As You Wish
One of the movies I hate that I love is the “Princess Bride”. It is a cheesy and humorous rendition of a fairy tale with the classic storyline, boy falls in love with girl, bad guy takes girl to be the prince’s wife, boy learns to be a really good swordsman, and goes and gets girl back. But in the movie the “boy” Wesley often responds to his beloved, Buttercup’s, requests, “as you wish.” He was willing to do whatever she desired, which may be loving and romantic, but is not very realistic or always helpful.
That is a similar context by which Jesus says, “Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours (Mark 11:24).” It’s as though Jesus is saying when we ask for anything, God’s response is “as you wish.” This is challenging because it makes God sound like a magic genie, just rub the lamp (pray) and ask God for whatever we want, and God will comply with our demand. And if we don’t believe God will do this, and that it is a done deal, then we don’t have true faith. Obviously prayer has a lot to do with faith, we trust in God to do exactly what God desires to do. The problem is this, what is our faith in? The thing we prayed for? That God will make it reality because of our prayer or request? Or is our faith in God himself who has his own will and desire to bring his kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven? Jesus’ brother James writes in his letter, “When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures (James 4:3).” God loves us, we are his beloved, and God desires to give us whatever we wish, when it is good for us and aligns with what God knows is best for us. Obviously we don’t get everything we ask for because not everything is what God desires to give us because our motive may be wrong, or in our ignorance and lack of understanding we ask for things that don’t work towards God’s good outcomes (recognizing that sometimes going through adversity and challenges is exactly the path we sometimes need to refine our character to reflect God’s). While God provides every good gift from above, God is not our magic genie, and therefore we need to be careful what we ask for. Does God want that mountain moved? If so, we pray with faith that God will move it. How do we know? We don’t always know, that is why Jesus also said, “If you remain in me and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you (John 15:7).” We abide in Jesus so that whatever we wish is really whatever is on Jesus’ heart to begin with, not our own desire.