ALL THINGS WHATSOEVER YE SHALL ASK IN PRAYER, BELIEVING, YE SHALL RECEIVE

In our materialistic society we are all too familiar with fantastic offers which, initially, appear so special until one reads the small print at the bottom. There are so many conditions attached that the fabulous can quickly become the futile.

The text before us today is not like that. Certainly, it is a great offer, containing what seems to be an unlimited promise. It is like an open ticket or a blank cheque. All things possible to prayer! When, however, it comes to daily experience and the promise does not seem to work out, we ask, ‘What is wrong?’. But we must ask ourselves again, ‘Has one of the promises of Christ failed?’. Never! The problem is that we have not looked carefully enough at the condition which is very dearly articulated by the Lord Himself in the immediate context.

Prevailing prayer must be accompanied by faith. The operative word of the text is ‘believing’. This is the faith, plus prayer, which can wither trees and uproot mountains. The Lord Jesus uses these natural objects as illustrations of what is humanly possible. Such situations can only be met by confident prayer. Many believers can testify to occasions when, confronted by human extremities, their confident cries Godward were matched by events nothing short of proofs of God’s omnipotence.

There is further amplification of this principle in the parallel passage in Mark chapter 11. There the Lord Jesus adds, in verse 22, ‘Have faith in God’. Here we learn that the faith in question is not blind, bare or baseless. It is the organ of the soul which rises from what is human to what is divine, from what is circumstantial to what is celestial, from what is earthly to what is eternal. Difficulties become designs, and obstacles become opportunities whenever faith brings God into the realities of life.

A further condition is introduced by the Lord in Mark chapter 11 in the very same section. He says in verse 25, ‘When ye stand praying, forgive’. Prevailing prayer must also be accompanied by a forgiving spirit. With faith Godward and forgiveness manward may our requests be increasingly fruitful to God’s glory.