Unanswered Prayer - Part 2

Today on Fellowship in the Word, Pastor Bill Gebhardt challenges you to become a fully functioning follower of Jesus Christ. Notice the connection between prayer and faith here. Jesus says, let me tell you something, this is a hyperbole by the way, no one's done this.

Because remember there's conditions. Whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and cast into the sea if it's God's will. That's what he just said, it has to be in God's will.

Not yours. See the power doesn't lie in you, it lies in God. And does not have any doubt, you actually believe God can do this. He said that could be granted to you. If it's God's will and you don't doubt it, I'll put the mountain in the sea.

That's amazing. Thank you for joining us today on this edition of Fellowship in the Word with Pastor Bill Gebhardt. Fellowship in the Word is the radio ministry of Fellowship Bible Church located in Metairie, Louisiana. Let's join Pastor Bill Gebhardt now as once again he shows us how God's word meets our world. The former pastor of the church used to say, Christians, especially in adulterous situations and things like that, he would say they're becoming sin sick.

And I thought that's an interesting way, it's like they have a disease. They can't see what everyone sees, their own sin. And they justify it and harbor it in their heart. So what's God's solution? New Testament, go with me to 1 John chapter 1. 1 John chapter 1, beginning in verse 5. 1 John chapter 1. 1 John is written to believers. Chapter 2 verse 1 says, my little children. He's not writing to an unbeliever, he's writing to believers. And he's talking about how do you establish an intimate relationship with God? How do you and God walk together? Which is the goal of all of our lives.

How do you do that? So he says in verse 5, this is the message we have heard from him and announced to you. God is light and in him there's no darkness at all. He starts out with a fact.

That shouldn't surprise us. God is light, he has no darkness. If we say that we have fellowship with him and yet we walk in darkness, we lie, we don't practice the truth. You see, this pastor couldn't say, hey, I walk in the light with the Lord.

No, you don't. You live in darkness. You see, you're living in darkness. You can't have fellowship with God and live in darkness. He said, but if we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another. And the blood of Jesus, the son, cleanses us of all sin. He means the sacrifice of Christ, the forgiveness of God is always available in our relationship with him. He's not talking about going to heaven or not. This has nothing to do with that. This is written to believers. If you want to have a relationship with God, you need to walk in the light just as God's in the light.

That makes as much sense as anything could. Well, then he goes on and he said, if we say we have no sin, we're deceiving ourselves, the truth's not in us. See, you can't do that. I don't ever sin. That's a lie.

I think that's one. You see, that's just the way this works. Then he says, here we go, if we confess our sins, he's faithful and righteous to forgive us of our sins and cleanses them all in righteousness. Wow. He said, if we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, his word's not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us of our sins.

That one word causes a lot of people, especially with so many people in this room, because of your background. Confess. Oh, I know about confession.

Yeah. Not sure you do. Confession is not about you doing so many Hail Marys and our fathers. It's not about you doing it. You don't work off your sin. Christ died for the sin.

That's over. The word confession doesn't mean what you think when you think of confession. I've really got to confess this. It's a simple word. The word's homo legao, homo, one, same, legao, word. To say the same word that God says, to agree with God.

That's what homo legao is. God, I've sinned against you. I know that sin. I acknowledge my sin before you. God says, that's fine, son. The blood of Christ continues to cleanse you. You and I still walk in the light now. See, that's such an important part.

Why? Because once we came to Christ, sin didn't leave us, as you know. If you don't believe it and you're married, you know at least it didn't leave your spouse. I mean, that's just the way this works. We sin. Everybody sins. But I have to acknowledge my sin, because I want to walk in light with God. You see, that's the whole point.

That's the part that he's making. He explains that even further over in chapter 2, verse 1. I'm writing these things so that you may not sin. But if anyone sins, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous. He himself is the propitiation for our sins.

Propitiation means satisfaction. He has satisfied the holiness of God with his sacrifice. And not for ours only, but also those of the whole world. Christ died for the sins of the world. So the point that he is making here is that we have an advocate. The Bible says he's our high priest. Jesus Christ intercedes for us.

That's the point. But we have to acknowledge our sin. So if you're involved in a sinful state and you decide, I'm not going to, I like this. And let's be honest. All of us have certain chronic sins that not only haven't you given up, but you probably don't want to. That's our heart.

