Why God Doesn’t Answer Your Prayers About Money
March 23, 2007 By Matthew Paulson
For Christians, prayer is a rather amazing concept. Many discount our faith, but we know that God will listen to us and our concerns, and do what’s best for us. Jesus even tells us in the book of Mark that “Have faith in God, Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you will receive it, and it will be yours.” If you ask God for something that will help you, He will give it to you. Solomon asked God for wisdom to handle his wealth, and God gave it to him. What are you asking God for?
Let’s ask a hypothetical question. Let’s assume God has some very big plans for you, Perhaps, God has decided you are the person who will save the life of a very important person, or cure a deadly disease. Let us then suppose that you are really depressed and hate life so much that you ask God to strike you down from earth? Do you think he would do it? Only God understands the mind of God, but it’s reasonable to assume that He will do what’s best for you, which is not always what you want.
A lot of people’s worry and concern resolves around money. Money is a frequent issue of prayer for a very great number of people. A lot of people ask God to help them out financially by winning the lottery or by blessing them with a great amount of money. In a recent movie, “Bruce Almighty” a regular man became God and gave everyone everything they wanted, and over a million people won the lottery when he gave everyone what they wanted. Is winning the lottery or just being given a great amount of money with no work the best thing for you? Often times, it is not. God will provide for us, but he will give us what we need, not what we want.
When it comes to money, the Bible says quite a number of things on the subject. In the bible we are told many times not to cosign on loans. We also know that there are no positive mentions to debt in the bible, and he even tells us that the borrower is slave to the lender. The Bible tells us to save money, and to work very hard to get out of debt if you are in debt. God tells us to give ten percent of our income to the local church. God lays out a number of things we should do to use the idea of money in a way that He would find pleasing.
Money makes you more of what you are. The Bible tells us that if God cannot trust us with little tasks, there is surely no way He will trust us with big tasks. If we are not following God’s ways with the money we do have, and most people are not, why would He give us even more of His money to work with? Would he not rather give it to someone who handles money in the way He finds to be pleasing and He knows will do good things with it?
God does not plan for all of us to be filthy rich, and that’s okay. He will provide enough for us to get by, and that’s all we need. Prayers for large sums of money very rarely go answered, because God knows that’s not what’s best for you. If you follow His ways when it comes to money, God will give you more of His money to manage. It’s as simple as that.
Posted in Christianity, debt, money
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April 24th, 2007 at 11:49 pm
I have a minimum wage job and student loan debt. Some years ago I tithed for several months, but the only way I could make that work was to let my utility bills and student loan payments slide. That works for only so long, until the nasty notices come in the mail, so I stopped tithing and made up the past due payments.
Yes, I have enough to pay the rent on time, keep food on the table, and connect a cheap used PC to the internet, but not enough to also tithe and get out of debt. (I am making reduced student loan payments which are negatively amortizing the loans.)
April 24th, 2007 at 11:52 pm
p.s. I don’t have cable or satellite TV or radio, I don’t have any bells and whistles on my PC (e.g. no sound or DVD or CD burner etc), no TV at all, no VCR, no DVD, just a PC, radio, and (this one belongs to my landlord) a microwave.