Answered Prayer

Garth Brooks did a song years ago about how some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers.  I thought about that at Mass this morning during the homily because the deacon was saying that God does not always answer our prayers.  I respectfully disagree with both of them. 

God answers all prayers, He just doesn’t necessarily do it the way we want Him to or when we want Him to.  Our world has moved into an “instant gratification” mind set and that, coupled with our self-centeredness, means we expect everything we want right now.  We need to learn “delayed gratification”, but I’ll talk about that another day.

God does answer each and every prayer, in His way and in His time.  He will either answer “yes,” “no” or “not yet.”  If we truly have a relationship with God, we’ll understand these answers when we get them.  This requires maturity in our spiritual lives, which takes time (delayed gratification).

Just because God doesn’t “grant our wishes” does not mean He has not answered our prayers.  Our Father loves us and He knows what’s best for us; much more than we do.  We may look with our own eyes and see what we need, but He looks with His all knowing eyes and knows what we need.  He is more interested in helping us get to heaven than in getting more prestige, money or whatever we think we want.

The next time you think God has not answered your prayers, spend some quiet time in prayer and ask God what His answer was, you may just find He answered it in a way you didn’t quite expect.  Garth Brooks had it somewhat right, some of God’s greatest gifts are different answers to our prayers than we expected.

“He whose attitude towards Christ is correct does indeed ask ‘in His Name’ and receives what he asks for, if it is something which does not stand in the way of his salvation. He gets it, however, only when he ought to receive it, for certain things are not refused us, but their granting is delayed to a fitting time.” ~Saint Augustine~