Solve Unanswered Prayers With This Amazing 3-part Bible Study

Unanswered prayers can be the result of many things. One key element causing God to not answer prayer is sin; the result of failure to hear and obey God. Use this amazing 3-part Bible study to solve unanswered prayers.

Summary

Because they did not listen when I spoke, I did not answer when they prayed. Zechariah 7:13 (TEV)

Think about this

It is common for people to pray to God in order to ask for something. When one asks for something they expect a response or an answer. Unanswered prayers happen because the Lord did not hear the prayer. Wrong living (sin) is the primary reason that the prayer is not heard. So, God does not answer all prayers.

I called, but you refused to listen. I held out my hand, but you paid no attention. 25 You did not follow my advice. You did not want me to correct you. 28 “Then you will call out to me. But I will not answer…” Proverbs 1:24-25 and 28 (ICB)

Key Points:

1. Sin is the main reason God will not answer prayer.
2. Jesus says for God to hear us we do not have to say the same thing over and over. When praying, do not repeat the same words over and over again, as is done by the Gentiles, who think that by using many words they will obtain a hearing. Matthew 6:7 (OEB)
3. The prayers of sinners (the wicked) are unanswered prayers. The Lord is ‘far from’ i.e., does not hear the wicked. The Lord never even hears the prayers of the wicked, but he answers the prayers of all who obey him.  Proverbs 15:29 (CEV)

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Introduction

Prayer

And to Seth, to him also there was born a son; and he called his name Enos: then began men to call upon the name of [to pray to] the LORD. Genesis 4:26 (KJV)

Before we start to study and understand ‘unanswered prayers’, let us look at the first mention of prayer (or so it seems) in the Bible, Genesis 4:26. The phrase ‘to call‘ comes from the Hebrew (H7121) qara‘ meaning to call unto; cry (for help); the phrase ‘upon the name‘ is from the Hebrew shem meaning name; the Name or character.

Most translators agree on a form of the phrase ‘to call upon the name‘ others interpret the phrase as ‘men began to worship‘ while a few use ‘men began to pray‘.

“Woe to you, Pharisees, and you other religious leaders. Hypocrites! For you won’t let others enter the Kingdom of Heaven and won’t go in yourselves. And you pretend to be holy, with all your long, public prayers in the streets, while you are evicting widows from their homes. Hypocrites!. Matthew 23:14 (TLB)

Prayer is

What is prayer? The simplest definition of prayer is verbal or silent communication with God. It is an exchange between a person and the Lord. The person talks to and listens to hear from God. Supplication, request, intercession, entreaty, and petition are the typical words for prayer.

It is not possible to cover the meaning of prayer or get a full understanding of prayer in this introduction. Please view the related articles at the end of this study for more information on prayer.

Unanswered Prayers

When God is not pleased with what people do, He will not listen to their prayer. For example, the Jews rejected the Lord by asking for a king to judge them. Samuel told the people what the Lord said, ‘you will be crying out because of your king whom you have taken for yourselves; but the Lord will not give you an answer in that day‘ [1 Samuel 8:18 (BBE)].

The message was clear ‘the Lord will not answer/hear’.

David knew that if he had ‘evil thoughts’ the Lord would not hear his prayer. ‘If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me‘ [Psalms 66:18].

Thus saith the Lord to this people, They have loved to wander, and they have not spared, therefore God has not prospered them; now will he remember their iniquity. 11 And the Lord said to me, Pray not for this people for their good:

12 for though they fast, I will not hear their supplication; and though they offer whole-burnt-offerings and sacrifices, I will take no pleasure in them: for I will consume them with sword, and with famine, and with pestilence. Jeremiah 14:10-12 (Brenton)

♥ Question for unanswered prayers – intro: If the Lord does not hear prayer, should one expect an answer?

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Part One

This series, also part of the ‘Awareness Series’, will deal with and solve the unanswered prayer mystery. Make sure you are listening for His answer is one suggestion. Oops, I meant to say do not decide that God did not answer until you are sure you were listening.

No answer

Why didn’t God answer my prayer? Have you ever thought about this or asked yourself that question? You are not alone, many have been in this place. This series will give Bible-based answers.

I must urge you to take the time to read the Scriptures and pray for understanding. The following lists a few reasons God does not answer prayer.

