Tag: radar

HOW DOES GOD HEAR PRAYER?

Dale Pollard

The most powerful Sound Surveillance System (SOSUS) is probably the most famous long-range listening device. It can detect faint sounds like submarine engines or whale calls from up to 3,100 miles away.

The barn owl, arguably, has the best hearing out of all the known animals (the author has no idea how this was determined/tested). Their ears allow them to calculate exactly where a sound is coming from—even in total darkness. They can even hear a mouse’s heartbeat beneath a layer of snow.

Have you ever wondered how God hears every prayer? Jonah prayed to God from the belly of a fish—and God heard (Jonah 2.1-2). At the end of the chapter, we find that God not only heard, but He answered by commanding the creature to release Jonah (2.10).

If humans, created in the image of God, can produce a technology capable of detecting sound thousands of miles away and our minds are a fraction of our Creator– reason leads us to believe that God can do far more. We’ve got examples in nature of incredible detection in the owl and the whale, but even better, we’ve got God’s Word.

“Out of the depths I cry to you, Lord; Lord, hear my voice. Let your ears be attentive to my cry for mercy” (Ps. 130.1-2).

“The eyes of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are attentive to their cry” (Ps. 34.15).

“If you do and they cry out to me, I will certainly hear their cry” (Ex. 22.23).

“…and if we know that He hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him” (Jn 9.31b).

God Knows Where They Are

 

Neal Pollard

At a preachers’ meeting I attended today, a brother led us in prayer specifically about the men, women, and children who were onboard the missing Malaysian Airlines Flight 370 as well as their families.  While there have certainly been many other prayers for these folks, this brother said something that should have struck me before today.  He prayed, “God, we know that you already know exactly where they are, but please help those searching for them to find them.”  Has that thought truly struck us?  Our omniscient God knows the precise point on this globe where those 239 passengers are.  If we let that sink in, it reminds us of a much further-reaching point.  God knows everything about everyone of us, where we go and what we do.

Scripture teaches this many times over, in both testaments.  2 Chronicles 16:9 tells us the eyes of the Lord move to and fro throughout the earth.  “He sees all the sons of men…all the inhabitants of the earth” (Ps. 33:13-14).  “His eyes behold, His eyelids test the sons of men” (Ps. 11:4). Hebrews 4:13 affirms that “there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.”  The mysteries of the ages that have long confounded our greatest minds could not be more plainly known to Him.  Whether or not the massive coordinated efforts of nations, militaries, technology, and resources solve this enigma is yet to be seen, but God knows the answer to this as readily as He does the greatest conundrums with which man has ever been confronted.

One day, God will cleave the skies and bring all unsolved mysteries to an end, with every secret, cloak and dagger, and clandestine activity which may have perplexed men for centuries.  He will bring these secrets into the judgment (Rom. 2:16).  While there is so much that we may not know, let us rest assured that we stand beneath the gaze of the All-Seeing eyes of God.