Rely on God 4

James 1:5-6

I have heard so many prayers begin with, “God, if you are there . . .” or “God, if you are listening . . .” One of my first thoughts when I hear this type of approach is to have little confidence that these prayers will be answered. I suppose the person praying is being humble in some way, but it leads me to think that the person has no faith, no firm belief in God.

James gives us a quick and simple lesson on how to approach God. What should we do when we want wisdom? Why will God give us this? What should be our attitude?

Now the words of James are that God will give us wisdom if we ask, but I believe this same concept applies to anything we might pray for as long as it is meant to glorify God and serve His kingdom. If we need wisdom we can ask for it. God is generous and loving and He wants what is best for us, so He will grant us that wisdom.

But I think the same will be true when we ask for strength, guidance, a more merciful heart, or more ability to do good things. God is loving and generous and wants what is best for us. If we pray with the intention of being a humble servant of God I believe God will grant our requests.

We need to have faith in this. We need to be confident when we pray. We need to be bold in our requests and ask God for the things we need to be good servants of His kingdom.

This is part of relying on God. We must know that we can rely on God to supply us with what we need especially when it is meant for His glory.

And when we pray we must have strong faith. We should not doubt. When we doubt we find ourselves tossing back and forth between belief and disbelief, between confidence and fear. We need to be strong and steady in our faith, relying on God with firm confidence.

DAILY CHALLENGE: How can you have confidence in your prayers?