You see, all of us have that. And he said, you have to acknowledge your sins. Because if you don't acknowledge your sins, as he said through David and the book of Isaiah, he said, I won't listen. So for some of us, the first thing we need to do if we want to make real good prayer requests to God is acknowledge our own sin.

You see, that's the point that he's trying to make. So we have to sometimes we don't pray. Sometimes we pray with the wrong motive. Sometimes we lack faith and sometimes we don't confess our sins.

And there's one more. Sometimes there's no answer to our prayers because of how you and I relate to other people. This is interesting.

I'll give you three different examples. Go with me to Proverbs chapter 21. Proverbs chapter 21. In verse 13. Proverbs 21, 13, Solomon writing. He who shuts his ear to the cry of the poor will also cry himself and not be answered.

Isn't that interesting? You turn your back on the needy people of your world and God says, I'll turn my back on you. You should answer the cry of the poor.

Because you're going to cry to me and now you expect me to answer you. It's a lot like what Jesus said. If you judge people from a judgmental point of view, I'll judge you by that standard. It's the same idea. You don't turn your back. So, I was here right in the beginning in the announcements tooting your horn. You know, saying, hey, there were people in the mission, there were poor.

Way to go. Now, I'm not naive. I don't think it was all of you.

But I do think it was some of you. See, how do you relate to that? How you relate to other people has an enormous effect on how God's going to relate to you in prayer. Secondly, go with me to Mark chapter 11. Mark chapter 11. Starting in verse 22.

This is interesting. Jesus answered, saying to them, he said, have faith in God. Now, Jesus is just making his point with that statement. There is nothing more important in your faith in God. Faith is the most important thing. Now, watch how he relates it. Truly, I say to you, whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and cast into the sea and does not doubt in his heart, but believes that what he says is going to happen, it will be granted to him. Notice the connection between prayer and faith here. Jesus says, let me tell you something. This is a hyperbole, by the way.

No one's done this. But he said, because remember, there's conditions. Whoever says to this mountain, be taken up and cast into the sea if it's God's will.

That's what we just said. It has to be in God's will. Not yours. See, the power doesn't lie in you.

It lies in God and does not have any doubt. You actually believe God can do this. He said, that could be granted to you. If it's God's will and you don't doubt it, I'll put them out in the sea.

That's amazing. He said, therefore, I say to you, all things for which you pray and ask, believe that you received it and they'll be granted to you if it meets the conditions. See, this confuses a lot of people that will use that verse and say, well, the Bible says I can ask for anything I want and I get it. That's what it says.

No, it doesn't because you don't have any power in you. Then he says, whenever you stand praying. Here we go. Forgive. Wait a minute.

How do you stick that in there? Whenever you stand praying, forgive if you have anything against anyone so that the father who is in heaven will also forgive you and your transgressions. But if you do not forgive, neither will your father who is in heaven forgive your transgressions.

Wow. Anybody who has anything against you, anybody who has hurt you, anybody who has said anything to you, done anything to you. He said, you better forgive. And if you don't, don't expect me to listen. You see, what are we as people?

What's the core of being a Christian? You know it and I am forgiven. Do I deserve it?

Nope. And you don't either. I am forgiven. Everything that I have coming to me in eternity is because God forgave me in spite of myself. That's our faith. So that's why Paul wrote to the Ephesians and said, and you have to forgive others, exist like Jesus has forgiven you.

And you know that. I mean, when Jesus was here, Peter tried to impress him and say, I know, let's see, the rabbis teach you only should forgive a person once. You see, that's the whole idea, once.

But I'll say three times. You see, and what do we do when it comes to forgiveness? You see, if you do something to me, you see, it's shame on you. But if you do it again and I'd forgive you again, it's what? Shame on me. That's twice.

No deal. Well, just think of Jesus that I'm not going to forgive you more than once. Where are we all going? You see, that's why Paul said you have to forgive us. Jesus forgave you. Now he says here in Mark 11 that you make sure you have forgiven those who have hurt you when you come to God in prayer. Is that hard?

Yes. That's really hard. Because you know who bears the pain of forgiveness? Always the forgiver.

Always. You always bear the pain. Somebody's got pain and only the forgiver is going to bear it. You see, and sometimes the way we think, we think, wait, this isn't even fair.

So I forgive him and now he's all free. And I bear all this pain. I'd rather be angry. I'd rather want vengeance.

