As Christians, prayer is our hope and weapon against trials and troubles of life as we breathe our days.
Why is God not answering my prayers? seem to be a quite whisper, a silent question inside us, when we find things not happening our way.
So now our faith and hope in God is dwindled, making us spend lesser moments in prayers.
Understanding the Thought, God Not Answering My Prayers?
Have you ever cried out to God and felt like your prayers disappeared into the silence?
In a world where everything moves faster, messages reply instantly, results come in seconds, waiting on God can feel unbearable and not customary to us.
You start wondering, why is God not answering my prayers?
You’re not alone. Many believers today struggle with this very question.
To begin, what is prayers?
We often approach prayers like a divine vending machine, insert a certain or right words of faith and our required needs, press the button, and expect the desired outcome, our wish and desires, all fulfilled.
When nothing comes out, we assume the machine is broken or unreal, thus God is not answering my prayers.
But O’ human being, God is not a machine. He is a Person, a loving Father, the first word if combined together as “Our Father” just as Jesus taught us to address Him in the “Lord’s Prayer”.
And this God in the perspective of a believer and a devout Christian spans eternity.
The first truth we must hold onto is that God’s silence is never equal to His absence.
The Bible assures us:
“Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you.”
Even when God seems distant. His promises remain near.
He is watching you, stirring your life, and loving you.
Sometimes silence can have the highest sound, when the stage is a prayer and the dialogue is spiritual, that moment of silence will deepen our faith.
So the eternal God when in Prayer to whom we address our needs doesn’t think or work like us humans in ‘yes’ or ‘no’
- ‘Yes’: This is the answer we long for, as it matches exactly as per our needs. We see it happening, we rejoice, and now our faith feels cheered and uplifted.
- ‘Not Yet’: Why? We would protest.
Our ignorant self don’t know where waiting comes in.
God has a timing, and even the saints in heaven pledge that “God’s timing is perfect.”
The story of Joseph in prison (Genesis 40-41) is a powerful story to a “not yet” moment from prisoner to prime minister.
- ‘I have a plan’
“plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jeremiah 29:11)
I’m only human, is your response. I’m asking for relief from a hardship, and God gives us a plan that is, the grace to endure it.
Building us to be resilient, we never knew we needed.
We feel God is closing the door of our needs.
There is frustration and unbelief and we protest, God is not answering my prayers.
But those who trust in the LORD will find new strength. They will soar high on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not faint.
(Isaiah 40:31)
Waiting on God is not a punishment but a preparation. During the delay, God may be shaping our character, aligning circumstances, or protecting us from what we cannot yet see.
Think of Joseph, from the Holy Bible, sold into slavery and imprisoned for years before rising to power in Egypt.
Had God answered his prayers for freedom immediately, the greater purpose, saving a nation, would not have been fulfilled.
God’s “not yet” is often His way of saying, “Trust Me, I’m doing something great.
God’s Silence: A Mirror to My Soul
Sometimes, the barrier to God not answering my prayers is not God’s unwillingness, but the condition of our own hearts.
The Bible, the Word of God, gives us clear insight into things that can hinder our prayers.
- Unconfessed Sin: Sin creates a barrier in our relationship with God. This does not mean we have to be absolutely perfect for God to hear our prayers, but a heart that is unrepentant and clinging to wrongdoing can stifle our prayers.
“If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.”
(Psalm 66:18)
- Selfish Motives: Are we praying for God’s will in our lives or for our own agenda and will to be approved?
God is not answering my prayers as my prayers are about my own comfort and wishes, not God’s glory and His Kingdom.
“When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.”
- Strained Relationships: Our vertical relationship with God is intimately connected to our horizontal relationships with others, our fellow beings.
Hatred and un-forgiveness can surely be a significant hindrance in your prayers going dry in fulfilment.
“And when you stand praying, if you hold anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may forgive you your sins.”
(Mark 11:25)
Now this isn’t a performance based relationship with God but is a relationship in alignment to God’s will for each of us.
It is coming before God with humbleness, repentance for all our wrongdoings, and an open heart, asking God to accept our whole surrendering to Him, so to align His will and desires for our life.
God Is Listening: Waiting in Faith, Not in Doubt
Nurse your faith, and don’t doubt that God is not answering my prayers.
God listens to your every word. Never let the evil one fill your ears with doubts regarding your prayers.
I will answer them before they even call to me. While they are still talking about their needs, I will go ahead and answer their prayers!
(Isaiah 65:24)
The promise above from the bible should be your faith, your belief in God.
The wisdom of God is unseen to our limited minds.
God Works for Our Good, even the ‘no’s’ and ‘not yets’ are woven into moments in wait, that will turn into moments in gold with time, that we cannot yet see.
There is a purpose in God’s will and ways.
God has filled our days in life with gifts, good gifts, not the material earthly kinds that perish, but the spiritual kinds that are more than gifts and are blessings for us each.
If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!
(Matthew 7:11)
The “answering my prayers” by God will happen in His way.
God has a plans for us, His plans and thoughts are higher, better and more lasting than our limited understanding that we ask for in prayers.
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,” declares the Lord. “As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts.”
(Isaiah 55:8-9)
What do we do when we feel for there is no ‘answering my prayer’
Waiting in Faith, should be our virtue. We do what the faithful that we learn of from the Bible have always done, we keep showing up. We come before Jesus, each day with raw honesty and a renewed beginning, seeking Him as the only savior and provider of our life and its needs.
We surround ourselves with persons of faith, and a community of believers who can pray with us and for us.
There is a promise in the scriptures, we should immerse in that truth, filling the silence that we feel with God’s written word.
We should choose to worship, not because of our circumstances, but in spite of them.
My Prayers Will be Answered: Holding Unto God
The intimacy and love of God over outcome, should be our spiritual zeal.
In our desperation of God answering my prayers, we can become so fixated on the thing we’re asking for that we miss the ‘One’ we are speaking to, the ‘Almighty God’
The core of our praying should not be the things that we get from God, but to get God Himself, filling up the spiritual dryness in us.
It is about our communion with Christ.
When in the moments where we feel God seems silent or our prayers seem dry, God is inviting us to press in closer.
To shift our prayer from “God give me…” to “God show me. Be with me in this moment, Change me…”
For most of our Christian struggles happens for our faith to grow profoundly.
It’s the presence of God in the receiving of the miracle that we had prayed for is at the core of our Christian faith and not alone its fulfillment.
Your prayer has been heard, stop thinking that God is not answering my prayers.
It may look different than you expected, it may arrive in a time that was not of your choice.
But remember, it’s coming from the hand of your “Almighty and Loving Father” who loves you perfectly and is committed to your ultimate good and wellness.
Hold on tight towards your hope and faith in Jesus.
Keep praying, your faith is being tested, but is also being strengthened for a glory and a blessing that will far outweigh this present struggle.
