Why We Ask And Don't Get From God

"You want what you don’t have, so you scheme and kill to get it. You are jealous of what others have, but you can’t get it, so you fight and wage war to take it away from them. Yet you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it. You ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures." (James 4-2:3) The reason many people are not successful the clean way is because God will not bless scheming and doing ungodly things to get things for personal pleasure and selfish ambition. God will only give when the motives are correct, aligned with his will and give glory. You'll never have to go against God and use earthly sensual and demonic wisdom to get where God wants you to be.

Quarantine has been a time to pray. I missed God. I missed the father I met when I was 16. It seemed my life was a mess after university. Job application after job application. Dead end jobs. Stuck living at home for the foreseeable future and everyone was forging ahead. It was tough. I didn't know where I wanted to go. Instead of asking the master. I was stuck in a haze of confusion looking for answers anywhere but where my hope comes from.

Today I remembered Hannah. Penneniah had many children. She mocked childless Hannah. However, Hannah decided to trust God. She went to Eli's temple full of tears, full of dissapointment, full of longing for that one dream to move her life forward. Hannah didn't focus on Peninniah or her barrenness. She didn't focus on the mocking or her doubts neither did she focus on her bleak future. She didn't give up and settle. She focused on God.

She prayed and kept praying furiously with her tears and dissapointements. She was praying so hard Eli noticed. She bargained with God and said if God gave her a child, she would give her child to God to use for his glory. Eli told her, her prayer had been answered. Hannah had her son and God had Samuel his prophet who heard his voice. Hannah's one son was greater than all Peninniah's children. God gives the best gifts but they have to be for his glory.

Then I asked God tell me what you want me to do to give you glory. Show me, guide the way. I'll do whatever you want. That's what God wants to hear. I know he will make my path straight if I trust in him and only him.