This sermon compares our “lived prayer” with our spoken prayers. When the two contradict, it is unlikely that we will see answers to the prayers we speak. You can watch the sermon by clicking the link below.

https://www.christianworldmedia.com/watch?v=hQ4igcy251-f. (Sermon starts at 31:15.)

Excerpts

In the church and in devotional literature, people often refer to a life of prayer, but that doesn’t go far enough. A life of prayer? Your life is a prayer. We may say a great many prayers about a great many things, and not see any answers because the prayers we occasionally speak request very different things from the prayer we constantly live. When it comes to prayer, a primary reason people do not receive answers is that their lived prayer contradicts their spoken prayers. God hears what your whole life is saying.

Sometimes pastors tell people, “You just need to pray more.” But more prayer is only a solution when too little prayer is the problem. It is not the solution when the problem is the wrong prayer – when our life is repeating a different request than our words.

Take the Lord’s prayer: We may say, “Hallowed be thy name,” while our lived prayer says, “Honored be my name.” We can say, “Thy kingdom come, thy will be done,” but contradict that by a life that says, “My authority be established, my desires be done.” We might pray “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors,” when our life is saying, “I want him to pay.” Many people pray, “Lead us not into temptation,” but their life is saying, “Get me as close to temptation as possible.”

What does God hear people say in their real voice? Some say, “Just leave me alone.” Others say, “Worship me. I would be like God.” Some people’s lives just repeat idiotically, over and over, “It’s not fair. It’s not fair. It’s not fair.” Others say, “My will be done, my will be done, my will be done, my will be done…” to all eternity. On the day of judgment, the real message of our lives will be dug out of us, and we will hear, beyond any shadow of a doubt, our true voice. We will know then what prayer our lives have been repeating all along.

God does take note of our prayers and pious feelings, but he sees those things for what they are: a part of the whole; a few lines from an enormous manifesto. If you’re thinking, “How then can any of us be saved?” the answer is, “We can’t – not by our own efforts – but we can be saved by Christ. Our lives can be redeemed, our hopes secured. Not because we are as good as we think but because God is better than we dreamed.

And don’t give up. Perseverance is key. Don’t quit trusting God. On the cross, suffering a separation we cannot imagine, Jesus refused to stop trusting. The very last thing he said from the cross was, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit” (Luke 23:46). You’ve trusted God this long; if you stop now, you stop too soon.