I recently had an interesting picture of how God answers prayer. We live in time and move in a linear direction forward, while God lives out of time and moves where ever He wants. It’s like we are on a train and the tracks are the time frame we live in. We can switch tracks, but we can’t go back, only forward.

When we pray, God answers. He puts that answer on the track so we will run into it. The problem is, we want the answers now and God may have put them further along in time. We think that, since we don’t see what we asked for, that God has not answered. He did answer, we just haven’t been patient to run into it yet.

We must be patient and full of faith. If we doubt or give up, then we switch tracks and will miss completely everything that we asked for. In fact, God is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think. (Eph 3:20) Not only will He answer, He will answer abundantly! So much more than we could think to ask for.

Never give up. That’s why He gave us hope as one of the gifts of the Spirit. If you have made God first in your life, above all things, you can ask and He will answer. Your answer is ahead of you and you will run smack into it. Do not alter course or doubt. The Lord is good to those who wait for Him, to the soul who seeks Him. (Lam 3:25)