Last week I continued my thoughts on the prayer acrostic ACTS and wrote about Thanksgiving. This week I want to give some initial thoughts about Supplication.
Supplication involves asking. This is the time we pray for others and ourselves. I think believers do well in this area because we know what our needs are, and sometimes they’re a lot. Paul encourages us to do this, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all comprehension, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus” (Phil. 4:6-7). However there are some conditions when we present our requests to God: don’t be anxious but be thankful. Additionally when we ask, we need to trust in God’s timing and way. This is what brings peace.
Sometimes when we pray we desire God to work in a preconceived way. At times we want God to align to our ways rather than us aligning to God’s. Say we present a request before the Lord; it could be about a finances, relationships, health, or a number of other things. You go before God asking Him for a job, preferably one in downtown Honolulu where it’s convenient to the bus stops and food places. You then prepare your resume and submit them to different places you’ve seen in the online want-ads and in the newspapers. Then you wait.
Some companies call you back for an interview but no job is offered. Then a friend tells you about a place that’s hiring but it’s located in the industrial area. It’s not a big company but they really need some help administratively, something you’re qualified for. You hesitate. This isn’t what you really wanted but after a month you’re getting a bit desperate. You let God know you really want a job in downtown Honolulu. But there are still no call-backs. Reluctantly, you apply to the company in the industrial area and they want to bring you on immediately.
Over the course of a week you grumble to God about how far the bus stop is from your new workplace. You have to pack a lunch everyday because there are no food places near the warehouse. You say, “Lord, this would have been so much easier if you opened a job in downtown. Aren’t you the God of the universe? Don’t you own the cattle on a thousand hills?” But little do you know during that time in this small company God is going to work on your heart and spirit – to teach you how to be patient, to teach you how to be frugal, and to teach you how to listen to the Lord outside the noise of downtown, all in preparation for a future ministry that will come 15 years later.
When we pray, we need to be careful not to pray wanting God to answer in a certain way. When we do this, we make Him out to be a genie rather than the sovereign God who sees all things from the beginning to the end. When we pray, we need to be open to what the Lord wants to do.
Additionally, we need to be open to the Lord’s timing. We like to think the Lord works fast. I think part of this comes from our Bible reading. Some of you may be using a bookmark where you read the whole Bible over the course of a year. This isn’t wrong and I highly encourage it. But you are essentially reading 2,000 years of history within one year. There is a tendency to think God works quickly because we read the Bible quickly. The last verse of Genesis to the first few verses of Exodus encompasses 400 years, but we read it in a few seconds. The last verse of Malachi to the first few verses of Matthew encompasses another 400 years but we flip the page between the Old and New Testaments within a few milliseconds. We need to be careful to think that God works quickly.
Therefore when we ask the Lord for something, we need to trust in His ways and His timing. When we pray, we need to leave the request in His hands. That doesn’t mean we only pray once and stop asking; it means we continue to pray and adjust our hearts towards His will, learning to trust in His sovereignty.
Sometimes we don’t have good leaders who last because they pray wanting God to align to their ways.
Questions to Think About:
When you pray, are you able to trust God’s ways and timing?
Can you think of a time when God answered a prayer but not in a way you expected?
© Gary Lau 2013
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