“Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours,” Jesus declares in Mark 11:24.
I can vividly recall one night, when I was at a very young age, lying in bed, yearning to possess the Force, the ubiquitous energy field from Star Wars that grants telekinesis to certain individauls. I fervently prayed to God, stretching out my hand toward an object in my room, beseeching to, even momentarily, wield this power. And if endowed, I would use it as a testament to His truth and power. I strived to expel all doubt, believing wholeheartedly that God would empower me, much like how Luke Skywalker, once he truly had faith in the Force, lifted his X-wing from the swamp in The Empire Strikes Back. Yet, to my young, disheartened self, no object ever moved.
Of course no object moved, despite my earnest adherence to Jesus’ prompting words. Commentaries on Mark 11:24 and similar ones I’ve found often offer platitudes about what Jesus “really meant” or downplay the sincerity of people’s pleas. While this verse has been discussed countless times, it deserves a reasoned examination that neither dismisses its implicatinos nor soft-pedals its impact on those who earnestly seek its promise.
There are two primary ways to interpret this verse: either Jesus is speaking hyperbolically, or He is offering a literal guarantee. The former seems more plausible, and here’s why. First, empirical observation shows that not all prayers, no matter how fervently believed, are answered as requested, as attested by my aspiration to wield the Force. Second, there must be boundaries to what can be asked. Jesus operates within a framework of justice, love, and grace, which precludes granting petitions that contradict these principles. God is not a genie bound only by the limits of “cannot kill anyone,” “cannot bring someone back from the dead,” and “cannot cause someone to fall in love,” while otherwise fulfilling every whim without discernment. Third, the surrounding text provides context. The two preceding verses read:
“‘Have faith in God,’ Jesus answered. ‘Truly I tell you, if anyone says to this mountain, “Go, throw yourself into the sea,” and does not doubt in their heart but believes that what they say will happen, it will be done for them’” (Mark 11:22-23).
This passage employs exaggerated rhetorical language, a common device in Semitic writings. Jesus uses similar hyperbolic expressions elsewhere, such as: “If your right eye causes you to sin, gouge it out” (Matthew 5:29), “It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle. . . ” (Matthew 19:24), and “Faith as small as a mustard seed can move mountains” (Matthew 17:20). Fourth, the verse about moving a mountain into the sea, which precedes Mark 11:24, describes a seemingly trivial and pointless miracle. If taken literally, such a petition would be uncharacteristic of Jesus’ teachings, which emphasize purpose and meaning. Furthermore, if the disciples understood this as a blanket promise, we would expect examples of them requesting and receiving arbitrary things, like 20,000 denarii to solve their problems instantly. Yet, the disciples’ actions in scripture do not reflect such behavior. These points illustrate why interpreting Mark 11:24 literally is unreasonable. Instead, Jesus likely employed hyperbole to emphasize the power of faith while operating within a framework of divine wisdom and purpose.
To simply conclude here, as many commentaries do, that Jesus meant He will provide what is best for you when He said, “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours” (Mark 11:24), is premature. While this notion may not be incorrect, it requires futher unpacking to understand its actual implications. Even with the substantiated inference that Jesus used hyperbolic language, further distinctions must be addressed: Is the verse entirely figurative, encouraging us to pray with faith while God works through our petitions, or are there specific criteria that, once met, enable someone to ask, fully believe, and receive? Neither possibility should be ruled out, as it remains unclear which Jesus intended.
Before exploring these two interpretations, you may be wonder why both ought to be considered. Most people might fittingly lean toward the figurative interpretation, akin to the popular proverb, “Ask and you shall receive.” A brief analysis, like the one previously discussed, could suffice for this view. However, Mark 11:24’s specific wording—“believe that you have received it”—sets it apart. This phrase is striking because it differs from the model of prayer Jesus demonstrates elsewhere. For instance, in the Garden of Gethsemane, facing the prospect of betrayal, public humiliation, and torture that would surmount to His death, Jesus prays, “My Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, not as I will, but as you will” (Matthew 26:39). Similarly, the Lord’s Prayer includes, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done.” These examples present a paradox: how can one surrender to God’s will while simultaneously holding no doubt that their prayer will be answered?
