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Pastor Lud Golz
Pastor Lud Golz

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  Home | Transcript Archive | July | July 02, 2009

Thursday, July 02, 2009

As we have been studying what the Bible says about having realistic expectations about answers to our prayers one issue has come up a number of times. That issue has to do with motivation. Listen to James 4:3, “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.” 

If the primary concern is living an easier life then we shouldn’t have high expectations that God is going to grant our request. It’s not that He doesn’t want to give us what we ask for, it’s because He sees that it will not be beneficial to us. He is always looking out for our best interests. 
 
James said in chapter one of his epistle, verse 17, “Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights.” James no doubt remembered what Psalm 106:15 in The Message paraphrase says, God “gave them exactly what they asked for; but along with it they got an empty heart.” Seeking what is best from God’s perspective and for God’s purpose is always best in our praying. 
 
I noticed in the early days of using the system of categorizing my prayer requests that I have been describing in recent visits that I tended to put more requests into Categories A and B than were justified. I often presumed a request was Biblically based but on further reflection I found I really needed to search the Scriptures more thoroughly to be sure I understood God’s will. I needed to ask, “What was Hispriority rating?” 
 
In our next visit I will share one more category that I would describe as therapeutic prayers. I hope you’ll join us.
 

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