Hello, I'm Shelley Quinn and welcome again to Issues and 00:00:29.89\00:00:33.08 Answers. You know this is a program where we take an issue 00:00:33.11\00:00:36.27 that we believe is important to many of because you write 00:00:36.30\00:00:39.42 and talk to us about these things and then we try to 00:00:39.45\00:00:43.66 answer that. Our issue today is unanswered prayer. So if 00:00:43.70\00:00:47.87 you know anyone who's struggling with this, and how 00:00:47.90\00:00:50.81 many of us haven't, why don't you call them right now and 00:00:50.85\00:00:53.57 tell them to tune in. Joining us again today is 00:00:53.61\00:00:57.02 Pastor Pavel Goia and he is from the Jainesville, Wisconsin 00:00:57.05\00:01:01.66 district where he has three churches. 00:01:01.69\00:01:03.64 Pastor Goia, thank you so much for coming back. 00:01:03.68\00:01:07.06 Thank you for having me here. 00:01:07.09\00:01:08.78 You know, I know that our viewers are really learning to 00:01:08.81\00:01:12.52 love you and they are really appreciating what you have been 00:01:12.56\00:01:17.15 sharing because you are a man of real prayer. I should say 00:01:17.18\00:01:21.55 you are a man who has a real, intimate, personal relationship 00:01:21.59\00:01:25.92 with the Lord and God has taught you how to become a man 00:01:25.96\00:01:31.02 of real prayer and that takes a man of real faith. But you 00:01:31.06\00:01:35.60 and I have talked independently when we're off the air and we 00:01:35.64\00:01:39.96 all have those occasions where we have unanswered prayer. 00:01:40.00\00:01:44.55 That's what we want to focus on today. Have you ever felt 00:01:44.58\00:01:48.66 discouraged, have you ever felt impatient, have you ever felt 00:01:48.69\00:01:52.73 anxious when you have an unanswered prayer? 00:01:52.77\00:01:56.00 Absolutely. In fact, my temperament is so fast that for 00:01:56.04\00:02:02.82 me it will be very easy for me to work but very hard to be 00:02:02.85\00:02:06.94 quiet or to be still or to wait. That's a punishment for me. 00:02:06.97\00:02:11.03 So when I ask God for help, 00:02:11.07\00:02:12.90 I want the answer and I want it now. 00:02:12.93\00:02:16.20 How many of us are like that! You know, Pavel, I typically 00:02:16.24\00:02:19.47 start this program with a scripture, and when you said 00:02:19.50\00:02:22.52 that, I realized the scripture that I should have used to 00:02:22.56\00:02:26.80 begin is Psalm 26:10 where God says, Be still and know that 00:02:26.83\00:02:31.19 I am God. But that is not easy, is it? 00:02:31.23\00:02:35.48 No. The more difficult thing for us humans is to wait upon 00:02:35.52\00:02:39.42 the Lord. We feel good when we do things. To wait and not to 00:02:39.46\00:02:42.66 be certain what to do and what direction we go, that's very 00:02:42.69\00:02:46.55 difficult and that's a faith exercise that we need sometimes. 00:02:46.59\00:02:50.04 But, Pavel, I have friends, and I have a friend right now who's 00:02:50.08\00:02:53.50 going through quite a bit and she is saying, God's being 00:02:53.54\00:02:57.56 silent. What have I done to offend God? He's not leading 00:02:57.59\00:03:01.55 me, I don't feel his guidance. There are other people who you 00:03:01.58\00:03:05.02 talk to and they'll say, I've been praying and praying and 00:03:05.06\00:03:08.46 praying and God's just not answering my prayers or 00:03:08.50\00:03:10.81 sometimes they'll say, My prayers don't go any higher 00:03:10.85\00:03:13.09 than the ceiling. What would you say to someone like that? 00:03:13.13\00:03:16.56 In my churches, we had a seminar about unanswered 00:03:16.60\00:03:21.52 prayers. In a few sermons, we went into this subject and I 00:03:21.56\00:03:25.49 use my very first Bible verse from Hebrews chapter 11. 00:03:25.53\00:03:29.40 In verse 35, it says that by faith they have been protected 00:03:29.43\00:03:34.69 from sword, from death, from prison and then in 37, by faith 00:03:34.73\00:03:38.74 they had been killed by sword, went into prison and lost their 00:03:38.77\00:03:42.74 lives. So same faith, two different outcomes. 00:03:42.87\00:03:48.77 That's profound; I really had never 00:03:48.81\00:03:51.52 made that comparison there. 