C.S. Lewis addresses this conundrum in Letters to Malcolm: Chiefly on Prayer, suggesting that Jesus may be alluding to a particular degree of faith. Returning to the two distinctions, we must consider whether Jesus is simply calling us to have faith in our petitions or if there are specific criteria that, when met, align heaven and earth to grant what is asked. Lewis leans toward the latter, partly because of this prayer paradox. Why would Jesus present two seemingly contradictory models of prayer? The subtle yet significant detail—believing without doubt juxtaposed to surrendering to God’s will—demands exploration. Lewis proposes, with humility and a concession of uncertainty that accompanies much theology, that the promise of answered prayer may refer to a rare, supernatural faith most believers never experience. He articulates:
“We must not encourage in ourselves or others any tendency to work up a subjective state which, if we succeeded, we should describe as ‘faith’, with the idea that this will somehow ensure the granting of our prayer. We have probably all done this as children. But the state of mind which desperate desire working on a strong imagination can manufacture is not faith in the Christian sense. It is a feat of psychological gymnastics. It seems to me we must conclude that such promises about prayer with faith refer to a degree or kind of faith which most believers never experience. A far inferior degree is, I hope, acceptable to God. Even the kind that says, ‘Help thou my unbelief’, may make way for a miracle. Again, the absence of such faith as ensures the granting of the prayer is not even necessarily a sin; for Our Lord had no such assurance when He prayed in Gethsemane. How or why does such faith occur sometimes, but not always, even in the perfect petitioner? We, or I, can only guess. My own idea is that it occurs only when the one who prays does so as God’s fellow-worker, demanding what is needed for the joint work. It is the prophet’s, the apostle’s, the missionary’s, the healer’s prayer that is made with this confidence and finds the confidence justified by the event. The difference, we are told, between a servant and a friend is that a servant is not in his master’s secrets. For him, ‘orders is orders’. He has only his own surmises as to the plans he helps to execute. But the fellow-worker, the companion or (dare we say?) the colleague of God is so united with Him at certain moments that something of the divine foreknowledge enters his mind. Hence his faith is the ‘evidence’—that is, the evidentness, the obviousness—of things not seen.”
Lewis’s notion of a superlative faith or a miraculous alignment of the will offers a potential reconciliation. This rare occurrence, conceivably unique to individuals like the disciples Jesus addressed in Mark 11, enables extraordinary outcomes when their prayers divinely align with God’s purposes. I’m curious to hear other ideas.
While Lewis’s exploration of a miraculous disposition provides a compelling resolution to the apparent discrepancy in Mark 11:24, it’s worth examining the first of the two distinctions mentioned earlier: that Jesus may be encouraging us to pray with faith, trusting God to work through our petitions. This perspective gains depth when we consider similar verses elsewhere in the Gospels:
- 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; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.”
- John 14:13-14: “And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it.”
- John 15:7: “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.”
- John 16:23-24: “Very truly I tell you, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete.”
Notice how none of these quotes from Jesus include the phrase “believe that you have received it,” which makes Mark 11:24 unique and the focus of this article. But even if Jesus meant it in the kind of way that Lewis speculates, that still doesn’t take us out of the conversation. As we stitch together a corner of the tapestry of prayer, all of these verses help us glean insight into how Jesus wants us to pray. While this is only a partial view, it is nevertheless more helpful than treating any single verse as the entirety of the gospel. Hence, I pose the inquiry: How ought we petition God?
To begin, share every small, broken detail weighing on your heart. Bring all the specifics to God, and through seeking, our prayers may be refined, as may what we seek. Additionally, adopt the Gethsemane model of prayer: “Lord, your will be done.” This introduces the paradox again. Jesus’ figurative language emphasizes the power of faith, suggesting that the greater one’s faith, the more the foundations of the mountains will shake. But what does this faith mean? It’s not about having zero doubt that we’ll receive exactly what we desire. Instead, it’s about absolute trust in what God desires for us and others—faith that His will be done. The challenge, and seeming paradox, is to pray both specifically and generally while always surrendering the outcome. The more we pray, however, I suspect the spirit of our prayers will gradually shift from the specific to the general.
