Have you ever felt like your prayers were evaporating into thin air? Have you ever wondered if prayers just hit the ceiling and bounce back?  What happens when we pray? When we pour out our hearts before our Heavenly Father, what happens?

Today I want to share with you an example of what happened when the prophet & political leader Daniel prayed in order to understand a vision the Lord had given him. This is not prescriptive for what happens each time we pray, but this true account offers encouraging insight to us. Perhaps it may embolden us to pray believing, without ceasing, expecting God!

And he said to me, “O Daniel, man greatly loved,understand the words that I speak to you, and stand upright, for now I have been sent to you.” And when he had spoken this word to me, I stood up trembling. Then he said to me, “Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart to understand and humbled yourself before your God, your words have been heard, and I have come because of your words.

When we pray heaven responds. The Lord both hears, answers, and when He deems it right, he acts directly on our behalf when we pray. The saints should be offering up all sorts of prayers at all times. This is what is means to pray without ceasing. This is what it means to be sober-minded for the purpose of prayer.

The prayers of the saints are effective, clothed in the righteousness which is upon us because of Jesus Christ, when we pray our God responds. This is true blessedness.

This is why we must press in relentlessly, continuously, joyously to our God, because He has ordained in sovereign goodness that the prayers of the saints effect the heart of God. The Lord God, the Almighty responds when we pray. That changes everything. 

Prayers don’t hit ceilings. Prayers don’t bounce off walls. Prayers don’t evaporate into oblivion. The prayers of the saint, the prayers of the child of God, the prayers of the Jesus seeker, the God pursuer enter into the glorious gates of heaven and storm the throne room. We are already seated with Him in heavenly places. We are in Christ and our God is with us in every conceivable way. And hears us when we pray. Don’t miss this in Daniel the messenger said to the man of God…I have come BECAUSE of your words (because of His prayer). God may not send a heavenly messenger in response to a vision (see Daniel), but in very real sense God is willing to move heaven and earth to meet with us. He did move heaven and earth when He sent His Son Jesus. Did not heaven lean in when God sent down to the darkness earth the most true and brilliant light of all time, Jesus? Did not Peter write…things into which angels long to look?  Did not the ground shake and the dead come out of their tombs when Jesus died? God moved heave and earth for His glory and for our eternal good! The dwelling place of God is in us, and He will forever be with us. Friend, you should pray always. Your God longs to hear you and respond to you and to show the glory and goodness of God. You will never see it, you will miss it, you will be sorry for it if you miss this precious truth of Scripture.

So, when you wait and wait and wait….and it’s hard and you keep waiting. You must begin to understand this truth, God is responding to you. Just as it was said to Daniel, friend, I can say to you….YOU are GREATLY LOVED and your God is responding to you even if in this physical world you cannot comprehend or yet conceive it. Later you will understand, perhaps in the here and now and certainly without doubt in the hereafter. 

In your wait…pray and keep on praying.