00:03:51.55\00:03:53.04 So prayer and faith are not about how we want the 00:03:53.08\00:03:57.64 answer, when we want the answer, but prayer and faith 00:03:57.68\00:04:01.88 are about trusting God. It's all about trusting our God. 00:04:01.92\00:04:06.06 I love my dad. He passed away, but when he was alive, I loved 00:04:06.09\00:04:10.11 him when he had money to give me and when he didn't give 00:04:10.14\00:04:14.27 me money because he didn't have any. I loved him the same and 00:04:14.30\00:04:18.43 I trusted him the same. We trust God when we see the 00:04:18.47\00:04:22.60 answer and when we don't see the answer, because we trust 00:04:22.64\00:04:25.51 him for what he is. 00:04:25.55\00:04:26.94 You know, personally I have found that if I rush into 00:04:26.97\00:04:32.11 a prayer, and when I say rush, if it's just a 15 minute prayer 00:04:32.15\00:04:36.86 or even a 20 minute prayer, I find that I don't often hear 00:04:36.90\00:04:40.90 from the Lord because I've got all of this that's on my mind 00:04:40.94\00:04:45.33 and my mind won't be still. Sometimes it takes me praying 00:04:45.37\00:04:49.59 an hour or two hours where I'm really prayed up or prayed 00:04:49.62\00:04:53.72 out and pressing into his presence. Then I can be still 00:04:53.75\00:04:57.89 and the Lord has impressed his thought by the power of his 00:04:57.93\00:05:01.43 Holy Spirit on my mind. He doesn't every lay out the whole 00:05:01.47\00:05:05.21 plan for me but he will give me something that I can hold 00:05:05.24\00:05:09.46 on to, some kind of direction. Now there are times that I 00:05:09.49\00:05:13.19 feel that the reason we don't get an answer from God is 00:05:13.23\00:05:16.47 because we don't hold still long enough to listen for 00:05:16.51\00:05:19.69 the answer. But there are other times that we know we're praying 00:05:19.72\00:05:22.72 for something according to his word and his will and we're 00:05:22.75\00:05:25.71 still not getting an answer. 00:05:25.74\00:05:27.01 Have you had that type of an experience? 00:05:27.08\00:05:28.08 Absolutely. For instance, when I was praying to go to a school 00:05:28.89\00:05:32.78 and I sent like a Europe. Nothing would come back. 00:05:32.82\00:05:35.58 I didn't know, does he want me to go to school, or maybe he 00:05:35.62\00:05:39.02 does but it's not the time. How long do I have to wait? 00:05:39.83\00:05:43.73 Where would I go? It was very hard to wait and not get an 00:05:43.76\00:05:48.03 answer. And this is very strange; when finally I gave 00:05:48.06\00:05:51.61 up on the idea of going to school. As long as I was 00:05:51.64\00:05:55.12 fighting and trying and thinking about a school, nothing would 00:05:55.16\00:05:59.38 come. When I gave up on school and I said, I'm going to pray 00:05:59.41\00:06:03.59 pray for a week and I leave it to you, and I'm not even 00:06:03.63\00:06:06.48 thinking about it; that's not my problem anymore, my 00:06:06.52\00:06:09.50 problems are your problems because I'm your son, then 00:06:09.53\00:06:12.44 God solved it and just after I gave up. I'm going to give 00:06:12.48\00:06:16.26 you another example. I wanted to sell a Nissan Altima while 00:06:16.30\00:06:20.05 I was in Romania long ago. 00:06:20.08\00:06:21.45 You wanted to sell what? A car, a Nissan Altima. 00:06:21.49\00:06:24.44 A Nissan Altima. Your accent came through there. 00:06:24.50\00:06:29.29 And I put it for sale, it was a good car, running 00:06:29.32\00:06:34.08 smooth and nice, and nobody wanted to buy the car somehow. 00:06:34.11\00:06:37.89 So I went to the market. It's a car market in the west of 00:06:37.93\00:06:41.70 the country and people came to see the car and my car would 00:06:41.74\00:06:46.88 not start, first time in two years. My car would always 00:06:46.90\00:06:49.85 started right away. The car didn't start. So I got a little 00:06:49.89\00:06:52.81 frustrated. I said, God, why the car doesn't start? Do you 00:06:52.84\00:06:56.40 want me to keep the car or what? So I gave up selling 00:06:56.44\00:07:01.06 the car, went home. Forgot about selling the car. Six 00:07:01.09\00:07:05.64 months later we got the papers to come to America and we needed 00:07:05.67\00:07:09.83 money for the plane ticket. So somebody shows up at the 00:07:09.87\00:07:15.24 door and says, Six months ago you had a car for sale in the 00:07:15.27\00:07:20.61 newspaper. Do you still have that car? My wife wants a 00:07:20.64\00:07:25.02 Nissan Altima. And we sold the car right before coming, so 00:07:25.06\00:07:29.40 we had money for the plane tickets. 