poor timing

(Contains material from Bill Hybels book "Too Busy Not to Pray".)

If the timing is wrong God says 'slow', and for most of us this feels little better than 'no'.

We live in a society where we are getting more and more used to having our demands and needs met instantly. Everything is 'fast': fast food, fast credit, fast photos, fast pleasure... fast life.

Just as a child may demand something and a parent says "no, not yet", God just might feel that the timing is not right for our demands to be met, not now. Why might he do this?

Sometimes God delays in order to test our faith. Do we relate to God as a loving father who will give us what we need when we need it? Can we trust him even if we don't see immediate results? Our faith is tested.
Sometimes God delays so that we can modify our requests. Over time we may see that the original request wasn't quite right. As we undertsand the situation better, we may want to modify our requests to make them more in line with God's will.
Sometimes God delays so that we can develop character qualities such as endurance, trust, patience or submission; qualities that come only when we wait patiently and trust in his timing. A lot of spiritual gains or growth come through enduring pain, hurt, struggle, confusion and disappointment.

We may not be able to see the reasons for the delay, but that isn't surprising. As God say's through the prophet Isaiah, 'My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways... As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your waysand my thoughts than your thoughts' (Isaiah 55:8-9) . We are the creatures, God is the creator. He knows what timing is best. Many times we will perceive an answer to prayer to be 'No', only to find out later that God was saying 'Not yet', so that he could orchestrate a greater act than we had the faith or insight to pray for in the first place.

There is another important reason as to why our prayers might not be answered, one which we have a responsibility to control ...click here.