author of more than 50 books, including Desiring God: Meditations of a Christian Hedonist and most recently Come, Lord Jesus.
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