Unanswered prayer
(You will find it helpful to Listen to the Audio above, as you read the text below.)
Matthew 7:7-8,
"Ask and it will be given to you;
seek and you will find;
knock and the door will be opened to you.
For everyone who asks receives;
he who seeks finds;
and to him who knocks, the door will be opened."
God will grant us, in answer to our prayers, such blessings as He knows to be best for us. If He does not give us the exact thing we asked for, then He will give us that which on the whole is far better, and which we would have asked for, if we had known what was best for us, as He does.
The time of God's answer may appear to our impatient minds, to be too long; but His answers shall not be protracted beyond the fittest season.
If anyone is discouraged for lack of an answer to his prayers, let him remember that God may have answered them already, though unperceived, and in a way not contemplated by the suppliant himself.
Paul, when praying for the removal of the thorn in his flesh, did not have it removed. Instead, his thorn was sanctified, and grace was given to him to improve it aright!
"Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But He said to me: My grace is sufficient for you, for My power is made perfect in weakness!" 2 Corinthians 12:8-9
Know then, whether you see it or not, that God both does, and will, answer your petitions. Only let our prayers be humble, and believing, and submissive—and they shall never go forth in vain.
The Lord Jesus gives us a perfect pattern for resignation in prayer, "Father, if You are willing, please take this cup of suffering away from Me. Yet I want Your will to be done, not Mine!" Luke 22:42