Often we pray faithfully and wonder if God is hearing our prayers or we think we are praying incorrectly because they appear not to be answered or are hindered. The Holy Bible outlines eighteen reasons why prayer is hindered or not answered:
1. People don’t pray or spend enough time with the Lord.
James 4:2 “You do not have because you do not ask God.”
Matthew 7:7-8 “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; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.”
2. People don’t pray boldly, expectantly and specifically.
Mark 11:24 “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”
3. People pray with the wrong motive.
James 4:3 “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.”
4. People pray out of the will of God.
I John 5:14 “This is the confidence we have in approaching God; that, if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us.”
5. It might not be time for the prayer to be answered.
Daniel 10:12-13 Then he continued, “Do not be afraid, Daniel, since the first day that you set your mind to gain understanding and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard and I have come in response to them. But the Prince of the Persian Kingdom resisted me twenty-one days.”
6. People have doubt and unbelief that their prayers will be answered.
James 1:5-7 “If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double-minded man, unstable in all he does.”
Mark 11:23 “I tell you the truth, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea, ‘ and does not doubt in his heart but believes that what he says will happen, it will be done for him.”
7. People do not pray in secret.
Matthew 6:6 “But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.”
8. People are ungrateful and don’t praise God.
Philippians 4:6 “Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God.”
9. People don’t use scripture as their prayer base.
Ephesians 6:17 “Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God.”
10. People negate their own prayers with negative confessions; they curse their own requests.
Matthew 16:19 “I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
11. People curse each other’s situations and pray out of God’s will.
Matthew 6:7 “And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words.”
12. People stop praying before their prayer is answered; they lack persistence and don’t pray unceasingly.
I Thessalonians 5:16-17 “Be joyful always; pray continually.”
13. People don’t know how or are unwilling to receive from God.
Romans 5:17 “For if, by the trespass of the one man, death reigned through that one man, how much more will those who receive God’s abundant provision of grace and of the gift of righteousness reign in life through the one man, Jesus Christ.”
14. People have iniquity in their heart.
Psalm 66:18 “If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened.”
15. People have sin in their words, thoughts and deeds.
John 9:31 “We know that God does not listen to sinners. He listens to the godly man who does his will.”
16. People fail to pray offensively and defensively and properly battle the enemy.
Ephesians 6:11 “Put on the full armor of God so that you can take your stand against the devil’s schemes.”
17. People take their eyes off Jesus and the power of his shed blood and the power of the Holy Spirit.
Proverbs 28:9 “If anyone turns a deaf ear to the law, even his prayers are detestable.”
18. People fail to ask and receive adequate prayer with others when needed.
Matthew 18:20 “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.”
The Holy Bible. New International Version by Biblica
Reference using BibleStudyTools.com
Click here to read what revolutionary results clients have said they received with the LENS…Low Energy Neurofeedback System.
If you or a family member wants an evaluation to determine the dependence on a substance and desire recovery from that substance abuse, please call me, Carol Ann Worthing, PhD, at 303-663-5846 or visit my Contact Page. I have professional experience with successful outcomes since 1992.
Carol Ann Worthing, PhD of Individual & Family Wholeness is a psychotherapist in private practice since 1992. She has her PhD in Psychology from Northcentral University in Arizona. She provides a safe and caring approach to your counseling and psychotherapy and evaluations for individuals, couples, families, and children. Her practice represents integrity, competency, and confidentiality, a safe and caring place for psychotherapy. It is her mission to guide you and your family to become emotionally and physically whole and to help you deliberately build your lives and families on that wholeness.