I'd rather become bitter. God says that won't do you any good. In fact, God said he's not all free. Remember what he said in Romans? Vengeance is mine, says the Lord. I'll repay. Now, that's a promise.

So don't worry about it. God will have that handled. But notice even there, the second thing is, if I don't have compassion for the needy and when I forgive those, I'm in conflict with. One last one is found in First Peter, Chapter three, First Peter, Chapter three. Now, Chapter three of First Peter, I won't go into the earlier verses, is talking about he's talking about a marital relationship. And he's talking about first the women, that part, if their husbands are disobedient to the word, how should they handle it? And by the way, you can't read six verses that seem more out of context than it with American culture than those six. When you read it, most of the time I tout this in a Bible study, I can just see the lady's eyebrows all furled.

You know, I mean, but that's what God said. You read it on your own. But notice verse seven, you husbands in the same way live with your wives in an understanding way. Understanding is an interesting word. If I put it in a paraphrase, this husbands must become students of their wives. I believe, because I'm far enough down the road, that's to you by death depart.

It's a lifetime pursuit. You have to be a student of your wife. Now, you say, why didn't they say wives do that?

He'll explain right now. He said, as with someone weaker, he said, with someone weaker since she's a woman. Ah, there's that chauvinism. This isn't about flexing muscles.

This isn't what he's talking about. You know what the word weaker means? Much more fragile. Implication emotionally. The analogy I've used when I've taught this over the year, Peter sees women as a vase and men as a bucket. OK, if you think of a vase and you think of a bucket, you know the difference. Women don't have to spend their lives understanding a man.

They can get that done in a week or two. There's no depth to men. We have no depth. We just are who we are. Now, women have found that.

Don't try to change that because that's a lifetime pursuit that you'll probably fail in. But women are much more complicated. Women speak on emotional levels a lot. Intimate emotional levels. Men, not so much. Only if you make them. I mean, men can—I'm not kidding. If I would talk to someone, even my own father, on the phone for an hour when he was alive, I'd get off the phone and my wife would say, OK, how's your mother doing?

She had health issues. Oh, I don't know. You don't know? No.

How about your brother? I don't know. What did you talk about? Sports. For an hour, we ran out of things to say and then that was it.

We could talk about fishing for hours, hunting for hours, golf for hours. That's men. But the idea of just pouring out your heart and going deep inside, man, that is really difficult for a man to do. I mean, see, it's not hard to understand. So that's what he's talking about.

But notice what he goes on and says. Show her honor as a fellow heir of the grace of life so that your prayers will not be hindered. How a couple relates to each other affects both of their prayer lives. Why?

Why would he do that? There's one horizontal relationship on earth that is the picture of your relationship with God. Husband and wife. And the two shall become one flesh. Marriage is a picture of your relationship with Christ and mine.

And that's why when we get to the end times, what happens in the Book of Revelation? It's called the marriage of the lamb. Who's the bride? All of us.

Male or female won't matter. We all make up the bride of Christ. So marriage is held to high esteem by God. He said the way your marriage works will have an effect on your prayer life.

Wow. So just think of it. You know, your prayers go unanswered if you don't pray, if you pray with the wrong motives, if you lack faith, if you don't confess your sin.

And it's how you relate to people. Now, a lot of times when you think God is not answering my prayers, there is a word that describes the way God often answers. Slow. That's important to God. Prayers are answered on God's timing, not yours. And see, how tenacious are you to pray without ceasing?

I think a lot of Christians will pray about something important for about a week. I'm done. I'm done.

I mean, I didn't get the answer. God says, don't do that. You're to pray without ceasing. David Jeremiah is a very close friend with my late mentor at Dallas Seminary, Howard Hendricks. And David Jeremiah tells a story. He said how he told him.

He said and I heard him say this. He said, Dr. Hendricks became a believer around 12 or 13 junior high in Philadelphia. His father is an unbeliever. And so Hendricks began praying for his father. And he told David Jeremiah, I prayed every day for my dad's salvation. For 72 years. And his dad converted before he died. How many of you?

10 years, 20 years. How many of you prayed for something? See this? Hendricks prayed every day. That's amazing. You see, but one day is no better than the other. He just prayed it the whole time. See, that's interesting. God said slow.

