What Hurts our Prayers?

There is no doubt God wants to hear from His children. Often there are things that get in the way of prayer. Let’s look at some of those today:

• Unbelief

James 1:6,7 “But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord.”

• Unsaved

I Timothy 2:5 “For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus”

-The only prayer God hears from a lost person is them calling out for salvation.

• Unforgiving spirit

Mark 11:25 “And when ye stand praying, forgive, if ye have ought against any: that your Father also which is in heaven may forgive you your trespasses.”

• Iniquity

Psalm 66:18 “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me:”

-Thank God we can go to Him and confess our sins and he will cleanse us and clear up the line of communication.

I John 1:9 “If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

• Asking Amiss

-Asking with the wrong motives or outside the will of God

James 4:3 “Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts.”

• Vain Repetitions

Matthew 6:7 “But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do: for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking.”

-Scripted prayers will never reach the throne of God.

• Not Asking

-This is probably the largest problem with saved people today. We simply don’t pray as we should.

James 4:2 “Ye lust, and have not: ye kill, and desire to have, and cannot obtain: ye fight and war, yet ye have not, because ye ask not“