Must I Obey God to Pray?

(1 John 3:22)

Question:

Must I obey the Lord in order to pray to Him? Or does He receive my prayers and answer them regardless of my obedience?

Answer:

We must answer this with a couple of caveats. First, we know that no one on earth is perfect and lives a sinless life. As Solomon puts it, “There is no man who does not sin” (1 Kings 8:46; cf. 1 John 1:8-10).

On the other hand, we know that if a person deliberately sins (disobeys God by doing what He forbids or refuses to obey God by failing to do what He commands), this is an entirely different matter. And this leads us to what Scripture says about prayer and obeying God.

The apostle John writes, “Whatever we ask we receive from Him, because we keep His commandments and do the things that are pleasing in His sight” (1 John 3:22). He goes on to add this: “The one who keeps His commandments abides in Him, and He in him” (v.24a).

This answers our question to a large degree. God answers prayer. However, His answering of prayer depends on whether we “keep His commandments” and whether we “do the things that are pleasing in His sight.” If a person refuses to keep God’s commandments and is not interested in doing the things that are pleasing to God, then we should not expect God to answer our prayers!

By the way, the commandments mentioned surely must refer to commands in the New Covenant wrings (the NT) rather than the 613 Mosaic commands. (See also 1 John 2:3-7.)

It probably needs to be repeated that obedience to God’s commands (through Christ Jesus) is one requirement that must be fulfilled if we ever expect to have God’s will on our side. This should not be difficult or negative to our thinking. As John the apostle says, “By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and observe His commandments. For this is the love of God, that we keep His commandments; and His commandments are not burdensome” (1 John 5:2-3). So let us love God and obey Him!

This means that God’s commands (in the new covenant writings, such as the commands of Christ Jesus—cf. Matthew 20:18-20) are necessary if we want to have God respond to us and answer our prayers! But we must have the right motive in our praying. We must love God and this love is to be manifested in our obedience to Him. We should not think, therefore, that we can live in known disobedience and still expect Him to bless us!