Pure, Honest Prayer

Pure, Honest Prayer

May 23, 2011

By Greg Ebie

King Hezekiah and the people of Judah had a problem and everyone knew it.

Sennacherib, the king of Assyria, camped with hundreds of thousand of soldiers just outside the walls of Jerusalem. Sennacherib and the Assyrians were an unstoppable force; they had destroyed many other nations. Now they were poised to do the same to the nation of Judah.

In the hearing of all the people at the wall, Sennacherib¹s representatives boasted of the king¹s victories and stated his intention to overthrow Hezekiah; they bragged that none of the other gods of any of the nations that had opposed the kings of Assyria were able to stop them from being victorious. What then could the God of Israel do to help Hezekiah and his people? Sennacherib sent a letter to Hezekiah with the same boastful threat.

Sennacherib was confident of his military strength to bring the people of Jerusalem to their knees, leaving their city as well as their God nothing more than a pile of rubble. Fear gripped the hearts of all those living in Jerusalem. Would their God do anything to help them in the face of certain defeat?

³Hezekiah received the letter from the messengers and read it. Then he went up to the temple of the Lord and spread it out before the Lord. And Hezekiah prayed to the Lord² (Isaiah 37:14,15, NIV).

Hezekiah did not prepare for battle. He did not plan his escape from the city; nor did Hezekiah sit and worry or become paralyzed by fear. Hezekiah prayed. But more than just a prayer, Hezekiah laid it all out before the Lord.

Sometimes I think our prayers make a quick request for help, but we never even let God have a chance to answer our prayers because we immediately try to solve our problems by ourselves. Maybe I¹m the only one with that problem? With an arrogant pride we never stop and just get real with God.

When was the last time any of us prayed something like this? ³Lord here is my problem and it is bigger than I am; I don¹t know which way to turn. God without Your help I¹m as good as beaten before the fight even starts.²

I notice something else about Hezekiah¹s prayer. It¹s not just a helpless cry for help. Hezekiah¹s request is not just for God to come to his rescue, but that God will prove himself as the Living God, the Almighty. Hezekiah¹s request wasn¹t so much about his need as about God being glorified. God would get all the credit for the victory, not Hezekiah.

I believe those are the kind of prayers God likes to answer, honest prayers with pure motives. I believe it is time to get real with God and stop pretending that I can make it on my own; it is time to lay it all on the line and let God be the One who not only handles it but gets the credit too.

How about you?