Ps 5:1 Give ear to my words, O Lord!”

“Give ear to my words, O Lord!”

Ps 5;1

Like the Psalmist, we, too, pray, “O Lord, listen to what we have to say.” There is little point, however, in bringing our concerns to the Lord if we are not certain that He is listening. We have no assurance that the Lord will hear us just because we ask. Our Savior, Jesus, tells us as much when He says that not everyone who calls Him, “Lord,” will be heard.

How can we be certain that our prayer will be heard? Ask the Father in My name, Jesus says, and He will hear you. To ask in Jesus’ name, is to ask the Father in a spirit of humble faith, deeply aware that because of our sinful nature we deserve no answer whatsoever. To ask in Jesus’ name, however, means more. It means that because of Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins we can be fully confident the Lord not only will but also must hear what we have to say.

Are there not times in our lives when it seems that our Lord does not hear what we ask? We bring to Him our concerns about the moral collapse in government and society, and yet nothing gets better. We bring to Him our concerns about our health or our job or our family, but things don’t seem to change. It is like talking to a blank wall! When we feel this way, we are the ones Jesus is describing when He says, “O ye of little faith.” What we need to know is that behind every wall our gracious Lord is listening to every word that we speak. When the Psalmist prayed the words of this text he knew he was not speaking to thin air! He firmly trusted that his Lord listened!

When you know exactly how to help someone, and they ask someone else, you are disappointed, aren’t you? When they finally have enough confidence to ask you, your response is, “I never thought you would ask! I’m delighted to help you.” So it is with our Lord. He is delighted to help us. It may very well be that what seems to us like divine indifference to what we ask is our Lord’s way of encouraging us to ask not only once or twice. He wants us to give over our whole lives to Him in thankful prayer.

The amazing truth of it all is that our Lord has been answering everything we ask all along! With His answers He is molding our lives in ways so subtle that we are often not aware of it, but ways that lead us to everlasting life. May God’s Holy Spirit work in us the kind of faith that continues to pray and always trusts Him to answer.