If one turns away his ear from hearing the law,
even his prayer is an abomination.
Proverbs 28:9
Wait! What? You
mean there are some prayers God doesn’t want?
According to scripture, yes.
Prayer is a universally accepted idea, but we want to set our own rules for it.
The majority of adults claim that they pray, but is God listening to those
prayers? Scripture commands us to pray, but there are some guidelines for those
prayers. For example, will God honor the prayer of a man who flings himself off
a skyscraper with the words: “God, keep me safe?” Or would God honor the prayer
of a murderer asking for nice weather for his next kill? Obviously, God does
not welcome every prayer, but we want to think that He always hears ours. But
does He? How do we know? Fortunately, He’s spelled it out pretty clearly for
us.
God is all about
the heart, because the heart determines our actions. We may say, “I don’t
believe in stealing,” but we slip a twenty out of our employer’s cash register.
We lied. We do believe in stealing. We may say, “I don’t believe in having sex
outside marriage,” but our significant other is moving in next week. We lied.
We do believe we can do whatever we want. Actions are our hearts on display. We
may say we love God, but our actions indicate whether or not we are lying (1 Jn. 2:4). So, when we continually defy God’s
clear commands, He doesn’t want to hear our requests. They disgust Him. He’s
not fooled by our lying lips; he sees our hearts. When we’ve become our own
gods, He knows it and He does not listen to idol worshipers.
Are you turning your
ear away from hearing God’s law? The only prayer He wants to hear is
repentance.
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