If God Is Sovereign, Are My Prayers Pointless?
00:00:00.000 | If God's will prevails, is it pointless for me to pray for what I want?
00:00:11.560 | This is a really good question from a podcast listener named Andrea.
00:00:15.280 | "Pastor John, hello.
00:00:16.960 | Why should we pray for things that we want, happiness for ourselves or healing for others,
00:00:22.960 | if we know in the end that God's will will be done?
00:00:26.760 | I struggle with praying for what I want because I know in the end God's plan will prevail
00:00:31.160 | anyways.
00:00:32.160 | And besides, He knows better than me because He is sovereign.
00:00:35.640 | I feel like this thought sometimes inhibits my prayer life.
00:00:39.320 | Isn't it pointless for me to pray for what I want?
00:00:43.420 | But then if I don't pray for what I want, what then would be the point of praying anyways?"
00:00:49.680 | Oh my, this is good.
00:00:52.120 | There are so many questions to ask about prayer.
00:00:57.460 | We can ask, "What does it mean to pray according to God's will?"
00:01:02.160 | 1 John 5:14.
00:01:03.160 | "What does it mean to pray in the name of Jesus?"
00:01:06.680 | John 14, 13.
00:01:08.440 | "What does it mean not to pray for the sin that leads to death?"
00:01:13.160 | 1 John 5, 16.
00:01:15.560 | Why is God compared to an unrighteous judge in Luke 18 when we pray?
00:01:22.080 | Or what does it mean to pray without ceasing in 1 Thessalonians 5, 17?
00:01:27.600 | Or what does it mean to pray in the Holy Spirit if He's in 6, 18 and on and on and on we
00:01:32.680 | could go?
00:01:33.680 | It's not surprising, it seems to me, therefore, that since prayer is one of the most stunning,
00:01:39.320 | amazing, astounding privileges given to human beings, that it would be shrouded in mystery.
00:01:47.640 | I mean, think of it.
00:01:48.720 | The Creator of the universe with infinite wisdom and infinite power and infinite goodness
00:01:55.840 | is telling us, finite, fallible, sinful creatures, to ask Him to do things that we think would
00:02:04.240 | be good for the glory of His name and for the good of the world.
00:02:09.840 | And that is exactly what the Lord's Prayer tells us to do.
00:02:13.000 | Pray, "Hallowed be Your name."
00:02:14.640 | That means glorify Your name, God honor Your name, revere Your name, and make sure Your
00:02:20.040 | will is done the way the angels do it in heaven, and so on.
00:02:24.000 | So I just begin this by saying, prayer is amazing to me.
00:02:28.160 | I love it, I'm baffled by it, I'm stunned.
00:02:32.720 | But she asked, I think, an answerable question.
00:02:36.200 | A lot of people stumble over it.
00:02:38.520 | I think it's one of the questions that has an answer in the Bible.
00:02:42.560 | She asked one straightforward question.
00:02:45.400 | "Pastor John, why should we pray for things we want—happiness for ourselves or healing
00:02:50.880 | for others—if we know in the end God's will will be done?"
00:02:55.760 | That's her question.
00:02:57.320 | Well, there are three reasons why you should pray for things that you want, even though
00:03:02.840 | we know God's sovereign will will be done.
00:03:05.520 | Number one, because God commands us to.
00:03:09.800 | He tells us to pray for what we want, provided our wants are shaped by His Word.
00:03:17.600 | John 15:7, "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish"—ha-e-on-thel-e-teh,
00:03:30.040 | if you want the Greek—"what you want, and it will be done for you."
00:03:35.840 | So He tells us, "Ask for whatever you wish."
00:03:40.680 | We're not supposed to try to divine the sovereign will of God and then simply say, "Do that!"
00:03:49.160 | That's not what prayer is.
00:03:51.060 | We do not know ahead of time the sovereign will of God that governs all things.
00:04:00.280 | We are supposed to let the Word abide in us and shape our wants and our wishes by the
00:04:09.440 | revealed will of God, not the sovereign, all-controlling will of God.
00:04:16.720 | The revealed will of God, for example, is 1 Peter 3:11, "Seek peace, Piper, seek peace,
00:04:24.080 | and pursue it."
00:04:25.800 | Now the way the sovereign will of God may work itself out in my life or your life in
00:04:32.600 | any certain situation, I don't know.
00:04:35.800 | It may be crucifixion.
00:04:36.800 | That's not peace.
00:04:38.400 | I'm not after that, and that's what happened to Jesus.
00:04:42.920 | We pray toward what He tells us to pursue, not by trying to figure out what He sovereignly
00:04:50.880 | decrees.
00:04:51.880 | So that's number one.
00:04:54.120 | Ask for what you want, because the Bible says to ask for what you want, not to pray for
00:05:00.440 | the things that you dream up God's going to do tomorrow.
00:05:05.040 | Number two, we should ask for what we want informed by the Word, because if we don't,
00:05:13.240 | we may not get it.
00:05:15.800 | James 4:2, "You do not have because you do not ask."
00:05:23.000 | Now let that sink in.