Reasons

• Lack of charity or mercy (particularly to the poor). Proverbs 21:13 and 14:31; Matthew 18:23-35; 25:31-46 (41-46); James 2:13].
• Pride – Job 35:12 [Psalms 18:35-42 (41); Proverbs 1:20-33 (28)]
  • A proud person is not humble; pride is the opposite of humility. 2 Chronicles 7:14 “If my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves, and pray…”
  • O Lord, You have heard the prayers of those who have no pride [the humble]. You will give strength to their heart, and You will listen to them. Psalm 10:17 (NLV)

Repeating words

Vain repetitions or large amounts of useless and repeated words are not okay. Jesus said, “And when you pray, do not use worthless repetitions like the [unconverted] Gentiles, for they think their lengthy, repetitious wording [in prayer] is more likely to be heard [by God]” [Matthew 6:7 (AUV)].

[example: 1 Kings 18:20-40 (26-29)].

NT:945 βαττολογέω battologeō bat-tol-og-eh’-o to repeat the same things over and over, to use many and idle words,, to babble, prate. (from Thayer’s Greek Lexicon )
[My note, this phrase, vain repetitions, used once. Some believe Jesus’s meaning is not clear.]

• Compare bible translations/revisions of Matthew 6:7
• Get more information on vain repetitions

Pretense

Hypocrisy, hypocrite or pretender. And when you make your prayers, be not like the false-hearted men, who take pleasure in getting up and saying their prayers in the Synagogues and at the street turnings so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, They have their reward [Matthew 6:5 (BBE)].

Conditional

To get your prayers answered, you must meet certain conditions. One is to obey God.

We will receive from Him whatever we ask if we obey Him and do what He wants. 1 John 3:22 (NLV)

Prayer must also be offered in the faith that God is, and is the hearer and answerer of prayer, and that he will fulfil his word, “Ask, and ye shall receive” (Matthew 7:7,8; 21:22; Mark 11:24; John 14:13,14), and in the name of Christ (16:23,24; 15:16; Ephesians 2:18; 5:20; Colossians 3:17; 1 Peter 2:5). from Easton’s Bible Dictionary

♥ Question for unanswered prayers – part 1: Have you prayed and not received an answer?

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Part Two

Not hear

One of the primary reasons for unanswered prayer is sin. Yes, sin has been responsible for God ignoring prayer. The following lists a few more reasons God does not answer prayer:

And I said, “Hear now, leaders of Jacob and rulers of the people of Israel! Should you not know what is fair? 2 Yet you hate good and love sin. You tear off the skin from my people and the flesh from their bones. 3 You eat my people’s flesh, pull their skin off, break their bones, and cut them up like meat for the pot.” 4 Then they will cry to the Lord, but He will not answer them. He will hide His face from them at that time, because they have done sinful things. Micah 3:1-4 (NLV)

• Refusing to hear the truth – Proverbs 28:9; Zechariah 7:11-13 [2 Timothy 4:1-5]
• God looks at the way we treat others and then determines if He will answer prayer. Let’s do something different [use these links to compare Micah 3:4 studybible.info and biblegateway.com] a basic Bible study. The difference is we will step through it together.
  1. Look at Micah 3:4 the second part of the verse: “But He will not hear them” (NKJV)

• AKJV, GNV, KJ21, KJV, OJB and WYC – use the word ‘hear‘
• AMP, ASV, BBE, CEB, CJB, DAR, ERV, ESV, EXB, GWT, GNT, HCSB, LEB, LITV, NASB, NCV, NET, NIRV, NIV, NOG, NRSV, NRSVA, NSB, RSV, VOICE, WEB and YLT – use the word ‘answer‘ instead of ‘hear’.
• So hopefully we agree that the Lord (see the first part of Micah 3:4) said He would not hear or answer (of course He would not answer if He did not hear) :-). We could go further into this since the word answer would imply that He did hear, but let’s move on.

Who

Next, let’s understand who the Lord will not hear or answer according to Micah. To do this we must go back to verse one. Using the NKJV as in step 1 above we find:

• Subtitles: ‘Wicked (sinful, unjust) rulers, priests, and prophets, ‘leaders of Israel
• 1st part of verse one wording: heads, leaders or princes of Jacob
• 2nd part of verse one wording: rulers, princes, officers, magistrates or leaders of the house (nation) of Israel

Reason

Finally, we should find the reason the Lord will not hear or answer their prayers. To keep it short stay within verses 1-4 but deeper study starts at Micah 1:1. I will start us off, please fill in the rest, and have fun!