I don't want slow. God's timing is always different than ours. Sometimes God says no. Paul had a thorn in the flesh. Three times he entreated the Lord. What did God say?

No, no, no. Then God explained it. Look, Paul.

Yeah, I understand. Whenever you're weak physically in pain, I'm strong in your life. But whenever you're healthy, you're strong in your life. Paul probably has a pride problem. So God said no. And Paul said, then I'll accept the pain for the rest of my life. So sometimes God says no. Then sometimes and often God says grow. He'll just wait until he sees you grow. See, you'll stay in the trial until what?

Until I grow, until I pass the test. He'll stay with it. Sometimes the prayers turn back on us to see, well, I trust him. That's an important part of this. And you and I both know we run to God when we're in great trial. We run to him. We can't wait to pray. And God says, yeah, I'm going to wait a little bit on this because you need to change. And then often God says, yes.

Yes, we meet the conditions. And he says, yes, I'll do that. In fact, James five says this. The effect of prayer of a righteous man accomplishes much. And then he says, oh, by the way, Elijah was a man just like you.

Just like you. That was a lot. And he prayed and it didn't rain for three and a half years. Would you call that powerful prayer?

Yes. He's just like you are. The notice the way he worded it, though, he said that the effect of prayer of a righteous man will accomplish much.

Why? A righteous man, the desires of his heart as God. See, that's a righteous man. That's a man who walks in light. That's a man of knowledge as a sin.

He meets all these conditions. And God says, yeah, that man can accomplish a lot. Prayer is such an important part of our lives and we underestimated Billy Graham was asked very late in his life. If you could do anything different, what would you do, Billy?

And Billy Graham said this. He said, if I could do anything better and different, I would pray a lot more. I would have prayed more all through my life. Now, think of all the things we think Billy Graham accomplished.

And Graham said, yeah, but I miss there was something I should have done more not go to more rallies, not lead more people to Christ. I should have prayed more. So this morning, just let me say, pray without ceasing. And if God isn't answering your prayers, just make sure it's not because of you. Let's pray. Father, this is such a difficult issue for all of us.

It's hard for us to understand sometimes that you're willing to answer, but you're answering your timing, not ours. You just ask us to wait and to wait requires faith. Sometimes, Father, you won't answer our prayers simply because we're praying for the wrong things with the wrong motives. Sometimes, Father, we're harboring our own sin.

Sometimes, Father, we're not forgiving others who have hurt us. Father, may your word speak to us today and say, look, I'm not going to let that be a condition for my unanswered prayer. But, Father, so often with so much grace, you tell us to come boldly to that throne of grace and you give us the mercy and grace that we need. We thank you for that. We thank you for answering our prayers because we realize, just like with our salvation, we're not worthy.

We don't deserve it. We simply receive it because of your greatness. Father, I pray that all of us continue to pray without ceasing, to continue to be dependent on you, to continue to examine our own motives and lives because, Father, that will create a life that will be for our good. And more importantly, it will create a life that is for your glory. We pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen. You've been listening to Pastor Bill Gebhardt on the Radio Ministry of Fellowship in the Word. If you ever miss one of our broadcasts or maybe you would just like to listen to the message one more time, remember that you can go to a great website called oneplace.com. That's oneplace.com, and you can listen to Fellowship in the Word online.

At that website, you will find not only today's broadcast but also many of our previous audio programs as well. At Fellowship in the Word, we are thankful for those who financially support our ministry and make this broadcast possible. We ask all of our listeners to prayerfully consider how you might help this radio ministry continue its broadcast on this radio station by supporting us monthly or with just a one-time gift. Support for our ministry can be sent to Fellowship in the Word 4600 Clearview Parkway, Metairie, Louisiana 7006. If you would be interested in hearing today's message in its original format, that is as a sermon that Pastor Bill delivered during a Sunday morning service at Fellowship Bible Church, then you should visit our website, fbcnola.org.

That's fbcnola.org. At our website, you will find hundreds of Pastor Bill's sermons. You can browse through our sermon archives to find the sermon series you are looking for, or you can search by title. Once you find the message you are looking for, you can listen online, or if you prefer, you can download the sermon and listen at your own convenience. And remember, you can do all of this absolutely free of charge. Once again, our website is fbcnola.org. For Pastor Bill Gebhardt, I'm Jason Gebhardt, thanking you for listening to Fellowship in the Word.