00:07:29.43\00:07:30.87 What I'm hearing you say is that when we pray, now we've 00:07:30.90\00:07:37.23 got to remember first that God hears the prayers of those 00:07:37.27\00:07:42.36 who have clean hands and a pure heart. So we need to repent 00:07:42.39\00:07:46.26 and confess our sins and make sure that there's no sin that's 00:07:46.30\00:07:50.13 standing in the way. But if we're in the right position, 00:07:50.17\00:07:54.16 and we have confessed our sins and we are abiding in Christ, 00:07:54.19\00:07:57.65 what I hear you saying is that sometimes when we pray and we 00:07:57.69\00:08:03.36 don't get an answer is that it's not God's perfect timing yet. 00:08:03.40\00:08:09.03 You have a saying; would you repeat it about God never 00:08:09.07\00:08:13.37 being early, how do you say it? 00:08:13.40\00:08:15.52 God is rarely early, but he's never late. 00:08:15.55\00:08:18.74 He's rarely early, but he's never late. 00:08:18.77\00:08:21.89 So sometimes when we think God is not answering our prayers, 00:08:21.92\00:08:25.52 he's up there saying, Be patient because I've got the perfect 00:08:25.55\00:08:29.11 timing to give you the answer for this prayer. 00:08:29.15\00:08:30.96 Then, you know, there's a song, it could be a country-western 00:08:31.00\00:08:35.97 song, forgive me, but I've heard this one and it's something 00:08:36.01\00:08:40.94 about thank God for unanswered prayers. There are 00:08:40.98\00:08:45.56 some times that we're praying for something and we can look 00:08:45.59\00:08:47.83 back and the answer did come, we just didn't recognize it. 00:08:47.87\00:08:52.17 The answer was no. And we look back in the past and we're 00:08:52.23\00:08:56.16 going, Oh Lord, thank you that you didn't answer that prayer. 00:08:56.20\00:09:00.35 We are in God's hands. We are God's children. We should pray 00:09:00.39\00:09:05.27 for the sake of God's presence and when we pray to experience 00:09:05.31\00:09:10.16 his presence everything else will pale in his presence. 00:09:10.19\00:09:13.10 We would forget if we would contemplate his presence. 00:09:13.13\00:09:15.97 I'm thinking more and more about a lady who came. I remember I 00:09:16.01\00:09:24.65 remember I was talking to a different pastor and we were 00:09:24.69\00:09:27.35 there and she came and she was sick and she asked for prayer. 00:09:27.38\00:09:31.16 There were another two persons sick in the church. One had 00:09:31.19\00:09:35.17 cancer, one had rheumatoid arthritis, and from the three 00:09:35.21\00:09:39.12 of them we prayed for all three. Two were healed and one passed 00:09:39.15\00:09:43.73 away. How do you explain. We prayed for the same people, the 00:09:43.77\00:09:48.46 same prayer, the same faith. So sometimes God answers in a 00:09:48.49\00:09:53.18 different way in a different time. God has his plans, his 00:09:53.22\00:09:58.64 time. But we don't prayer for our will to be done. We must 00:09:58.68\00:10:04.07 agree to enjoy and to accept his will. 00:10:04.11\00:10:06.48 Amen, Amen. And, you know, one thing I take a lot of comfort in 00:10:06.51\00:10:11.34 is Romans 8:28 which says that, All things work together for 00:10:11.38\00:10:16.18 good for those who love God and are called according to 00:10:16.21\00:10:19.26 his purpose. Now if you took that scripture as some do, as 00:10:19.30\00:10:22.02 a stand-alone scripture, it doesn't always make sense. 