Honest and Faithful Prayer - Genesis 18:17-33

<)) Listen to the sermon here

[Genesis 18:17-33] …Then the Lord said, “Because the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah is great and their sin is very grave, I will go down to see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to me. And if not, I will know.” So the men turned from there and went toward Sodom, but Abraham still stood before the Lord. Then Abraham drew near and said, “Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked?”  Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city. Will you then sweep away the place and not spare it for the fifty righteous who are in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing, to put the righteous to death with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from you! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?” …

Honest and Faithful Prayers

“Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you” [Luke 11:9]. God does hear your prayers. But what kind of prayers does He desire to hear? Prayers that are worded rightly? Reverent enough? Thorough enough? Pious prayers? What prayer is a good prayer to God?

Here’s the first part of the answer I’ll give you: God does desire to hear honest prayers. God wants you to be straightforward and truthful with Him – to say with your lips what is truly going on in your heart.

This is how prayer is in Scripture itself. The book of Psalms is a book of honest prayers, in which the one praying makes his heart made known to God:

“How long, O Lord, will You look on? Rescue me…” [Psalm 35:17]. “Awake! Why are You sleeping, O Lord?” [Psalm 44:23].

“My God, my God, why have You forsaken me? Why are You so far from saving me?…I cry by day, but You do not answer…” [Psalm 22:1-2].

“O Lord, rebuke me not in Your anger, nor discipline me in Your wrath… Your arrows have sunk into me, and Your hand has come down upon me… for my iniquities have gone over my head…” [Psalm 38:1-2,4].

“Righteous are you, O Lord, when I complain to You; yet I would plead my case before You. Why does the way of the wicked prosper? Why do all who are treacherous thrive?” [Jeremiah 12:1].

And Abraham, in today’s reading from Genesis 18:17-33, who drew near to the Lord and said, “Will You indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? … Far be that from You! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?”

Let’s note that Abraham’s complaint isn’t that God is bringing His justice against the wicked. In fact, in that regard, we men and women tend to be much quicker to call for judgment and destruction than God is.

God’s justice comes when, after every attempt and much time – both through discipline and troubles sent, and through God’s kindness and messengers of the Gospel sent – hearts are, nevertheless, hardened and will not repent and believe.

Such was the case in these five cities in the region of Sodom and Gomorrah. Their sins went beyond nature, and their hearts were thoroughly hardened against God their creator [Romans 1:18-32].

But, Abraham lived next door to these cities. He did business with them. He was once, not long before, the leader of a plot to deliver them from four other kings who had taken them captive. And, Abraham’s nephew Lot and his family lived in one of those cities.

“Certainly there are still some righteous among the wicked, Lord. Would you destroy their whole life and livelihood over the sins of others? Turn their homes to rubble? Would you sweep even them away? If there are fifty who still look to You – or forty-five – or ten – wouldn’t You spare the place for them? Or will You be unjust, O Lord?”

“Won’t You please do what is right, God?” An honest prayer.

And, in fact, God already had in place His plan for how He would deliver from Sodom and Gomorrah those who still turned to Him – which, like in the days of Noah, was a number reduced to one family. In this case, Lot and his two daughters.

God is just and never was going to sweep away the righteous with the wicked. And, if Abraham had no faith that God was good, Abraham wouldn’t have appealed from his heart to God’s righteousness. God would be just and true to His promises.

Yet it is God’s desire to work His goodness through our honest and fervent prayers. Abraham’s honest prayers were answered for Lot’s sake – and that was God’s will, to save Lot through Abraham’s honest and fervent prayer.

The prayer God likes to hear is honest prayer – and faithful prayer. Faithful prayer is prayer that believes. Abraham didn’t disbelieve God’s righteousness but believed it and therefore called upon it.

And those who prayed in the Psalms let out their honest complaints, but did so to the One whom they believed was hearing and answering:

“I will thank You in the great congregation; in the mighty throng I will praise You” [Psalm 35:18]. “Rise up; come to our help! Redeem us for the sake of Your steadfast love!” [Psalm 44:26]. “You who fear the Lord, praise Him! … For He has not despised or abhorred the affliction of the afflicted, and He has not hidden His face from him, but has heard, when he cried to him” [Psalm 22:23-24].

“But for You, O Lord, do I wait; it is You, O Lord my God, who will answer… O Lord, my salvation!” [Psalm 38:15,22]. “But You know me, O Lord. You see me…” “I utter my complaint and moan, and He hears my voice.” [Jeremiah 12:3; Psalm 55:17]

Our honest prayers are God pleasing prayers because they are prayers of faith – prayers which complain to Him because He will hear and answer.

Abraham was not disrespectful to God for praying as he did. He prayed with humility, “I am but dust and ashes” [Genesis 18:27]. And the honest cries and complaints of our heart are spoken in faith as children who call out to their Father who hears.

Above all, our Lord Jesus is the perfect Man of honest and faithful prayer. Without sin, and without doubt, He nevertheless suffered perfectly and fully what it is to be trapped in our lowly, sin-fallen condition.

When Jesus carried the sins of the world in His flesh on the cross, He carried fully in Himself our cries and complaints. He knows what it is to be you. Jesus prayed Psalm 22 on the cross, “My God, My God, why have You forsaken Me?” And He did so in perfect faith, trusting in the resurrection of the body, believing that His Father would raise Him to life.

My prayers are not perfect. I do sin with hypocrisy, making my prayers to God come out more pious than what is really going on in here. Not trusting fully that I can speak fully honestly to my God. And not with perfect faith, but with faith always tainted by a thread of doubt.

But I am baptized into Jesus Christ. You are baptized into Jesus Christ. Your prayers are spoken not in your name, not in Abraham’s name, but in Christ’s holy name.

Your prayers are offered in the perfect relationship of the Son and the Father, clothed by baptism in the perfect, honest cries of Jesus on the cross – who prayed for us all, under our sins and suffering – offered in the perfect faith of His lips who is our intercessor.

And, along with this, you and I who are sinners – like Abraham and Lot – are also the righteous by faith in Jesus Christ. You are justified – counted righteous to God, because of Jesus’ all-atoning death on the cross – by faith alone in Jesus Christ.

Abraham, “the man of faith” [Galatians 3:9], “believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness” [Genesis 15:6; Romans 4:3; Galatians 3:6]. You also who have believed what Jesus has done for you are counted righteous by faith – until that day when we are made righteous in heaven. Until then, God hears the honest and faithful prayers of the righteous-by-faith on earth.

For patience in your waiting, in your struggles with how God handles this sin-fallen world, and for needed relief and forgiveness from your own sins and faults, give to God – your Father and Friend – the honest words of your heart, with faith that believes He hears you. Amen.