• They knew or should know right from wrong.
• The leaders practiced and tolerated and ignored evil acts.

How long must I cry, O Eternal One, and get no answer from You? Even when I yell to You, “Violence is all around!” You do nothing to save those in distress. Habakkuk 1:2 (The Voice)

God does not listen to our prayers if we intend to go back to our sin as soon as we get off our knees. When we forsake our sin and follow him, however, he willingly listens—no matter how bad our sin has been. What closes his ears is not the depth of our sin but our secret intention to do it again. God hears our intentions as clearly as he hears our words. from Life Application Study Bible

♥ Question for ‘unanswered prayers part 2’: Is sin causing your prayers to go unanswered?

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Part Three

This is the last of the 3-part series. To get to the point, this last part will address sin, a very broad topic, so let’s begin. The best place to start is to define the word sin. Those who have attended church services may have some idea of the meaning. Have you ever heard the terms ‘sin of commission‘ and ‘sin of omission‘? I’ll briefly explain:

• The sin of commission (action, doing, or performing): something (includes doing, saying, thinking, or feeling) or a thing that is against God’s teaching. In other words, the sin of commission is evil, disobedient, wicked, or bad conduct.
• Also, the Sin of omission (ignoring, disrespecting, or avoiding): not doing something (includes doing, saying, thinking, or feeling) that God’s teaching says we should do. It damages our relationship and communication with God since one fails to conduct oneself in a good, obedient, righteous, or right way.

Example of the sin of commission:

The wrong things the sinful-self does are clear: committing sexual sin, being morally bad, doing all kinds of shameful things, 20 worshiping false gods, taking part in witchcraft, hating people, causing trouble, being jealous, angry, or selfish, causing people to argue and divide into separate groups,

21 being filled with envy, getting drunk, having wild parties, and doing other things like this. I warn you now as I warned you before: The people who do these things will not have a part in God’s kingdom. Galatians 5:19-21 (ERV)

Example of the sin of omission:

Then he shall say to those on the left hand, Depart from me, you cursed, into eternal fire, prepared for the devil and his angels: 42 For I was hungry, and you gave me no food: I was thirsty, and you gave me no drink: 43 I was a stranger, and you did not take me in: naked, and you did not clothe me: sick, and in prison, and you did not visit me.

44 Then they also shall answer him, saying, Lord, when did we see you hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not minister to you? 45 Then he shall answer them, saying, Truly I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me. 46 And these shall go away into eternal punishment: but the righteous into eternal life. Matthew 25:41-46 (RKJNT)

What is sin?

Sin is constant voluntary action, word, desire, or purpose against God’s will. It is against the will of God to not believe in God; unbelief is sin. Sin is doing things that one should not do (evil, wrong) as well as not doing things that one should do (good, right) in accord with God’s will. Constant sin defines our relationship or lack of relationship with God. It is the result of failure to hear and obey God.

An excerpt from the Pocket Dictionary of Theological Terms: “The fundamental unbelief, distrust and rejection of God and human displacement of God as the center of reality.”

The Lord never even hears the prayers of the wicked, but he answers the prayers of all who obey him. Proverbs 15:29 (CEV)

Wicked

Most translations either use “The Lord is far from the wicked” or some form of ‘far from’, however, I need you to keep an open mind and study God’s word. This is a comparative verse, it tells us what the Lord will do for the wicked and righteous; opposites, right?

Now, the response to their prayers should also oppose each other, hear the righteous and do the opposite for the wicked. Also, consider the following information from as many Bible commentaries as I could find (I rarely do this but wanted to make a point.

Proverbs 15:29

• Adam Clarke’s Commentary: [The Lord is far from the wicked] ‘He is neither near to hear, nor near to help.’
• Barnes and Pulpit Commentary compares Proverbs 15:29 to John 9:31 “Now we know that God does not hear sinners…”
• Bible Knowledge Commentary/Old Testament “He distances Himself from them, refusing to hear them.”
• Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown Commentary ‘i.e., far from ‘hearing their prayer‘
• Keil and Delitzsch Commentary ‘their prayer reaches not to Him‘
• Matthew Henry’s Commentary ‘has no communion with them, will not hear them‘

Behold, the Lord’s hand is not shortened, That it cannot save; Nor His ear heavy, That it cannot hear. 2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; And your sins have hidden His face from you, So that He will not hear.