00:10:22.06\00:10:24.72 How can you tell a woman who's just lost her husband and her 00:10:24.75\00:10:27.75 children in a car accident, well God works all things 00:10:27.78\00:10:30.32 together for good? If somebody said that to me in those 00:10:30.36\00:10:35.77 circumstances, I'd want to sock them. But we can't separate 00:10:35.84\00:10:40.57 that from Romans 8:29 which explains Romans 8:28. He's 00:10:40.60\00:10:45.45 working all things together for our good, it says in 00:10:45.48\00:10:50.25 Romans 8:29, because those he foreknew he predestined to be 00:10:50.29\00:10:56.42 conformed to the image of his son. What that tells me is 00:10:56.45\00:11:00.65 everything that our loving heavenly Father does is for 00:11:00.68\00:11:05.44 our eternal benefit. I prayed once so hard for a friend of 00:11:05.47\00:11:09.78 mine. Her sister was dying of cancer. The Lord had raised her 00:11:09.81\00:11:14.09 up once before and when he raised her up, she turned her 00:11:14.12\00:11:17.89 back on God. When the cancer returned, she got closer to God 00:11:17.92\00:11:21.72 than she ever had been. We prayed for her healing, but the 00:11:21.75\00:11:25.58 Lord told me to take my friend outside and explain to her 00:11:25.62\00:11:29.98 that if my friend, who loved her sister so much, had to 00:11:30.02\00:11:35.06 trust God that if he could see that if he raised Laura up 00:11:35.09\00:11:39.78 that she would turn her back on him again. God would prefer 00:11:39.81\00:11:43.64 to let her have a little shorter life here on earth and keep 00:11:43.67\00:11:47.46 her secure for eternity, 00:11:47.49\00:11:49.27 than to raise her up and let her turn her back on him. 00:11:49.30\00:11:52.90 We have such a short vision because compared to this short 00:11:52.93\00:11:57.80 life, when we put eternity in the scale, to live with God 00:11:57.83\00:12:02.05 for eternity, these troubles are not even worthy to be 00:12:02.08\00:12:06.23 considered. And if God can do something good from something 00:12:06.26\00:12:11.63 God has to power to do something good from a mess. He can turn 00:12:11.66\00:12:15.99 a mess into a blessing. So he doesn't want us to go through 00:12:16.03\00:12:20.66 difficulties, but God certainly can turn them into a blessing, 00:12:20.70\00:12:25.29 and can use them for something good if we trust him. 00:12:25.33\00:12:27.61 You know, part of this is that as James said that we should 00:12:27.65\00:12:33.94 rejoice in our trials. Sometimes I believe that as 00:12:33.98\00:12:37.01 James says, he's testing our faith and he sees the potential 00:12:37.04\00:12:41.23 in us is the way I look at it. He's trusting us with this 00:12:41.26\00:12:46.44 trial. Are you interested in rocks at all? Absolutely. 00:12:46.47\00:12:50.73 Okay, so you know when you find an old rock and it can 00:12:50.76\00:12:54.95 just be covered with all of this stuff and you put it in the 00:12:54.99\00:12:57.51 tumbler and it tumbles and it tumbles and it tumbles till 00:12:57.54\00:13:00.00 it polishes up and it gets rid of all that stuff on the outside 00:13:00.03\00:13:03.98 and when you bring it out then it's this beautiful, shiny 00:13:04.01\00:13:07.51 onyx or whatever the stone may be. Sometimes we have to 00:13:07.54\00:13:11.63 stay in that tumbler and let God just get some of the 00:13:11.66\00:13:15.71 dross off of us as he would put gold into the fire, and I 00:13:15.75\00:13:20.04 think that's the reason why he doesn't answer some of our 00:13:20.07\00:13:24.33 prayers in our timing is because he knows we are not 00:13:24.36\00:13:27.29 ready to receive the answer. 00:13:27.38\00:13:29.97 Moreover, I believe he answers all prayers. It's just in our 00:13:30.00\00:13:33.05 definition answer means what we want. 00:13:33.09\00:13:35.45 In God's definition, answer means what he has for us. 00:13:35.49\00:13:39.87 So God answers in his power, in his love, in his time, in 00:13:39.90\00:13:44.50 his way. Sometimes we don't see it right away. 00:13:44.54\00:13:47.31 Sometimes it may be a little different, 00:13:47.35\00:13:49.59 but God answers all honest prayers. 00:13:49.63\00:13:51.81 Pavel, can you look back in the past and think of the most 00:13:51.84\00:13:55.83 difficult time when you felt that God was not answering 00:13:55.86\00:13:59.82 your pray and just share your struggle with us. 00:13:59.85\00:14:02.80 Absolutely. When I was in Collegedale, and I already 00:14:05.08\00:14:08.51 shared a little of this story and also in Andrews, in a 00:14:08.55\00:14:11.95 foreign country, having allergy, being without a 00:14:11.98\00:14:16.77 sponsor, learning Greek and Hebrew from English, and I 00:14:16.81\00:14:22.05 didn't know English well, it was difficult. I used to give 00:14:22.09\00:14:27.29 when I had my business, never to receive 00:14:27.33\00:14:30.61 and I was very proud in that time. 00:14:31.43\00:14:33.23 So wait; I don't want to miss that point. You are saying that 00:14:33.26\00:14:37.69 you gave back to God from your business in Romania, but did not 00:14:37.72\00:14:42.11 receive and you took pride in the fact that you could give 00:14:42.14\00:14:45.59 and not need to receive because you were so blessed. 