"Prayers The God Hears:" The Pharisee And Tax Collector

Parables to Live By

“Prayers the God Hears: The Pharisee and Tax Collector”

Luke 18:9-14

Watch on YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xlUjYOQFsro

Over the years, I’ve seen and heard quite a few prayers, and what others consider being the type of prayers that God hears.

Now, almost everybody believes in prayer. Whenever there’s a catastrophe, whether through a violent attack by someone upon others, or through a natural disaster, we immediately ask for prayer. Even medical science is crediting faith and prayers as major factors in a person’s recovery.

But is random speech skyward actually prayer, and are they the prayers God hears and answers? Interesting question, and since I’m not God, I don’t have the answer. What I know is that God is just, merciful, and gracious, and I’m sure glad He is.

Within the church, I have heard people say God only hears prayers of faith, so tell God what you want and believe He will give it. And while this sounds good, the problem is if you don’t receive what you pray for, then the assumption is your faith is lacking.

Now, quoting what I see as the heart of the first commandment of God’s top ten, God says, “I am the Lord your God … You shall have no other gods before Me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image … you shall not bow down to them nor serve them.” (Exodus 20:2-5 NKJV) 

Now, those who espouse it’s our faith that makes God move on our behalf, have, in a way, broken this first commandment, because they have made God into an image of their own making. For them, God is this sort of genie in a bottle, or He is a super vending machine. Just say a prayer, drop some money into the bucket, and out pops your prayer request.

Yet are these the prayers God hears, or have we been bowing down to a false image?

One of my least favorite aspects of prayer coming from some churches is when it makes prayer a part of a marketing campaign. I’ve seen prayer handkerchiefs or prayer cloths prayed over by pastors and evangelists and then mailed to people who need an answer from God, but with a donation attached.

The unfortunate part of all of this is how some people look upon prayer as a gimmick cooked up by religion to get more money out of people’s pockets.

Now, the last thing I want to do is to speak against prayer, or our asking God for our needs, because the Bible tells us of our need to ask, seek, and knock, and how our heavenly Father hears from heaven and provides (Matthew 7:7-11). Further, it says we have not because we neglect to ask, but it also says the reason we don’t receive is not because of our lack of faith, rather it’s because we’re asking with the wrong motives, seeking to use it on our own pleasures rather than furthering God’s kingdom (James 4:2-3).

This brings us to an important point; not everything we direct towards God is prayer. Instead, they are more of a list of wants and desires.

Dallas Willard, theologian, and author has said that just talking to God is not prayer, even though prayer is talking to God. Not all the words we direct towards God qualify as prayer, no matter how many religious words we use, and no matter how many prayer clothes we buy.

Today, in the story Jesus tells, He gives us the type of prayers God hears so we can pray more effectively. Further, I think the deadly viruses of religiosity and self infect much of our prayer life.  

And what this means is our prayers are nothing more than wrongly focused appreciation combined with thinking that God somehow owes us for our belief in Him. Tell you what, chew on that while as we look at today’s story.

“Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others: ‘Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, 'God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’ And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’ I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” (Luke 18:9-14 NKJV)

Jesus was speaking to a large group of religious leaders, those who regarded themselves as righteous before God; those who followed the Law as written by Moses, along with additional laws created by the religious leaders, so people wouldn’t transgress God’s holy law. We know these additional laws as the Talmud, which comprises two books, the Mishnah and Gemara, or the civil and ceremonial law.