How much can God deliver when answering prayers?

[Davis Oslo]

I understand Christianity ultimately provides salvation from hell and a place in heaven when a person dies. Alongside that God also can answer prayers by delivering things or services for a person when he is still alive.

My question is: what are the limits of these gifts? What are the most valuable gifts a person or a community has received before going to heaven or hell?

 

[crossnote]

I understand Christianity ultimately provides salvation from hell and a place in heaven when a person dies. Alongside that God also can answer prayers by delivering things or services for a person when he is still alive.

My question is: what are the limits of these gifts? What are the most valuable gifts a person or a community has received before going to heaven or hell?

Why would you want to know if you reject His greatest Gift, His Son given as a sacrifice for our sins?

 

[St_Worm2]

I understand Christianity ultimately provides salvation from hell and a place in heaven when a person dies. Alongside that God also can answer prayers by delivering things or services for a person when he is still alive.

My question is: what are the limits of these gifts? What are the most valuable gifts a person or a community has received before going to heaven or hell?

Hello Davis, I see that you are still pretty new around here, so first off, WELCOME TO CF

While it's true that Jesus' death on the Cross saves us from His Father's wrath (and thereby, Hell/the Lake of Fire) in the eternity to come, the most immediate and valuable blessing/benefit that we receive is salvation from both the penalty and the power of sin in our lives. These are, in fact, the two (principle) things that we are saved from, 1. sin and 2. the Father's wrath.

Granted, being saved from sin probably doesn't sound like much to you (I know that it didn't to me for years), but to the 'new' me (if you will) it is everything! The guilt that I felt because of my sin/because of my very fun, but very sinful life, had become nearly unbearable to me. However, as soon as I knew that God had forgiven me, I felt like the weight of the world had been lifted off of my shoulders, and I also felt an overwhelming sense of peace & joy because I knew that I was finally free. My Judge, who I used to fear, had become my Savior, who I loved instead, and who I knew loved me

So, freedom from sin, as well as a continual sense of joy & peace (concerning both my life in the here and now, and my life in the age to come) are what I would call "the most valuable gifts" that I have ever received.

--David

 

[Davis Oslo]

Why would you want to know if you reject His greatest Gift, His Son given as a sacrifice for our sins?

I talking about the praying process when one asks a specific thing from God. Like, if a person asks to be cured of a disease and he is cured or asks to get wealth and acquires a winning lottery ticket for a certain amount of sum. What are the known limits of the value of services He is willing to supply besides going to heaven? I know He has raised a man named Eutychus from death, but not sure if that was because someone was requesting it or because that was in His interests.

 

[St_Worm2]

Hello again @Davis Oslo, you also asked how the gifts/blessings of God are limited. In a certain sense, they are unlimited, according to Him anyway. Here's one of the verses from the Bible that speaks to this.

Romans 8
32 He who did not spare His own Son, but delivered Him over for us all, how will He not also with Him freely give us all things?
​

The rub (or limit) here is that God knows what is best for us, so He is not going to give us something that He knows will be harmful to us (even though it may be our heart's desire in the moment). This is similar to the way a loving, human father, acts towards his children, of course, but unlike our human fathers, God, who knows the big picture of our lives (as He is the one who knows the end from the beginning), knows what is TRULY best for us.

--David

 

[Davis Oslo]

So, freedom from sin, as well as a continual sense of joy & peace (concerning both my life in the here and now, and my life in the age to come) are what I would call "the most valuable gifts" that I have ever received.

Freedom and joy sounds to me as a package one receives automatically when he becomes a true Christian. Surely, you didn't pray to receive this after you became a Christian, you already had that. But besides that, what can I expect to receive when I ask something additionally.

 

[crossnote]

I talking about the praying process when one asks a specific thing from God. Like, if a person asks to be cured of a disease and he is cured or asks to get wealth and acquires a winning lottery ticket for a certain amount of sum. What are the known limits of the value of services He is willing to supply besides going to heaven? I know He has raised a man named Eutychus from death, but not sure if that was because someone was requesting it or because that was in His interests.

Thank you, I understood your question, but what I did not understand was "Why would you want to know, if you reject His greatest Gift, His Son given as a sacrifice for our sins?"

Praying is not a process, it is rather a privilege where we have access to God despite our unworthiness, on account of Jesus' shed blood.

 

[St_Worm2]

Freedom and joy sounds to me as a package one receives automatically when he becomes a true Christian. Surely, you didn't pray to receive this after you became a Christian, you already had that. But besides that, what can I expect to receive when I ask something additionally.

Hello Davis, while there was certainly the initial/wondrous/nearly overwhelming sense of freedom, joy and peace when I first believed, such feelings can be fleeting as time goes on, especially in the midst of difficult circumstances, and/or the sin that we have allowed ourselves to engage once again. This is why we Christians are commanded to rejoice in/be thankful for ~everything~, even for the tough stuff that we face, and to pray w/o ceasing .. e.g. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18; cf Philippians 4:6-7.

As we do, there should also be a renewed and increasing sense of freedom, joy and peace in our lives as we are grow in our knowledge, understanding, love for and trust of God (IOW, as we grow closer to Him and more deeply understand Him, especially His great love for us ). So these initial "gifts" are ones that we continue to receive from Him, and that in increasing measure, throughout our lives.

--David
.

 

[Tolworth John]

My question is: what are the limits of these gifts? What are the most valuable gifts a person or a community has received before going to heaven or hell?

Welcome to the forum.

Interesting questions. One that is not easy to answer as value depends very much upon what each person values.

May I suggest two answers.
First off, life is a very valuable gift we have all decieved.

But you want asked for gifts.
I would say it is irrelevant. As Christianity is not about what we get in material terms from God and prayer is not primarily about asking for things, but is how we communicate with God.

 

[Tone]

I understand Christianity ultimately provides salvation from hell and a place in heaven when a person dies. Alongside that God also can answer prayers by delivering things or services for a person when he is still alive.

My question is: what are the limits of these gifts? What are the most valuable gifts a person or a community has received before going to heaven or hell?

John 14
"13And I will do whatever you ask in My name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14If you ask Me anything in My name, I will do it."

Mark 11
"Truly I tell you that if anyone says to this mountain, ‘Be lifted up and thrown into the sea,’ and has no doubt in his heart but believes that it will happen, it will be done for him. 24Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours. 25And when you stand to pray, if you hold anything against another, forgive it, so that your Father in heaven will forgive your trespasses as well."

James 4
"2You crave what you do not have; you kill and covet, but are unable to obtain it. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask. 3And when you do ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may squander it on your pleasures."

Abba Yah please Breathe deeply into this life and raise @Davis Oslo up into the heavenly places with Yahshua ha Mashiach in the Name of Yahshua ha Mashiach. Amen.

Psalm 37
"3Trust in the LORD and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. 4Delight yourself in the LORD, and He will give you the desires of your heart. 5Commit your way to the LORD; trust in Him, and He will do it."

Matthew 7
"7Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you."

"12In everything, then, do to others as you would have them do to you. For this is the essence of the Law and the prophets."

Luke 11
"13So if you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!”"


Yah bless you and welcome to CF!