The Lord will answer.

Everyone who has prayed devoutly and sincerely has undoubtedly experienced at times the keenest kind of disappointment because he has not received an immediate answer to his prayer, Perhaps you have yourself prayed sometimes for something that you wanted badly. It was an insistent, an urgent desire. You felt that you could hardly wait even to utter the prayer. Yet, your prayer has remained apparently unanswered. At such times you may have found comfort in this beautiful Sunday School hymn:

      "Unanswered yet? Tho' when you first presented
      This one petition at the Father's throne,
      It seemed you could not wait the time of asking,
      So urgent was your heart to make it known.
      Tho' years have passed since then, do not despair;
      The Lord will answer you, sometime, somewhere."

This is a beautiful hope, a sublime faith; and every one of us should cultivate such hope, such faith. Moreover, everyone of us should practice such persistency in prayer as is described by the poet in this hymn.

      "The prayer your lips have pleaded
      In agony of tears these many years?"

For very often, without question, our prayers fail to move the Father, because they are not urged upon Him, nor are they upheld by that hopeful trust which knows no wavering. Jesus emphasized two points in this connection that we should grapple to our hearts.

Pray often and persistently.

As we have already learned, Jesus condemned long. {98} repetitious prayers. He despised also the hypocrite, and the hollow prayer of the hypocrite. But Jesus did not mean by such condemnation that we should not appear often before the persistently. Father, and press the case for which we are pleading. On the contrary, as you will readily see from the following parables, Jesus emphasized the importance of persistency in prayer.

The importunate friend.

"And (Jesus) said unto them. Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves; for a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him? And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth."

The unrighteous judge.

"And (again) He spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint; Saying, There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, neither regarded man: and there was a widow in that city: and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary. And he would not for awhile: but afterward he said within himself. Though I fear not God, nor regard man; yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me. And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith. And shall not God avenge His own elect, which cry day and night unto Him, though He bear {99} long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily."

An urgent desire necessary.

These parables speak sufficiently for themselves. The lesson that Jesus wanted to impart is clear. It is important that we persist in the prayer that we want urgently to be fulfilled. However, it was not Jesus's purpose to teach His disciples merely to repeat constantly an urgent prayer. Merely repeating a prayer is really of no more worth than uttering a long prayer full of repetitions. Jesus taught that Father gives His best and choicest gifts only to those who desire them intensely. We keep on praying for those things that we truly want, because the desire for them is urgent, intense and insistent; and we keep on keeping on.

Implicit trust necessary.

But there is a second element that must necessarily enter into the right attitude in prayer to God. Not only should our prayers express our intense desires, and be spoken frequently, but they should be accompanied by a simple, childlike trust and confidence in God.

Seek first the kingdom of God.

"Take no thought for your life, what ye shall eat, or what ye shall drink," taught Jesus; "Nor yet for your body, what ye shall put on. Is not the life more than meat, and the body than raiment? Behold the fowls of the air: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns; yet your heavenly Father feedeth them. Are ye not much............