Episode #401: Do You Actually Anticipate that God will Answer You? – Becoming Childlike

Hey, friend, have you ever asked God a question and then immediately moved on? “God, what should I do here?" You pause for maybe two seconds and then move on to problem-solving on your own or thinking about something else or hoping He answers at some point, someday, that you can kind of recognize.

Now I know I've been there, and I don't think that I'm alone in this, but I've noticed that when my kids ask me a question, they don't move on so quickly. They actually anticipate or expect that I'm going to respond, even to the extent of them hollering my name multiple times from another room across the house and getting frustrated if I don't hear them. But when I learned to pray, and for many of my years praying, I didn't actually anticipate for God to reply.

We're talking about being childlike in our faith because we can come to God as His beloved kids. And He tells us all throughout Scripture that He will answer us.

Jeremiah 33:3, "Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and unsearchable things that you have not known."

John 10:27, "My sheep listen to my voice. I know them, and they follow me."

James 1:5-6 tells us that if anyone lacks wisdom, we can ask God because He gives generously to all.

We can believe that God speaks but pray like He doesn't.

My approach to prayer was really one-way delivery. Here's my request. Here's my gratitude. Here's what I'm worried about. Thanks, God. Please help me. Amen. And there's nothing wrong with coming with requests or gratitude or worries, but relationship includes interaction. And you're here because you believe that too, or you at least hope that it's true, and that's a good place to start.

Children naturally anticipate interaction from someone that they trust. They have to be taught not to interrupt your conversations because they come in believing that you're there to hear them and engage with them. And we as God's kids can't possibly interrupt Him. So then it stands to question why we don't come to Him with the same anticipation and excitement and eagerness?

Anticipating God's reply doesn't mean that God owes us an immediate answer or that the first thought that pops into our head must be the Lord. It's simply leaving room for God to be an active participant in our relationship. It's anticipating that when He says that we can call to Him and He will answer us, that's true, that He's trustworthy in what He says.

Coming to God in prayer and waiting to listen for Him changes our posture after “amen.”

Maybe the answer comes the next time we open our Bibles. Maybe it comes in a sense of conviction or peace or wisdom over time, or trusted insight from another person. Or perhaps we wait, and we're not sure exactly when the answer will come or how it will come, but we're listening, anticipating that God will reply because we trust Him, and He tells us that He will.

Prayer changes when we approach it like an ongoing conversation.

And so the listening posture gets to continue with us as we go about our days, not just in the times when we're in a quiet space with our Bibles open. God speaks to us through our circumstances, and prayer gets to be this ongoing conversation that we have with Him. Both speaking and listening as we face new meetings, new circumstances, new decisions.

And sometimes hearing what God would share with us includes being open to hear the thing that we've been avoiding. Something that we haven't been willing to hear. And that's where we're taking this conversation today.

Because kids don't get to pick and choose what they listen to from their parents. And we don't wanna have selective listening that will work against our back-and-forth conversational relationship with God.

And so here's a question that I invite you to ask Him today, and linger with it. Come back to it later today or later this week if you're not sure what He's sharing with you yet. And then when you feel like He might be prompting something for you, ask him more questions about it and ask for his help, and trust that he will respond to you in that too.

God, what's something that you've been saying to me that I haven't been ready to hear?

Have a good talk.

And if you've been encouraged by this content, please share it with a friend and help them grow in their conversational relationship with God too!

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