00:14:45.62\00:14:48.51 Now for me to be at that point to need help, I would rather 00:14:48.55\00:14:52.28 die that to ask for help. 00:14:52.32\00:14:54.14 Oooo, a little pride there, huh? 00:14:54.18\00:14:55.54 Oh yeah, we need to learn lessons. And I remember 00:14:55.57\00:15:01.45 going to the school and saying, I need to find some 00:15:01.49\00:15:07.30 work because I need to somehow pay my bills. I remember going 00:15:07.33\00:15:10.94 to God in prayer and walking to school crying and praying 00:15:10.98\00:15:13.97 and walking home and crying and praying and spending the 00:15:14.00\00:15:16.92 whole night praying and saying, God, this English is impossible; 00:15:16.95\00:15:20.73 they have no rules, they have just exceptions. Teach me 00:15:20.76\00:15:23.34 English. And then I would say, God, I cannot find enough work 00:15:23.38\00:15:27.16 to pay my bills, and to pay school and to pay insurance, 00:15:27.20\00:15:28.73 and to pay tuition and to pay books and, I mean, a lot. 00:15:28.77\00:15:33.14 I was overwhelmed and we hit rock-bottom. We said there is 00:15:33.17\00:15:37.51 no way out. There is nothing we can do. We don't have 00:15:37.55\00:15:40.20 anything up our sleeve. We cannot solve this. 00:15:40.24\00:15:42.49 So we called up before God and we said, God, it's in your 00:15:42.53\00:15:46.93 hands. You provide in your time. And God did a great 00:15:46.96\00:15:51.48 miracle, great miracles, every day, every step without us 00:15:51.51\00:15:55.12 asking anything. We didn't ask anybody for anything. 00:15:55.16\00:15:58.74 God just provided everything. 00:15:58.77\00:16:00.45 I know you have a lot of stories. You know something? 00:16:00.49\00:16:04.98 I know that we've talked about several miracles that God has 00:16:05.01\00:16:08.08 done in your life, and I mean true miracles. There was one 00:16:08.12\00:16:11.41 story, if you missed it before, when he was in Romania, owned 00:16:11.45\00:16:14.88 a business in a Communist regime and the Communists actually 00:16:14.91\00:16:18.30 took at least 55% of the business. You didn't really 00:16:18.34\00:16:22.24 own it yourself. At that time you had someone who was 00:16:22.27\00:16:26.11 saying to you, who oversaw this for the communist regime, who 00:16:26.14\00:16:30.06 was saying to him, If you don't start working on Sabbath, we're 00:16:30.10\00:16:33.99 going to put you in prison, and he refused. So the man, 00:16:34.02\00:16:38.38 actually, this agent of the government actually went to a 00:16:38.42\00:16:42.46 storage are, got some glass that had been stored outside in 00:16:42.50\00:16:46.53 boxes rotted from the weather and he brought it back and 00:16:46.56\00:16:50.68 the most amazing thing was that he put that in front of 00:16:50.72\00:16:54.99 your business on a Sabbath and then told you that it 00:16:55.03\00:16:58.94 actually had rotted while it was there even though he'd 00:16:58.98\00:17:04.07 brought it in that condition. Now tell us the rest of that 00:17:04.11\00:17:06.65 story, what happened, because I want to share that miracle 00:17:06.69\00:17:09.20 again. We had to cut it short before. What happened 00:17:09.24\00:17:12.21 and what did he say to you about that glass? 00:17:12.25\00:17:14.70 There were seven tons of glass and he knew that I could not 00:17:14.74\00:17:20.40 transport it back to the storage house, because it was 00:17:20.43\00:17:23.33 all rotten, the wood box. He said, If you can safely bring 00:17:23.37\00:17:28.53 it back then you don't have to pay for it. But if something 00:17:28.57\00:17:33.70 happens, you will have to pay for it or go to prison. 00:17:33.74\00:17:36.08 Pay for because it had been ruined and since the government 00:17:36.12\00:17:39.47 was your partner you couldn't waste anything. 00:17:39.50\00:17:41.85 Exactly. I was not allowed to waste anything. 