A Clean Heart

How easy it can be to “pray.” Athletes pray during sporting events. Soldiers pray in the face of danger. People in business pray during tense moments. Hospitals are filled with prayers. Children pray about pretty much anything.

These are prayers in our moments of need, often without any meaningful preparation, maybe even without a real relationship with God.

Those who approach God with this kind of prayer can find themselves taking prayer for granted and thinking about God only during emergencies. If He doesn’t answer as they want, they may react with anger or bitterness.

But the Bible provides a different picture of prayer. This prayer begins with a personal relationship with God.

Through this relationship, we understand how to live, our lives are transformed, and we can know God as our Father. We become sensitive to His standards and realize how sin can separate us from Him. We understand why it’s important to confess our sins and eliminate anything that interferes with our relationship. As God warned through Isaiah, because of sin, He “will not listen,” even if we “multiply prayers.”

Do you want God to hear your prayers? First, seek to develop your personal relationship with Him. Ask Him to penetrate your thoughts and feelings, words and actions, to search you to see if there is anything that must be cleansed.

As God reveals any sin to you, don’t hold back, but confess. Seek to be clean. Purge anything that may separate you from Him.

Then, with a clean heart, experience the joy of unbroken harmony and fellowship with Him! Your prayer life can be bold and confident.