“Prayer changes things…” Or so they say.
But immediately someone will correct you with: “No, not prayer. It is God who changes things”!
Well then, what is the point of praying?

But prayer does change things. When God acted to deliver Hezekiah from the Assyrian horde, He specifically attributes His response to Hezekiah’s prayer: “Because you prayed…” (2 Kings 19:20, Isaiah 37:21)
Because you prayed!

Or maybe you hear a person comment: “I missed having my Quiet Time with God this morning, and now nothing has gone right for me today.”
“Really?” the same someone (above) interjects. “Having your Quiet Time doesn’t mean God will bless you, or that missing it He won’t. God’s blessing is all of grace, it has nothing to do with what you do.”

Well, yes – but the Bible also tells you that a life blessed with peace is bound up with your prayer life:

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. (Phil 4:6-7)

The following comments by Doug Eaton are helpful:

The Power of Prayer

Sometimes, to protect a passage of scripture from the abuses it receives from those who twist it, we add so many qualifications that we eliminate not only the false teaching but also the profound truth it communicates.
We find one such passage in the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus says, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you” (Matt. 7:7).

If you watch prosperity preachers, you will find several who pervert this passage of scripture. They turn it into some name it and claim it doctrine, and most of what they want to claim has more to do with worldly well-being than spiritual.
Other teachers have said that God cannot work until you pray. He is hindered until you allow him to work by giving him permission in prayer, as if God is not sovereign.

Others will say this verse has such a clear promise that if God is not answering your prayers, it must be because you lack faith. Convenient for them, you can show God you have enough faith and get your prayers answered by financially donating to their ministry. Men and women who do such things are wolves who feed on the flock instead of feeding the sheep. If they do not repent, their judgment awaits.

We are right in protecting this passage from abuse, but sometimes we go too far.
For example. Someone might say, “There is power in prayer.” And a well-meaning Christian will respond, “The power is not actually in prayer, but in God. We do not trust in prayer; we trust in him.”
Of course, we must ask, “So God has the power to act on our behalf when we ask, but the means he has provided to speak with him is impotent?” If that is the case, then why do it?

Another believer might come along and say, “Prayer changes things,” when another well-meaning Christian warns, “Our prayers do not change God. He is immutable. He set his plan from beginning to end in eternity past. Our prayers do not change things.”
Of course, they built a straw man and knocked it over in that response. The original comment was not that prayer changes God or his plan but that it changes things for us—either our circumstances or us as believers.

When we finish qualifying this verse, especially if we buy into the argument that there is no power in prayer or that it does not change anything, we are left with an empty shell of a biblical passage that will no longer encourage the believer to pray as intended.

Jesus is telling us emphatically that we should be praying people. Ask, seek, and knock are three metaphors for prayer. The threefold parallelism is God telling us to pray, pray, pray, and his promise is I will answer, answer, answer.
There are guard rails built into this passage, which we can unpack another time, like God only giving good things. This promise of good things eliminates the possibility of God answering our ignorant prayers for anything harmful to us.

God is our Father, and he has good things to give us, most of which deal with our greatest needs, life, and godliness. He has promised to provide the Holy Spirit to those who ask and wisdom to those who seek it. And often, he even meets our physical needs.

Prayer is a powerful means of grace that God has provided to us. He has good things to give us that we do not have because we have not asked.
Some may argue, but God knows what we need even if we do not ask. That is true, but refusing to pray is disobedience, and there are rewards to obedience in prayer that we will not experience any other way. For one, intimacy with our Father will always be lacking in our Christian life if we neglect prayer, and the peace that passes all understanding that flows from it will continue to elude us.

There is power in prayer; it changes things. Ask, seek, and knock, and you will receive.
Do you believe this? I am not asking if you mentally agree with this truth. I am asking if your life gives evidence that you believe it to be true.
Are you living the way someone who believes Jesus’s teaching on prayer would live? If not, begin today and find out what you are missing.

Doug Eaton is Associate Vice President of Enrolment for Trinity International University. For more, see here.