Aim True Like A Fine Rifle

per james, ask for the right reasons, right intent
per john IF what we ask Him for is in his will, we will receive it!

 

I get what you saying, but in some regards I agree with the person who said if God really wanted to punish us, He would answer all of our prayers. I have prayed specifically for things that would have not been in my interest in hindsight. Thankfully, God said no. I have learned since to pray, "if it's in Your will." But I agree with specificity, because how else will you know when God says yes.

 

Who am I to know what it is I need? When I pray for the Lord to bless or protect my family I am putting faith in His ability to know what is best. I don’t know what dangers are ahead this day. I don’t know if the things I want are truly the things I need.

The specific “rifle” prayers you mention are a formula for failure. God knows better than we do and must often say NO to our requests. In my lifetime I have had many prayers, many of them very specific prayers, answered like I wanted, but probably ten fold were answered negatively.

When you ask for a specific prayer like, “Lord please let so and so be healed from their cancer and live” and then they die, you must recognize that it was not God’s will to heal them. I have prayed by many hospital beds and an awful lot of those people died. Was there something wrong with me? Was there something wrong with my prayers?

I feel the danger here is that we get into a “wealth and prosperity” mode where we expect God to bless us with material gain and joy. The Lord’s will for our lives too often is wrought with pain and poverty, yet it is still His will and still brings glory to Him. Your poverty, your loss, your pain, your sufferings, are not indications that you have failed or that God has forsaken you.

 

Jesus told his Apostles that the father would answer anything they asled of him in name of jesus, but peter /john/james qualified that, for peter said to make sure relationship with wife solid, John if in will of God, james ask from good intentions/desires!

 

HAMel and NC Tentmaker, you are both right.

How often do we have the perception, both in ourselves and others, that we/they are just going through the motions of praying? -- Canned prayers.

How often do we have a "gimme something special", as the basis of our prayers? By way of example: Lady at church bumped her leg and had a bruise. Added her name to the prayer list, knowing that in a few days her bruise would fade away. Maybe not the best example, but hope it serves to illustrate how often our prayers can be so self-centered that we can easily get into the mode of "wealth and prosperity" for even trival concerns.

Thy will be done.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and the wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; Enjoying one moment at a time; Accepting hardship as the pathway to peace. Taking, as Jesus did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; Trusting that He will make all things right, if I surrender to His will; That I may be reasonably happy in this life, And supremely happy with Him forever in the next. ~ Reinhold Niebuhr

 

Perhaps I did.

I understand the idea of asking for very specific, and often difficult things, that way we know God is hearing our prayers and answering us. But the word of caution I would extend is to remember that the answers to those prayers will often be no. Even when the answer is yes, it may not be what we really need.