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"God will always hear you when you pray." I have heard people say this over and over in my lifetime, and I believe that it is the single biggest misconception about prayer.

Praying With a Clean Heart
Prayer itself is no misconception; however, people have trouble in the proper use of it. For instance, where many people say that God will always hear us when we pray, the Bible clearly states "If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me." (Psalm 66:18)

The root of the word 'regard' is to approve or allow with joy, and 'iniquity' of course, is wickedness or sin. Clearly, if we come to the Lord with un-confessed sin, He will not hear our prayers to begin with, let alone answer them to our satisfaction.

I realize that is an unpopular thing to say, in a time where we each interpret the word 'sin' in our own way. Unfortunately for most, the Lord is not as open-minded about the definition of sin, and it really does not matter what we claim on the issue. If we retain feelings in our heart (or pleasure in things) God calls sin, we have effectively closed the door of communication to Him. It is as simple as that.

Instead of being offended at what God considers sin, why don't we just believe Him when He says "For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;" (Romans 3:23) and use every prayer first for confession and repentance? It cannot hurt to hold a clear conscience before God, and the best way to do so is to confess everything that falls under the umbrella cast in His word. Claiming our own interpretation or quoting the beliefs of others we have patterned our lives after is not acceptable when God has so clearly defined things for us in the Bible. The first step to answered prayer, then, is to pray with a heart freshly cleansed from sin.

Asking and Receiving:
We can all quote the verses on asking and receiving, be it the verses that say "ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock and it shall be opened unto you" (Luke 11:9, Matthew 7:7) or the verses that tell us "And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive." (Matthew 21:22), or even "Ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full."

We can draw from those verses that the Lord is pleased for us to seek and find Him; that He loves to answer our prayers. The misconceptions people have about these verses, though; happen when they leave out important key words like 'believing'. Faith is so essential to every aspect of our lives as believers.

We

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