¹⁴This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. ¹⁵And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.

The promise of answered prayer cannot be taken as a blank check to get whatever we want. Many Christians have become discouraged because of misunderstanding this. Psalm 37:4 tells us that God conditions His response to our desires on our delighting in Him. If we desire what God desires, we can confidently ask in His will, and He will answer us. Our passage today makes answered prayer contingent upon praying “according to His will.” But what does this mean?

Most Christians wrestle with this question. Some present a laundry list to the Lord in hopes that some request will resonate with Him and He will make it happen. For others, prayer becomes a rote, legalistic activity done in the hope that God will reward their faithfulness. Still others allow their prayer life to dwindle because of a lack of identifiable answers, or they chock up the answers to coincidence, as though they would have happened even apart from prayer. Some imaginatively interpret their circumstances to fashion what seems like an answer to prayer but lacks the genuine spiritual dynamic God intends.

John, however, writes of active confidence in prayer that comes not from a superficial spiritualization of events but from being sure of our standing with God. He eternally loves us and will never love us less than the ultimate love He demonstrated by sending Jesus to take our place on the cross. We must keep coming back to His supreme love for us because all of our interactions with Him are based on His love, not ours. He continues to desire us and our relationship with Him.

The heart that is knit with God’s prays for the things that God desires. As we grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior (2 Peter 3:18), our prayers line up with His desires. Of course, we don’t always get it right, and that is why John (and Peter) write about these things, to encourage us to grow in our faith.

So in our prayer life, we know God’s will through His revealed Word (the Bible) and the testimony of the Spirit within us. The more in tune we are with Him, the more our prayers are transformed and aligned with Him. And, therefore, the more we will see God answering us.

Lord, continue to teach me to pray according to Your desires and will. Thank You for the repeated assurance in Your Word that You will hear and answer when I pray.