Avoiding the Obstacles to Prayer

1. Unforgiving Spirit

This is one of the most common hindrances to answered prayer. When we nurse a grudge or harbor ill will toward someone else, God will not deal favorably with us. This is the predominate barrier to all prayer, which is delineated in the Lord’s Prayer (Matthew 6:9-13).

Mark 11:25 (Jesus said)
“And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.”

2. Sinful Life

Unconfessed sin in the life becomes a serious roadblock to the praying Christian. Idols in the heart cause God to turn away and allow prayers to go unanswered.

Psalm 66:18
“ If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.”

Isaiah 59:2
“But your iniquities have separated between you and your God, and your sins have hid his face from you, that he will not hear.”

3. Unbelieving Petitions

Prayers are often halted by unbelief. We read and accept God’s promises, and yet our hearts doubt their truth. It has been said that faith is only omnipotent when on its knees.

James 1:6-7
“But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord.”

4. Selfish Requests

Before we approach God with our self-gratifying list, we must learn that prayer is basically asking what we already know God’s will to be. And His will is contained in the revelation of His Word. The life of the Apostle Paul is an example of this principle. He does not pray for material possessions or consumable items. His petitions are never selfish or shortsighted. Paul prayed with eternity’s values in view. Too often our prayers are filled with personal comforts, earthly possessions and our desire for happiness.

James 4:3
“Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.”

5. Lack of Marital Unity

Our prayers can go unanswered due to problems in our marriage relationship. Incidentally, the strength of a couple’s prayer life reveals the spiritual health of the marriage. When disharmony occurs, prayer is impeded.

“If unconverted people can have happy homes without prayer (and they do), how much happier Christian homes would be with prayer” (Weirsbe).

I Peter 3:7
“Likewise, ye husbands, dwell with them according to knowledge, giving honour unto the wife, as unto the weaker vessel, and as being heirs together of the grace of life; that your prayers be not hindered.”