Many believers want to know when what they have asked God would happen. When? How? My brother, my sister. Did you ask God for the time for Him to send you on earth? Did your parents themselves asked Him for anything? They may have prayed for a child, and then it is you who came. Don’t you know that sometimes, some women get pregnant and end up without a child after the whole pregnancy?
My friend, Jesus told the disciples, and He is telling you today that: “It is not for you to know the times or dates the Father has set by his own authority” to do what He wants to do in your life or even to answer your prayers. You see, even the disciples were impatient because they chafed under the Roman rulers and wanted Jesus to free Israel from Roman power and then become their king. Jesus told them that God the Father sets the time timetable for ALL events: worldwide, national and personal! Thereofre, if you want changes in your life that God has not yet made, don’t become impatient. Instead, trust God’s timetable.
You know, there are prayers you do that are according to God’s will: the desire to know Him more, to get closer to Him, to have wisdom or discernment, or even to develop a prayer life… such prayers, God answers them when they are done in the name of Jesus, but there is an appointed day for that answer to come. Jesus said: “In that day you will no longer ask me anything. Very truly I tell you, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name” (John 16:23). Also bear in mind that, if the Lord is asking you not to worry about earthly matters that you can stand up and try to get by your own means (Matthew 6:25-34), He is certainly not going to tell you to worry about spiritual things you have no control of. Instead He is saying: “Do not let your hearts be troubled. You believe in God; believe also in me” (John 14:1). So, your heart is troubled because you still don’t believe in His promises, you do not believe He is capable of making them come true! It may be hard to admit but that’s what it is as the Bible also says: “Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding” (Proverbs 3:5). So, as long as you want to understand things with your own logic, you have still not trusted God to be Sovereign in everything. And Finally and this could be the answer to those believers whose faith is wavering, unstable and want to know when God will do something for them and how He will do it: “Have faith in God,” Jesus answered. “Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Go, throw yourself into the sea,’ and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them. Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours” (Mark 11:22-24). No one can please God without faith. One day you have faith and you believe, another day you doubt God? Do you really have faith then? He who has faith does not question God about the time and how He will act in his/her life or answer his/her prayers! He who has faith believes and waits patiently knowing that God is never late, but we are the ones who delay His actions because of our sins or our lack of faith. Stay blessed in Jesus.