How to pray when you wish to get a thing, very much?

Question:

How to pray when you wish to get something, very much?

Tendency of humans is to get all earthly things settle down at first ,but for the spiritual person, is to search for spiritual things.In the Lord’s prayer, Jesus is teaching us how to pray for earthly things :”Give us this day our daily bread”. Bread for everyday it’s the symbol of all our daily  physical needs  and not of our luxury needs. Even if God is choosing to bless us with luxury things in this life , it’s His grace and His gift for us  and not our merit.James reminds us to be grateful to our heavenly Father for every perfect gift which is coming from Him:

Don’t be deceived, my dear brothers and sisters. Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of the heavenly lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.(James 1:16-17]

Life,health , riches , talents, oportunities – all are coming from God’s hand. For ”our daily bread”- all our daily needs-all comes from  God , we need to have a grateful attitude.

How, then , I have to pray to God when I wish to get something very much?

Pray according with His will and promise 

We can not expect to receive something that God didn’t promise us, but we can pray with complete trust for the things  that God have already promised us. In Psalm 37, David urges us to trust in God’s promises and to walk faithfully  before Him.

“Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and enjoy safe pasture.
4 Take delight in the Lord ,and he will give you the desires of your heart.A little while, and the wicked will be no more; hough you look for them, they will not be found.But the meek will inherit the land and enjoy peace and prosperity. I was young and now I am old, yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread.” (Psalm 37:3-4, 10-11, 25)

If we are faithfull to the Lord, do good and our walk is faithfully, God will give us all what our heart desire. But, we have to say that number one priority is not to walk after worldly things, but His righteousness,His Kingdom . Therefore …

Search for God’s kingdom 

If we have a clear understanding of God’s character ,then we have a correct relation with Him, through Jesus Christ who has promised us ,to take care of all the things we need.

“Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothes?For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. 33 But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” (Matthew 6:25, 32-33)

The more we focus on spiritual matters, God  will take care of all material things. Many times God gives material things to His children by miraculous ways , but His main way to provide is through work.

”For even when we were with you, we gave you this rule:The one who is unwilling to work shall not eat.We hear that some among you are idle and disruptive. They are not busy; they are busybodies.Such people we command and urge in the Lord Jesus Christ to settle down and earn the food they eat.”(2 Thessalonians 3:10-12 NIV)

God is giving us strength , resources, opportunities and ability to work, so we are able to provide for our daily needs.

Do not ask with the wish to waste in worldly pleasures

James is telling us that fights and quarrels among us are coming from a corrupted heart.

“What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don’t they come from your desires that battle within you? 2 You desire but do not have, so you kill. You covet but you cannot get what you want, so you quarrel and fight. You do not have because you do not ask God.When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.”(James 4:1-4)

The word pleasure used here by James, it refers itself to pleasure with wrong motive.Desire for such things is fighting inside of us , it steals away our peace and tranquility and its disstroing relations with others.They ask , and don’t receive, because they ask bad , with thoughts to waste in their pleasures.Such prayer is not good, because it’s asking with thought in spending on worldly things.Psalmist is saying:

“If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.” (Psalms 66:18 NIV)

The Pharisees used to pray long prayers, but they where eating the widows houses.

“They devour widows’ houses and for a show make lengthy prayers. These men will be punished”(Mark12:40 NIV)

Therefore, stop asking for things which satisfy the flesh , but ask for things that satisfy the soul.In the ”Lord’s prayer” Jesus is teaching us to seek first God’s holiness,His will,and afterwards our needs etc.

Let us not misinterpret wrong Jesus words :

““So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” (Luke11:9-10 NIV)

Lets suppose that we ask for our own interest for searching God’s kingdom.If we ask for things that satify only our flesh, God will not answer our prayers ,because our needs do not agree with His needs and this things He is doing it for our own good.

Lets pray , with the words of the author of Proverbs 30:

“Keep falsehood and lies far from me; give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread. Otherwise, I may have too much and disown you and say, ‘Who is the Lord?’
Or I may become poor and steal, and so dishonnor the name of my God.”(Proverbs 30:8-9 NIV)

I reccomand you to study the following courses with inductive study from series of Teachings over Teachings for a better approach of the subject  discussed in this article .

• James 
• God , I need answers