00:17:41.89\00:17:44.20 So I hired a truck driver; it was a big truck that had 00:17:45.93\00:17:49.79 the crane behind the cabin and he put the cables around 00:17:49.82\00:17:53.61 the boxes like some shoulders, wood shoulders, that you hang 00:17:53.65\00:17:57.94 the boxes. He raised the boxes up and when he rotated them 00:17:57.97\00:18:01.73 in the air, the bottom of the boxes broke and the glass went 00:18:01.77\00:18:05.54 out, shoo, just slipped out from about seven tons of glass. 00:18:05.57\00:18:09.31 How much would that have been equivalent money-wise? 00:18:09.35\00:18:12.76 Fourteen thousand or more but at that time, for me that was 00:18:12.79\00:18:16.91 a lot. I could not have come up with that money. 00:18:16.94\00:18:19.40 So did you even have time when you saw the bottoms break out 00:18:19.44\00:18:22.88 and this glass start to fall out, did you even have time 00:18:22.92\00:18:26.33 to utter a prayer? No. 00:18:26.36\00:18:28.97 But for the last few months I was in the beginning 00:18:29.01\00:18:31.99 struggling because I didn't want to go to prison and I 00:18:32.02\00:18:34.98 didn't have that money to pay and then I started to 00:18:35.01\00:18:37.89 kind of instead of praying that I get help and freedom, I 00:18:37.93\00:18:42.50 started to kind of pray that God would do whatever 00:18:42.53\00:18:47.17 he sees was better for his name and his glory. 00:18:47.20\00:18:49.87 So I actually gave it to God and I said, Your time, your 00:18:49.91\00:18:52.21 will, whatever is for your glory 00:18:52.24\00:18:53.99 The glass, falling from the box, stopped in the air. You could 00:18:54.03\00:19:01.81 literally go like with your hand like that or like that. 00:19:01.85\00:19:05.64 It was seven tons of glass in the air. 00:19:05.67\00:19:07.79 Seven tons of glass just was suspended in the air, nothing 00:19:07.82\00:19:12.90 holding it up, nothing attached on the top. 00:19:13.14\00:19:15.10 This is an absolute total miracle. 00:19:15.13\00:19:17.63 The president, the secretary, the driver of the truck, myself, 00:19:17.66\00:19:21.84 people around on the street, neighbors, they were all like 00:19:21.88\00:19:25.99 mute. The driver of the truck, his knees were literally shaking 00:19:26.02\00:19:31.77 and he said, What do we do? I said I don't know. I could 00:19:31.80\00:19:35.31 not believe. I said, Who am I? I don't deserve this. God is too 00:19:35.34\00:19:38.65 good. I would imagine God could help me in the court 00:19:38.69\00:19:41.17 but not to stop the glass in the air. 00:19:41.21\00:19:43.30 That's like parting the Red Sea. 00:19:43.34\00:19:46.58 God never changes. He has power to do miracles. 00:19:46.62\00:19:48.79 God never changes. We have the same God. 00:19:48.82\00:19:51.35 So the man who had perpetrated this act on you by moving the 00:19:51.39\00:19:55.96 glass there, he's standing there as well. 00:19:56.00\00:19:58.16 Tell us the rest of the story. 00:19:58.20\00:20:00.07 The driver asked me what to do. I said, I don't know. 00:20:00.10\00:20:02.74 So he lowered the boxes. The glass would be still in the 00:20:02.78\00:20:05.35 air and the boxes would come and get the glass in and then down 00:20:05.39\00:20:09.59 together. The President said, You know what, you don't have 00:20:09.63\00:20:13.80 to pay, you don't have to move them, 00:20:13.83\00:20:15.77 you don't have to do anything. 00:20:15.81\00:20:17.03 This is the man who moved them there in the beginning 00:20:17.07\00:20:19.46 who was trying to put you in prison. 00:20:19.49\00:20:21.67 He said, Leave this place, move away from our business, 00:20:21.70\00:20:26.54 just don't curse me and my family. 00:20:26.57\00:20:28.03 Don't curse me? He knew that you were calling on a power 00:20:28.07\00:20:31.99 that was too great for him. That's amazing 00:20:32.02\00:20:35.88 But the reason I wanted you to share that story is you 00:20:35.92\00:20:40.45 have seen such amazing, I mean Pavel has seen such amazing 00:20:40.49\00:20:44.53 answers to prayer and you and I ask, Can this be true? 00:20:44.57\00:20:48.06 Why would God do a miracle for him when I haven't seen 00:20:48.10\00:20:51.63 him do anything like that for me and I believe personally 00:20:51.66\00:20:55.25 we hear all the time from missionaries from Africa and 00:20:55.28\00:20:59.22 India and Papua, New Guinea, missionaries who are coming 00:20:59.26\00:21:03.44 in, we hear stories of such incredible miracles and some 00:21:03.48\00:21:06.94 of us in the United States might sit and say, Why don't 00:21:06.97\00:21:10.75 we see these kind of miracles? Well part of the reason is 00:21:10.79\00:21:14.15 because we have so many resources and we have so much 00:21:14.18\00:21:17.47 available to us that it doesn't really require a miracle. 