Do you sometimes feel that your prayers go up in thin air and nobody is listening? Or that there is a blockage and your prayers are not going further that the room you’re in? There are certain things in our lives that can cause hindrances to our prayer life.
Let’s look at a few scriptures to get clarity on what specific, can cause hindrances.
Relationships
The way you treat your spouse: 1Pet3:7 Likewise husbands, live with your wives in an understanding way, with great gentleness and tact and with intelligent regard for the marriage relationship, as with someone physically weaker since she is a woman. Show her honour and respect as a fellow heir of the grace of life, so that your prayers will not be hindered or ineffective.
I don’t want to get into a debate or exclude the way a wife should treat her husband, but let us focus on what the verse say about the husbands prayer life.
The way you treat your wife can affect your prayers. Your relationship with her is an example of Christ’s relationship with the church.
Eph5:25 Husbands, love your wives, as Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her that He may sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, so that He might present the church to Himself in splendour, without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, that she might be holy and without blemish.
Impatience
When we pray for something we expect results by the time we say Amen. Worst case scenario by tomorrow morning, we expect things to be different.
When Daniel prayed for his people, he waited 21 days for an answer from the angel Gabriel. Dan10:12 Then he said to me, fear not Daniel for from the 1st day that you set your heart to understand and humble yourself before your God, your words have been heard and I have come because of your words. The prince of the kingdom of Persia withstood me 21 days, but Michael, one of the chief princes came to help me…
There are some things happening in the spiritual realm that we cannot see, but that doesn’t mean God didn’t hear your prayer. There are things that need to be put in place to make your request happen.
Pray with the knowledge that God heard you the first time. Gabriel said to Daniel that God heard his prayer the 1st day.
Num14:20 And God said: ”I have pardoned him as per your word.’ Vs 28 ”As I live, said the Lord, just what you have spoken in My hearing, I will most certainly do to you.
God hears everything we say….
Lack of knowledge
Hosea 4:6 My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge, because you have rejected knowledge, I reject you from being a priest to me…
What you know and understand about God will affect your prayer life directly.
You can only ask and trust God for what you know and believe He is capable of.
The Father in Mark 9 have heard about Jesus healing the sick and he took his son to Jesus for healing. When the father spoke to Jesus, he said in vs 22…’But if You can do anything, take pity on us and help us. Verse 23 Jesus said to him, ”If You can? All things are possible for the one who believes and trust in Me.”
Lack of faith
James1:6-7 But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea that is driven and tossed by the wind…7 For that person must not suppose that he will receive anything from the Lord.
Mark11:24 Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.
God isn’t hard of hearing, but some things in our life and our actions cause God’s ear to not hear our prayers. He cannot go against His own word. He said in 1 Pet3:12 that His ear is open to the righteous. We need to be in right standing with God and we need to be in right standing with the people around us. So that we can boldly go to the thrown, pray to God and know that what we pray will be so. When you stand with confidence in front of God with your prayer knowing that you have done what is required, e.g. Asked for forgiveness, forgiven others, treat your spouse with love and respect, love your neighbor as well as your enemy. (That doesn’t mean you condone everything they do.) Then you can know with confidence that your prayer will be answered.