Wednesday, March 30, 2016

When God Won't Listen To A Christian's Prayer

My Utmost For His Highest
 
He…wondered that there was no intercessor… —Isaiah 59:16
 
“The reason many of us stop praying and become hard toward God is that we only have an emotional interest in prayer. […] Worship and intercession must go together; one is impossible without the other. Intercession means raising ourselves up to the point of getting the mind of Christ regarding the person for whom we are praying (see Philippians 2:5). […] When we lose sight of God, we become hard and dogmatic. We throw our petitions at His throne and dictate to Him what we want Him to do. We don’t worship God, nor do we seek to conform our minds to the mind of Christ. And if we are hard toward God, we will become hard toward other people. […]  Be a person who worships God and lives in a holy relationship with Him.”  CHAMBERS
 
Next to reading the Word of God, I think that prayer is the most neglect discipline in the Christian’s life.  Prayer is communication with our Father.  When the disciples asked Jesus to teach them to pray, Jesus began with “Our Father who is in heaven …”  (Luke 11:2) Prayer is vital.  Prayer is spiritual.  But prayer is useless if our hearts are not right.  God does not hear the prayers of those who are not His children.  And for those who are, He will not listen when we try to approach him with sin in our hearts.  It’s not like having a conversation with your earthly father.  You might talk to him and all the while you have deceit or some hidden sin in your heart.  Prayer is a spiritual act.  Prayer is a combination of thoughts – what it is that you are praying about, devotion – your love for God, and the Spirit – the enabler of your spiritual life.  The Word says the “the prayers of a righteous man are powerful and effective”  (James 5:16)  That would cause us to consider what is it that makes the man righteous … right before God … a pure heart and clean hands .. (Psalm 24:3-6) “Who may ascend into the hill of the Lord? Or who may stand in His holy place? He who has clean hands and a pure heart, Who has not lifted up his soul to an idol, Nor sworn deceitfully. He shall receive blessing from the Lord, And righteousness from the God of his salvation.”
 
We must pray, but our hearts must be right when we do.  We don’t get to define the conditions for our relationship with God. We don’t approach God in the wrong way intentionally, we do it without thinking.  Remember that when you pray, you are praying to your Father in heaven.  The Creator of the universe.  A friend of ours gave me simple reminder for how I should pray .. ACTS .. Adoration .. recognizing who God is … Confession … confessing my sins (1 John 1:9)Thanksgiving … thanking God for what He has done in my life … and lastly Supplication(Philippians 4:6-7) .  Oh, and the next time someone asks you to pray about something .. stop and pray right then … with them … You both will be glad you did.  ELGIN
 
Charley Elgin

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