GOD IS NOT LISTENING

Have you prayed to God about something? You prayed and prayed yet you feel like God is not hearing your prayers. And so you prayed harder, you coupled it with fasting, yet the more you pray and fast, the more you can’t see God answering your prayer? So you begin to doubt God and think, "MAYBE, GOD IS NOT LISTENING." Well, guess what, THERE ARE TIMES WHEN NO MATTER HOW WE PRAY, GOD IS NOT LISTENING TO US…

The Scriptures is replete with examples of God’s people calling on His name for different reasons under different circumstances. From the Old to the New Testament we are flooded by the truth that men call on to God, pray to him and ask for his provision, for strength, for power, for deliverance from their hopeless conditions BUT SELDOM FOR REPENTANCE.

This is a familiar story back in the days of the prophet Isaiah. Isaiah 59:1-4 states"1 Surely the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear. 2 But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear. 3 For your hands are stained with blood, your fingers with guilt. Your lips have spoken lies, and your tongue mutters wicked things. 4 No one calls for justice; no one pleads his case with integrity. They rely on empty arguments and speak lies; they conceive trouble and give birth to evil." This passage vividly depicts the troubled time in which the prophet Isaiah lived. The divided kingdoms of Judah and Jerusalem were crying out for deliverance from social and political crisis and so they did pray to God to rescue them from such tumultuous situation. In Isa. 58:1-4, we can see here how the Israelites seemed to eagerly seek God to know his ways and to be delivered and so they came to him, not just in prayer but also in fasting. But as they see and feel that God’s hands are seemingly not upon them, they started to blame him and charge him of being unfaithful to his people.

Yet, in the passage we’ve just read, we are faced by the reality of their condition as the prophet Isaiah, being the mouthpiece of God, confronted them with the real issue at hand: THE ISSUE OF SIN AND THEIR UNREPENTANT HEARTS. We can see here the reality in v.1 that indeed, the Lord saves and listens. Yet, contrasting that to the reality of sin in v. 2 which describes it as the one that separates us from God and that which keeps God from listening to us. GOD EAGERLY DESIRES TO LISTEN TO OUR PRAYERS, YET OUR UNREPENTANT HEARTS KEEP HIM FROM HEARING OUR CALL.

GOD IS NOT LISTENING, first, WHEN WE PRAY YET WE ARE SEPARATED FROM HIM BECAUSE OF SIN (V.2a.) “But your iniquities have separated you from your God.” (v.2a) Iniquity is defined as a gross injustice or wickedness (TOD). It is important for us to note here that the Israelites were seeking God to free them from the injustices in their society but they themselves are charged of the same thing.

Sin on the other hand is called in the Bible with different names: trespass, transgression, iniquity and so forth. But it all boils down to this--Sin is anything and everything that God hates, anything that is contrary to his nature and who he is. It comes from the Greek ἁμαρτία (hamartia) which means "to miss the mark" or "to miss the target." If you are playing darts, your target is to hit the bull’s eye but when you miss it, you know it’s a big mistake because the rule of the game is to hit nothing else but the bull’s eye. Since God is a holy God, he hates evil and we just cannot sugarcoat it.

Second, GOD IS NOT LISTENING WHEN WE PRAY YET WE HOLD ON TO OUR SINS AND DO NOT REPENT OF IT (v.2b-4). The passage states, “…your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear. 3 For your hands are stained with blood, your fingers with guilt. Your lips have spoken lies, and your tongue mutters wicked things. 4 No one calls for justice; no one pleads his case with integrity. They rely on empty arguments and speak lies; they conceive trouble and give birth to evil. (v.2b-4) The sins in view here are found in verses 3, and 4 and the following verses talk about the specifics of it. God’s people rebelled against him and they are now crying for deliverance but without even thinking of repentance. In the Scriptures, a hiding of God’s face is used frequently to describe God’s unwillingness to meet his people or hear their prayers at some particular time and in this instance, God did not listen to his people because they were guilty of violent crimes, injustices and troubles.

As we browse to the preceding chapters of the book, we can see here that the Israelites not only prayed to God for deliverance but they coupled it with fasting. Imagine that, PRAYER AND FASTING. THEY PRAYED AND THEY FASTED BUT STILL GOD DID NOT LISTEN TO THEM, BECAUSE THEY DID NOT GET IT RIGHT. Right at the outset of the book of Isaiah, God has already told them that He won’t listen to them because they were not turning away from their sins. Isa. 1:15-16 says…"15 When you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide my eyes from you; even if you offer many prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood; 16 wash and make yourselves clean. Take your evil deeds out of my sight! Stop doing wrong."

In Isa. 58:4, we are again confronted by the truth that the Israelites fasted in vain, when it says,"Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife, and in striking each other with wicked fists. You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high."

A young boy asked his father to buy for him a pair of shoes. It’s kind of expensive but he really wanted it because most of his classmates do have their own. So he begged his father and told him every day about it. That was the time when they needed to renovate their house and his parent’s meager savings is only enough for it. But he still begged and I fasted. He skipped a few meals believing that his father would notice him and somehow give in to what he wanted…Alas, his dad noticed him, yes, he noticed BUT he told him that his desire was not right at the moment.

Much like the Israelites, they prayed and prayed harder, they coupled it with fasting, yet their prayers did not reach the heavens because they’re not confronting the truth of what God would want them to do. Let me repeat, in Isa. 58:4b it says, "You cannot fast as you do today and expect your voice to be heard on high."

WHEN WE PRAY AND THERE IS SIN IN OUR HEARTS, GOD WILL NOT LISTEN. I BELIEVE THAT MOST OF US, IN ALL HONESTY, ARE GUILTY OF THE SAME THING AS THE ISRAELITES WERE, WE ARE QUICK TO ASK TO ASK GOD FOR SOMETHING WE NEED AND WE BECOME DOUBTFUL OF GOD IF NOT BLAMING HIM WHEN WE FEEL AND THINK THAT HE IS NOT HEARING US WHEN WE CALL. BUT WE ARE SO INDOLENT AT LOOKING WITHIN US AND SEE FOR OURSELVES WHY GOD IS NOT LISTENING. I love what Matthew Henry said about this: "If your prayers be not answered, it is not because his ear is heavy when we speak to him, but because our ears are heavy when he speaks to us."

BUT IS THERE STILL HOPE FOR GOD TO LISTEN TO US? In Psalm 139:23-24, it says, "23 Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my anxious thoughts. 24 See if there is any offensive way (SIN) in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.” Isaiah 1:18 states "Come now, let us reason together," says the LORD. "Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red as crimson, they shall be like wool.”

As the passages above suggest, all we need to do is to come to him, admit our mistakes, transgressions, sin, iniquities, however you might want to call it, without sugarcoating anything, and repent-turn away from it, and embrace the grace of God for us.

God in his grace loves to listen to his people. Our greatest need of salvation has been remedied by him more than 2000 years ago when he sent forth his Son, Jesus Christ, to die a cruel death on the cross- a testament that even before we call on him, he has already made the way to come and save us. And so, we should remember that God wants to listen to our prayers because…“Behold, the arm of the LORD is not too short to save, nor his ear too dull to hear.” (Isa.59:1)

AND WHEN WE COME TO HIM, SURELY HE WILL HEAR US, YES HE WILL, BECAUSE GOD IS LISTENING, YES, HE IS LISTENING…
 


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