People, by majority, tend to avoid prayer.  To most, prayer is like those little hammers you can buy to smash out your window in case you drive into a lake.  In fact it is so like that little hammer, that most people can’t remember where they put it when they need it the most.  If they remember at all.

But prayer is not exclusively for men.  When you tell people they should pray, they think of themselves as ugly and unworthy therefore afraid of the Most High God.  And they equate God with a holy law they cannot and are not willing to fulfill.  They may say “okay” but they will not.

People think of prayer as something they are expected to do as a righteous ritual.  But prayer is not for us.  Prayer is for God.  He takes delight in seeing his creatures come to him.  So when we don’t pray we rob him of his joy.

I will make a fool of myself by giving this example.  I lay on my bed one day, feeling fully unworthy of his presence.  I spoke a few words to him but did not kneel before Him in prayer.

Then I sensed that familiar loving voice of the Lord Jesus.  “It is not right to keep what belongs to him.”

The understanding was immediately clear.  Humanly speaking, I was hurting God’s feelings.  I was busily robbing him of his joy.  With that understanding, it was very easy to get up and kneel in humility to give him praise and thanks.

When people refuse to pray, they are often correct about their guilt.  But the guilt will not dissipate unless we go to the one who can remove it.  He will remove it if we come to him in humility and earnest intent.

How do I know this?  Because Jesus willingly allowed himself to be murdered so that he may become the mercy of God.   He is the crown jewel in all God’s creation.  No one exalts trivia.  Rather, he gives glory to his greatest prize.  How much more does God?

If we are guilty of sin, that is one thing.  But to be guilty of non-belieg is an entirely different matter.  By refusing to believe we are counting God’s greatest prize as far less valuable.

God was deadly serious about offering his Son as the sacrifice for our sins.  He is deadly serious about how we receive that sacrifice.  (It is not possible to put that more strongly.)  Therefore he is deadly serious about saving us.  Therefore he is deadly serious about his desire to commune with his creation.

There is holy wrath waiting for those who refuse to believe.  But his generosity and mercy are even more potent for those who receive His gift. 

This is true.  It is a faultless saying.   Why then would anyone refuse to give God what is rightfully his?

With the promise of utter annihilation , and the promise of eternal embrace, how can anyone choose the former?  It is not logical.  It makes absolutely no sense.  God refers to such a choice as foolish.

His people, in this place, willingly testify that God is a beautiful loving Father.   Ask and they will tell you how much God loves them. 

(I can only hope that the man you think is a Christian, and approach to ask, is truly in love with God.  Beware, many masquerade by wearing the name.)

With even a summary view of the gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, you will get the picture of God in Jesus.  If you approach those books with humility, understanding will come.

There is no safety away from him.  But near him there is all safety and confidence, not to mention a clean conscience.  And by going to him we give him what is his. 

I had a dear old friend you once told me, “It is impossible to out give God.  He has a bigger shovel.”  If you give him what he wants, do you think he will not rightly give you what you need?