00:21:17.50\00:21:21.16 God can use someone else to answer our prayer, but it does 00:21:21.19\00:21:25.80 my faith such, I just gives me a surge of faith to hear this 00:21:25.83\00:21:30.40 story because it tells me when you're really down to 00:21:30.43\00:21:33.75 that point where man can't save... man couldn't save 00:21:33.78\00:21:37.03 anyway that glass from breaking. But God will step in and do 00:21:37.07\00:21:41.63 something that man can't do. And he was honoring your faith. 00:21:41.67\00:21:46.37 yet here's a man you have said that you've had miracle after 00:21:46.41\00:21:51.08 miracle to answered prayer and it's still difficult for you 00:21:51.11\00:21:55.75 when your prayers seen to be "unanswered. " It's something 00:21:55.79\00:22:00.05 that you struggle with as well. 00:22:00.09\00:22:01.74 Absolutely, absolutely. Prayer is not a one-time event; 00:22:01.78\00:22:06.95 prayer is a lifestyle and unless we spend every day in 00:22:06.98\00:22:11.15 time with God, we struggle. Every time when I don't spend 00:22:11.19\00:22:14.63 enough time in the morning then I am wondering why God 00:22:14.67\00:22:19.31 doesn't answer, why doesn't he help? So we must pray in 00:22:19.35\00:22:23.96 order to learn how to pray. 00:22:24.00\00:22:25.02 It's a practice. It's something that... it's just physicians 00:22:25.06\00:22:28.27 say that they are practicing medicine... as Christians we 00:22:28.31\00:22:33.41 need to be practicing prayer. So what would say if you could 00:22:33.45\00:22:37.84 tell those who are listening to our voice right now, if you 00:22:37.87\00:22:42.05 could tell them just one or two things that could change 00:22:42.09\00:22:46.62 their prayer time and connect them more closely with God, 00:22:46.66\00:22:51.16 what would you say as a beginning point? 00:22:51.20\00:22:55.07 I believe that we have wrong priorities. We care but we 00:22:55.11\00:23:01.31 but we don't care enough for prayer. We are afraid to 00:23:01.35\00:23:07.49 really pray because that might change our life and we don't 00:23:07.52\00:23:09.94 really want to change. Whoa, boy! that's a powerful 00:23:09.98\00:23:14.32 statement. So I believe sometimes God allows us to hit 00:23:14.36\00:23:18.66 the rock-bottom to realize what we really want. 00:23:18.70\00:23:21.01 And then we make the God the priority. We wake up in the 00:23:21.05\00:23:23.93 morning and start with God and throughout the day walk 00:23:23.97\00:23:27.18 with God and as we connect with him, we'll learn how to 00:23:27.21\00:23:30.49 trust him, we will grow like babies grow and we will learn 00:23:30.53\00:23:33.78 to experience our wonderful God. We have a wonderful, 00:23:33.81\00:23:38.14 powerful, loving God. Amen. For you when you were 00:23:38.17\00:23:42.43 actually quite young when you learned something it took me 00:23:42.46\00:23:45.92 many years to learn and that was not just to come to God 00:23:45.96\00:23:49.67 with a laundry list of what needed to be done but that 00:23:49.70\00:23:53.66 you're actually coming to prayer to what I call press 00:23:53.70\00:23:57.71 into his presence to get closer to God to know him. 00:23:57.75\00:24:01.72 What are some of the steps that helped you or help you? 00:24:01.76\00:24:05.56 Is it the Bible reading, the contemplating, the meditating, 00:24:05.60\00:24:09.01 what is it that helps you when you're trying to really get 00:24:09.05\00:24:12.43 to know God better? For me it is amazing, they go 00:24:12.46\00:24:15.67 together hand in hand. For me prayer is not just only talk; 00:24:15.70\00:24:19.97 prayer is when we study the Bible, is when we keep quiet 00:24:20.00\00:24:24.19 before God and listen to his voice. Prayer is when God can 00:24:24.22\00:24:28.12 talk to me to my very need in my very words through the 00:24:28.15\00:24:31.98 Bible all of the time reading, not looking for an answer but 00:24:32.02\00:24:34.84 reading my daily study, where ever I am in the Bible. 