Other verses clarify why Jesus encourages us to ask. For example, in Matthew 7:9-11, Jesus says, “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!” So yes, it’s clear why an omniscient, loving God wouldn’t simply give us whatever we, as fallible beings, happen to want—for He knows what is best. But what’s best is not always so obvious to us.
I must admit that I often struggle with these passages due to their frequent softening or misinterpretation, sometimes accompanied by accusations of faulty mechanics. Firstly, it can be infuriating to tell someone enduring unimaginable suffering that their prayer is actually being answered. Secondly, suggesting that someone’s prayer wasn’t answered because they lacked enough faith, as in some prosperity gospel teachings, is deeply shameful to the Church. Even the unbiblical idea that everything becomes easy in Christ distorts the truth absurd. As I concluded last week, there are aspects of prayer that we simply don’t fully understand, yet we are still called to engage in it faithfully. I have maintained that God works through a providential, eternal, actively creative plan; not a segmented, linear one. In this, Christians surrender understanding to faith—the same faith we have seen here that Christ calls us to—which must fill the void left by our limited comprehension.
God is greater than we can imagine. And while it may offer only enough light to see your hand in a time of absolute darkness, it is still more light than there would be without God.. A child doesn’t cling to his mother because he hopes she will provide; he does so because she will provide, and with that certainty, there is hope. Likewise, don’t cling to hope for hope’s sake. Instead, cling to God because he is the reality, and with that reality comes both hope and joy. If you accept the reality that Jesus is Christ—and it’s important to remind yourself that you do—and if you have faith in what Jesus says (whom you believe), and if you bring your worries, struggles, and petitions to him in whom you believe and have faith, then there is nothing more freeing than that within God’s eternal, creative plan. For whom is the freer man? The one with a hundred paths to choose from at his discretion, or the one guided toward the single best path, even if other paths seem good, righteous, or justified?
Yet enforcement is nowhere to be seen. For even the best path ceases to be freeing if not chosen freely, just as the noblest virtue ceases to be virtuous if not enacted willingly. This brings me to my concluding thoughts.
Temporarily setting aside the warranted idea that Mark 11:24 pertains to specific individuals or moments, at a more applicable level, it reads similar to the first third of 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.” This verse directly precedes Christ’s assurance that God, like a loving father, will not give a stone as bread, even if we naively or ignorantly ask for it. We now understand what this “asking” entails: it guides us toward the right path—not just the path of our life, but surrendering the outcomes of all events, big and small, to a plan grander than ourselves, the path of all creation. Yet, we must not overlook the middle part of Matthew 7:7, which implies personal responsibility. Each individual must discern their actions, take accountability when they stray, and trust that greater works are at play. One final word on the matter. I do not hold a deterministic theology where we lack control over our actions, and God is the ultimate cause of everything. I believe we have choice. Thus, we cannot assume all things will work together according to God’s will if we haven’t taken the action to ask and seek. Don’t presume you’re on the right path just because God wants what’s best for you if you haven’t prayed, petitioned, and pursued excellence in Christ and the life you’ve been given. Many people are happy without doing these things, and many are unhappy despite them. My concern is not fleeting happiness, but eternal fulfillment. For Christians especially, myself being chief of the matter, I encourage not to seek without asking, and not to ask without seeking. God can undoubtedly work through broken and lost individuals, but Christ clearly calls us to ask. Personally, I’m inclined to simply seek the right door, but there’s a dance—an obligatory one, I may add—to cultivating virtuous activity, petitioning your thoughts to God, and surrendering the results. I may stumble through the steps, but thankfully, I don’t have to lead. For the One who leads, leads with grace.
References:
- Lewis, C. S. (2017). Letters to Malcolm, chiefly on prayer. HarperOne.
- NIV Bible