The Prayers God Does Not Hear

by Patte Smith on Wednesday, February 16, 2011 at 7:03pm

We know that God does not listen to sinners,
but if anyone is a worshiper of God and does his will, God listens to him.
 ~ Jesus in John 9:31

You came back and wept before the LORD, but He paid no attention to your weeping and turned a deaf ear to you. ~ Deuteronomy 1:45

For you know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears. ~ Hebrews 12:17

When you spread out your hands in prayer, I will hide my eyes from you; even if you offer many prayers, I will not listen. Your hands are full of blood. ~Isaiah 1:15

If anyone turns a deaf ear to the Law, even his prayers are detestable. ~ Proverbs 28:9

You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. ~ James 4:3

The LORD is far from the wicked but He hears the prayer of the righteous. ~ Proverbs 15:29

Then they will call to Me but I will not answer; they will look for Me but will not find Me.~ Proverbs 1:28

For what hope has the godless when he is cut off, when God takes away his life? ~ Job 27:8

The LORD is far from the wicked but he hears the prayer of the righteous. ~ Proverbs 15:29

Indeed, God does not listen to their empty plea; the Almighty pays no attention to it. ~ Job 35:13

 But anyone who sins defiantly...blasphemes the LORD, and that person must be cut off from His people. ~ Numbers 15:30

If I had cherished sin in my heart, the Lord would not have listened. ~ Psalm 66:18

For if we go on sinning deliberately after receiving the knowledge of the truth, there no longer remains a sacrifice for sins, but a fearful expectation of judgment, and a fury of fire that will consume the adversaries. ~ Hebrews 10:26-27

Such sins are more heinous that are committed presumptuously. Under the law there was no sacrifice for presumptuous sins. (Num 15: 30). To sin presumptuously, is to sin against convictions and illuminations, or an enlightened conscience. 'They are of those that rebel against the light.' Job 24: 13. Conscience, like the cherubim, stands with a flaming sword in its hand to deter the sinner; and yet he will sin. Did not Pilate sin against conviction, and with a high hand, in condemning Christ? He knew that for envy the Jews had delivered him. Matt 27: 18. He confessed he 'found no fault in him.' Luke 23: 14. His own wife sent to him saying, 'Have nothing to do with that just man.' Matt 27: 19. Yet for all this, he gave the sentence of death against Christ. He sinned presumptuously, against an enlightened conscience. To sin ignorantly does something to extenuate and pare off the guilt. 'If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin,' that is, their sin had been less. John 15: 22. But to sin against illuminations and convictions enhances men's sins. These sins make deep wounds in the soul; other sins fetch blood; they are a stab at the heart.

How...may a man sin against illuminations and convictions?

When a man sins after counsels, admonitions, warnings, he cannot plead ignorance. The trumpet of the gospel has been blown in his ears, and sounded a retreat to call him off from his sins, he has been told of his injustice, living in malice...yet he would venture upon sin. This is to sin against conviction; it aggravates the sin, and is like a weight put into the scale, to make his sin weigh the heavier. If a sea-mark be set up to give warning that there are shelves and rocks in that place, yet if the mariner will sail there, and split his ship, it is presumption; and if he be cast away, who will pity him?

When a man sins against express combinations and threatening. God has thundered out threatenings against such sins. 'God shall would the hairy scalp of such an one as goes on still in his trespasses.' Psa 68: 21. Though God set the point of His sword to the breast of a sinner, he will still commit sin. The pleasure of sin delights him more than the threatenings affright him. Like the leviathan, 'he laugheth at the shaking of a spear.' Job 41: 29. Nay, he derides God's threatenings. 'Let him make speed, and hasten his work, that we may see it:' we have heard much what God intends to do, and of judgement approaching, we would fain see it. Isa 5: 19. For men to see the flaming sword of God's threatening brandished, yet to strengthen themselves in sin, is in an aggravated manner to sin against illumination and conviction.
~ Thomas Watson
http://www.ondoctrine.com/2wat0016.htm

The Prayers God Does hear are the prayers of the righteous, who fear the Lord:

He fulfills the desires of  those who fear Him; He hears their cry and saves them. ~ Psalm 145:19

The eyes of the LORD are on the righteous and His ears are attentive to their cry. ~ Psalm 34:15