00:24:34.88\00:24:38.82 God can use it to talk to my need. For me prayer is when 00:24:38.86\00:24:42.13 God keeps quiet and I know he says it's not the time 00:24:42.17\00:24:45.95 right now. So prayer is a continual walk, it's a daily 00:24:45.98\00:24:49.73 with God. So for the person who is 00:24:49.77\00:24:52.65 sitting out there discouraged feeling like their prayers are 00:24:52.69\00:24:55.80 not going above the ceiling or that God is not answering, 00:24:55.83\00:24:59.45 or that God is being silent, what encouragement would 00:24:59.48\00:25:03.06 you give them? This is what I tell them: 00:25:03.10\00:25:06.19 When you go to prayer, stop for a second to pray for you 00:25:06.23\00:25:10.05 and to think about you. You are not going to die if you 00:25:10.08\00:25:13.86 don't pray today for your problems. Try for one day to 00:25:13.89\00:25:17.50 focus on Jesus cross and his love, his character and what 00:25:17.54\00:25:21.33 he has done for you and all those fears and switch the 00:25:21.36\00:25:25.50 focus from themselves and give themselves up for a day, 00:25:25.53\00:25:29.28 and switch the focus on God, they say that that was the 00:25:29.31\00:25:33.03 most blessed day they had. 00:25:33.06\00:25:34.12 So if you're having difficulty you feel like your prayers 00:25:34.15\00:25:37.61 aren't going anywhere, you feel like you're not hearing from 00:25:37.65\00:25:42.02 God, then your advice to our viewers is to go to God and 00:25:42.05\00:25:46.04 don't ask for anything, just go focusing on the cross of 00:25:46.08\00:25:49.99 Jesus Christ, thanking him for everything he's done, focusing 00:25:50.03\00:25:54.26 on what God has done in the past, the power, looking at him 00:25:54.29\00:25:58.49 as creator and just thanking him that he's the one who 00:25:58.52\00:26:02.28 redeems us and sanctifies us, and that is the type of prayer 00:26:02.31\00:26:06.43 that can change our lives. 00:26:06.47\00:26:07.79 Pavel, would you please pray for those who are listening. 00:26:07.83\00:26:12.20 Sure, I will be happy. Heavenly Father, 00:26:12.24\00:26:16.05 we come before you and we consider it a privilege to 00:26:16.08\00:26:21.30 contemplate your love and to talk about how to approach your 00:26:21.33\00:26:25.71 presence, how to pray. Father, we don't even deserve to come 00:26:25.74\00:26:29.92 before you, and yet you allow us to come before you as we 00:26:29.95\00:26:34.51 are to get to know you more and more. We pray that people 00:26:34.55\00:26:39.14 who have been watching this program, they will understand 00:26:39.18\00:26:43.60 who you are. They will understand how to pray and how 00:26:43.64\00:26:47.99 to get their right priorities, to put you right in the center 00:26:48.02\00:26:52.28 and they will understand that it's all about you. We pray 00:26:52.32\00:26:56.07 that they will get to know you, to experience you daily, 00:26:56.10\00:27:00.04 to trust you, to love you, to have peace and joy and let 00:27:00.08\00:27:03.69 you bless them and they will become a blessing for others. 00:27:03.73\00:27:07.31 Father, we pray in Jesus' precious name and we thank 00:27:07.35\00:27:12.32 you so much for answering our prayer. Amen. 00:27:12.36\00:27:16.33 Amen. Pastor Pavel Goia, thank you so much for being 00:27:16.36\00:27:21.81 with us today, for sharing the journey that God has taken 00:27:21.84\00:27:25.10 you on. Thank you very much for inviting me it was my 00:27:25.14\00:27:28.36 privilege. Well it's been our joy. 00:27:28.40\00:27:30.27 And for those of you at home, I hope you've been inspired 00:27:30.31\00:27:33.48 as I have been inspired to understand that there is no 00:27:33.52\00:27:37.03 such thing as unanswered prayer. God is either saying 00:27:37.07\00:27:40.52 yes, no or possibly he's saying wait for my perfect timing. 00:27:40.55\00:27:44.54 Well, now our prayer for you is that the grace of our Lord 00:27:44.58\00:27:48.19 Jesus Christ, the love of the Father and the fellowship 00:27:48.23\00:27:52.28 of the Holy Spirit will be with you today and always. 00:27:52.32\00:27:56.34