Abominal Prayers?

Scripture Verse that Caught my attention today: Proverbs 28:9 When one will not listen to the law,
even one’s prayers are an abomination.

Observation: Very interesting verse.

Application: One of the Bedrock Beliefs at the church through which I serve is this: “God Hears Our Prayers.” Prayer is a big part of our life. We have a prayer chain, we pray before meetings, before meals, at worship, individually in our devotional time, etc.

We were careful not to say, “God Answers our Prayers,” mostly because we don’t want presume to know when a prayer has truly been answered or not. It is enough for us to simply believe that God hears our earnest pleas.

The above verse provides an interesting twist to our belief. The verse suggests that some of the prayers that God hears are not to God’s liking. Actually, it would appear that whatever merit the prayer might have in its own right, if its context is rancid, God doesn’t even want to hear it.

Basically it would appear that God isn’t particularly interested in hearing our pleas if we are deaf to the needs of others.

Now, to be fair, this is but one proverb. There are many other proverbs and psalms and there are the various stories and sayings on prayer throughout the Bible that at times present a somewhat different story. Still, if we are persistently unwilling to demonstrate the kind of love that the law offers, some of our prayers might be abominable at best.

Prayer: Lord, help us to be less focused on ourselves and therefore more able to offer the kinds of prayers that you truly want to hear. In Jesus’ name. Amen.

(Readings today included: Proverbs 28-29, Psalm 60, Romans 16)