00:05:24.360 | There is a real causal connection between our asking and God's giving.
00:05:30.860 | The absence of asking is the cause of the absence of receiving.
00:05:36.840 | That's what James says.
00:05:38.220 | You do not have because you do not ask.
00:05:41.020 | So ask, lest in failing to ask, you fail to receive.
00:05:46.660 | There it is.
00:05:47.660 | Period.
00:05:48.660 | Believe that.
00:05:49.660 | Do that.
00:05:50.660 | Number three, and this is the reason that number two is valid, that we may fail to receive
00:05:57.760 | when we fail to ask.
00:06:00.080 | Here's the reason.
00:06:01.280 | God plans our prayers just as surely as he plans the events that he performs in answer
00:06:11.440 | to our prayers.
00:06:13.840 | Take Jesus' prayer for Peter and for Peter's repentance after his denial.
00:06:19.160 | For example, Luke 22:32, he prays like this before Peter denied him, which he told him
00:06:27.960 | he would do.
00:06:28.960 | "I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail.
00:06:34.360 | And when," not if, "when you have turned, strengthen your brothers."
00:06:40.960 | So God had planned for Peter to deny Jesus.
00:06:46.320 | That's why Jesus knew he would.
00:06:48.120 | That's why Jesus said he would.
00:06:50.400 | And God had planned for Jesus to pray for Peter's repentance.
00:06:57.000 | And God had planned in answer to that prayer to cause Peter to repent, which he did.
00:07:03.280 | So it would make no sense to say God's will for Peter is going to happen no matter what
00:07:12.280 | Jesus prays, when in fact Jesus' prayer was part of what God willed.
00:07:18.720 | And that's the way it is with all prayer.
00:07:21.680 | God doesn't plan the world and then wonder if anybody's going to pray for part of his
00:07:29.440 | plan to be changed.
00:07:31.800 | He plans the world, and part of his planning for the world is the praying of his people
00:07:39.520 | for what he plans to do.
00:07:41.680 | Here's an example from Ezekiel 36.
00:07:47.800 | "The nations that are left all around you shall know that I am the Lord.
00:07:53.880 | I have rebuilt the ruined places and replanted that which was desolate.
00:08:00.440 | I am Yahweh, the Lord.
00:08:03.840 | I have spoken.
00:08:05.400 | I will do it.
00:08:07.040 | Thus says the Lord God, this also I will let the house of Israel ask me to do for them,
00:08:16.760 | namely to increase their people like a flock."
00:08:19.560 | Now, the word "let" doesn't quite get the sense of the Hebrew as though God were
00:08:26.440 | just giving permission for them to pray.
00:08:29.240 | Like, "I will let the house of Israel ask me to do this."
00:08:34.000 | No, more literally, it's a statement of intention and purpose from God.
00:08:39.280 | It says, "This also I will be sought," that is, prayed to, "I will be sought by
00:08:48.200 | the house of Israel to do for them, namely to increase them like a flock of men."
00:08:55.040 | In other words, God intends to restore and increase Israel, and so he purposes, he plans,
00:09:03.000 | he intends their prayer.
00:09:06.080 | "For this I will be sought by the house of Israel to do this for them, because I
00:09:11.280 | intend to do this for them, as I have just said."
00:09:14.240 | So the third reason we should ask for what we want, what we wish, is that God plans our
00:09:23.840 | prayers just as surely as he plans the events that come from them.
00:09:29.780 | So don't question God's way of doing things.
00:09:32.980 | He loves us, and he's not toying with us when he says, "Be constant in prayer, and
00:09:40.280 | let your requests be made known to God, and pray at all times, and continue steadfastly
00:09:47.040 | in prayer, and pray without ceasing, and ask and you shall receive, and do not lose heart
00:09:53.800 | in praying."
00:09:54.800 | He's not toying with us when he says all these things.
00:09:58.840 | He's granting us the dignity of joining with him in glorifying himself as part of
00:10:08.520 | the cause of all that he does.
00:10:12.040 | Beautiful synthesis of God's absolute sovereignty and his desire that we pray from our own desires.
00:10:18.680 | Thank you, Pastor John.
00:10:20.720 | Whether you listen in the car, at the gym, doing chores, thank you for inviting us into
00:10:24.600 | your day.
00:10:25.600 | If you have not done so, you can subscribe to Ask Pastor John in your favorite podcast
00:10:29.560 | app in YouTube or in Spotify.
00:10:32.400 | To find other episodes in our archive, or to submit a question to us directly like this
00:10:37.600 | one from Andrea, go online to DesiringGod.org/AskPastorJohn.
00:10:44.880 | Well each of our lives are shaped by multiple forces.
00:10:48.440 | The friends that we choose, the parents we didn't choose, and the socioeconomic class
00:10:53.360 | background that we had little or no control over.
00:10:57.120 | So can we say that we are mainly the product of our background?
00:11:01.440 | That is the question up next time.
00:11:03.000 | I'm your host Tony Rehnke.
00:11:04.000 | We'll see you back here on Monday.
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