Faith Plus Prayer Equals What?
You may have had to endure all kinds of trials … so that your faith … may be proved genuine and may result in praise, glory, and honor when Jesus Christ is revealed. 1 Peter 1:6-7
“Maybe if I’d had more faith, God would’ve answered my prayer.”
Have you ever said something like that? Or has a well-meaning friend implied that your prayer wasn’t answered because you needed more
faith?
Many Bible passages address the connection between faith and prayer. For example, Jesus told the woman with the issue of blood that her faith had healed her (Matthew 9:22). But we can never reduce God or faith to a mathematical equation: request plus faith equals favorable answer. Two miracles recorded in Acts 9 indicate that the relationship between prayer and healing isn’t that simplistic.
In Lydda, Peter met Aeneas, a man who’d been bedridden for eight years (v. 33). Did Aeneas have no faith, a little faith, or a great amount of faith? We don’t know. He may not have been a follower of Christ; Lydda had a large Greek population, and Aeneas is a Greek name. Yet God healed this man (v. 34).
Dorcas lived in nearby Joppa. She is described as a disciple of Christ who “was always doing good and helping the poor” (v. 36). When this godly woman became ill, other disciples urged Peter to come, hoping he could help her. She died before Peter arrived, but God restored Dorcas’s life when Peter prayed for her (v. 40).
The Bible doesn’t connect anyone’s prayers to Aeneas’s healing, and only Peter’s prayer at Dorcas’s bedside is referenced in her healing. In these cases, Luke, the author of Acts, emphasizes that the healings glorified God and motivated people to turn to the Lord (vv. 35, 42).
These two miracles prompt me to examine my prayers for physical healing. Am I interested only in physical well-being, or am I equally concerned about spiritual healing that draws me and others into a closer relationship with God? We may never know why God heals some people and not others. Maybe we should stop asking that question. Instead, we can pray that God will be glorified and that people will be drawn to him whether or not physical healing is the answer he provides.
When you pray for healing—for yourself or others—how is your request worded? Talk to God honestly about your desires and ask him to align your will with his.
DIG DEEPER
In John 9, Jesus healed a blind man. Read verses 1-3. When the disciples asked why the man was blind, what did Jesus say? What does that indicate about faith, healing, and prayer?
Read Luke 8:49-56. Compare the healing of Dorcus to the healing of Jairus’s daughter. What was similar? What was different? How was God glorified in both instances?
What does Peter say about the purpose of “all kinds of trials” in 1 Peter 1:3-10? How might this teaching relate to health issues?
Read 2 Corinthians 12:7-10. What healing did Paul pray for? What kind of healing did he receive?
Denise K. Loock
This devotion is part of a series on the book of Acts.