3 For your hands are defiled with blood, And your fingers with iniquity; Your lips have spoken lies, Your tongue has muttered perversity. Isaiah 59:1-3 (NKJV)

♥ Question for ‘unanswered prayers part 3’: Are you getting answers to your prayers?

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Unanswered Prayers wrap-up

The experience of unanswered prayers can frustrate even the best Christian. I often think of the relationship I had with my children and the times they asked for something knowing they were disobedient or had repeated a request that I already answered. Yes, you guessed it; I either would not answer or I would tell them to leave my presence.

Sin damages our relationship with God our heavenly Father. Having read/studied this lesson, are you convinced that sin is a cause of unanswered prayer?

Then he said unto me, Hast thou seen this, O son of man? Is it a light thing to the house of Judah that they commit the abominations which they commit here? for they have filled the land with violence, and have returned to provoke me to anger: and, lo, they put the branch to their nose.

18 Therefore will I also deal in fury: mine eye shall not spare, neither will I have pity: and though they cry in mine ears with a loud voice, yet will I not hear them. Ezekiel 8:17-18 (KJV)

When we obey God we remove a major element that can lead to unanswered prayers. Like a good father, God will hear and answer the prayers of His obedient children. So obey God and be blessed—Tim ☺.

Study outline

Sumary: Zechariah 7:8-14 (13); Proverbs 1:20-33 (25 and 28); Matthew 6:5-15 (7-8); Proverbs 15:29.

Intro: 1 Samuel 28:3-25 (6 and 15); Genesis 4:25-26 (26); Matthew 6:5-14 (5-6). John 8:37-47 (47); Matthew 11:1-19 (15), 7:7-11 and Luke 11:9-13. 1 Samuel 8:10-18 (18); Psalms 66:16-19 (18).

Part 1: Proverbs 21:12-17 (13), 14:31; Matthew 18:23-35; 25:31-46 (41-46); James 2:13. Job 35:9-16 [(12); Psalms 18:35-42 (41); Proverbs 1:20-33 (28)]. Matthew 6:5-7 [(5 & 7); Luke 18:9-14 (13-14); Job 27:7-10 (8-10); Isaiah 1:2-20 (15)]. 1 John 3:16-23 (22).

Part 2: Proverbs 28:7-10 (9); Zechariah 7:8-14 (11-13); Micah 3:1-4 (4). Habakkuk 1:2-4 (4).

Part 3: Galatians 5:16-26 (19-21); Matthew 25:31-46 (41-46); Proverbs 15:29; Isaiah 59:1-3.

Conclusion: Ezekiel 8:1-18 (18); Proverbs 1:8-33 (10-16 & 23-31); Psalms 66:16-20 (18); James 4:1-10 (3).

Related studies/lessons/snacks for further Spiritual growth:

The Prayer Formula – an estimated 4-minute read.

Pray First – an estimated 3-minute read.

Prayer Blockers – an estimated 24-minute read.

Speaking In Tongues Does Not Mean They Represent God! – an estimated 12-minute read.

McClintock and Strong Biblical Cyclopedia (MSBC)

See what is available on the Sound Truth Ministry website.

Copyright information:

C-E

Scripture quotations marked (CEV) are from the Contemporary English Version Copyright © 1991, 1992, 1995 by American Bible Society, Used by Permission. || (ERV) Taken from the HOLY BIBLE: EASY-TO-READ VERSION © 2001 by World Bible Translation Center, Inc. and used by permission. || (EXB) The Expanded Bible Scripture taken from The Expanded Bible. Copyright ©2011 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.’

I-T

(ICB) Scripture taken from the International Children’s Bible®. Copyright © 1986, 1988, 1999 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved. || (NKJV) Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved. || (GNT) and (TEV) Scripture quotations marked (GNT) are from the Good News Translation in Today’s English Version- Second Edition Copyright © 1992 by American Bible Society. Used by Permission. || (The Voice) The Voice Scripture taken from The Voice™. Copyright © 2008 by Ecclesia Bible Society. Used by permission. All rights reserved.