“And when ye spread forth your hands, I will hide mine eyes from you: yea, when ye make many prayers, I will not hear: your hands are full of blood.” Isaiah 1:15
In this verse the word for “hear” is shama`. It is not merely a passive verb, it not only means to hear… but to listen… to act on what was heard.
God says that when we make many prayers… He will not act on them, why? Because our hands are full of blood.
The Word of God is true. If we pray… even many prayers… that God seems to have not acted on we must ask ourselves, “Are my hands full of blood?”
But what does that mean?
All the sacrifices that they people of Israel had made were “man-made.” They gave up what they wanted to… not what God wanted them to. And the blood of those man-made, unacceptable sacrifices was still on their hands. They thought that it didn’t matter what they sacrificed… just that they did something. They gave up what was easy… what didn’t put a burden on them… what they could do without anyway. They showed no dependence on God. They held back what He wanted and offered up, sacrificed, what they didn’t want.
Have you ever done that? Given up something you could do without hoping it would be enough.
You hold on to the thing you know He wants you to let go of. You try to balance it out with a lot of little things that don’t matter. It doesn’t matter how many “zeros” you add up… the end result is the same. Nada. Nothing. Zero. Zilch. Zippo…
God says to us, “I will not act on sacrifices to self… only on sacrifices to Me.”
He does not leave us without direction. And I love where it all leads.
“Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil; Learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, and let us reason together, saith the LORD: though your sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. If ye be willing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land:” Isaiah 1:16-19
His promise of the sacrifice of His Son, our Lord, Jesus Christ, washes us clean. And the result is that He calls us to reason together with Him. We can draw nearer to Him.
“Draw nigh to God, and he will draw nigh to you. Cleanse [your] hands, [ye] sinners; and purify [your] hearts, [ye] double minded. Be afflicted, and mourn, and weep: let your laughter be turned to mourning, and [your] joy to heaviness. Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and he shall lift you up.” James 4:8-10
I comes down again to our closeness to God. We ask and receive not because we are too far from God. And one of the reasons we are too far from Him is because our hands are full of blood. The blood of man-made sacrifice. The thing that God wants us to surrender won’t fit through the door to His house… the house of prayer.
Surrender all... draw near to God… hear what He has to say.
More tomorrow…
SDG
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