The video above will assure you from a passage of Scripture that God hears and responds to our prayers.
But now, if we look at the fullness of Scripture, we cannot say that the only reason that God calls us to come to him and pray is merely relational.
I’m about to say something very theologically important so take note of it. It’s this: God in his sovereignty has established in the world a contingency. God in his sovereignty has established in the world a contingency.
That is to say, that there are some things that God will only do in response to prayer, and other things that God may not do because there was not prayer.
God in his sovereignty has established in our universe a contingency that is this thing of asking, seeking, and knocking—coming before him in prayer (Matthew 7:7-11).
Because you cannot read the Bible and see prayers happening there without getting the fact that prayer changes things.
I mean, prayer really does change things—situations, circumstances, people, nations, opposition—like, prayer really changes things.
God has put this in place, this contingency, that when we pray there are certain things God will do that he won’t do when we don’t pray and there are certain things God won’t do because we did pray.
For example, intercessory prayer—that is, praying for others. Take, for example, Exodus 32. In Exodus 32, Moses has led the children of Israel out of Egypt. He’s taken them to Mount Sinai—Israel’s all camped around Mount Sinai there—and Moses goes up on the mountain to be with the Lord.
For Israel, he literally did pray too much because they began grumbling around the base of Mount Sinai and they’re like, “Dude, what’s the deal with Mo? Mo is up on this mountain forever, and we’re just down here waiting around and there he is with God. What’s going on?”
So of course Israel does what Israel did—they make themselves a golden calf—and their High Priest says, “This is now your god,” and they began to worship it.
And God gets a little upset.
And God says to Moses while they’re on the mountain communing together, “Moses, your people have made for themselves an idol and are worshipping it. Moses, get down the mountain. I am going to judge Israel and wipe them off the face of the earth and I will make a great nation from you instead” (Exodus 32:7-10, paraphrased).
Now, God is just, and God is righteous, and God would’ve been fully justified in his judgment against Israel for their idolatry—for their worshipping and going after this false god.
What does Moses, the intercessor, do? Moses asks God and said, “God, according to your character, and your kindness, and your covenantal faithfulness, I am asking you to have mercy on this people,” he prayed (Exodus 32:11-13, paraphrased).
What did God do? God said, “Okay.” It actually says in the text, “God changed his mind” (Exodus 32:14 NLT).
Now we bristle theologically at “changed his mind,” and so we should for the Scriptures say elsewhere, “God is not a man…that he should change his mind” (Numbers 23:19 ESV).
The idea of that text is different than when men and women change their minds. We change our minds for one of two reasons: either we did not have all the information, or we were dead wrong. We have already established that God knows all the information—he is omniscient. And God is never wrong. God is altogether righteous.
What this means is that God, then, in response to Moses’s prayer, relented from his course of action. God was going to judge Israel and they deserved it, but because one person prayed and said, “God, I ask you to have mercy,” God literally in the Hebrew “relented from an undesirable course of action and extended mercy.” For God loves mercy.
Put this in juxtaposition to Ezekiel chapter 22. In Ezekiel chapter 22 Israel is in trouble once again they’ve been playing the harlot with false gods and God is upset with them, and God is going to judge them. And he pronounces judgment.
And then it says at the end of Ezekiel 22, “And God looked around for a person who would stand in the gap and plead the case, but he couldn’t find one. And so then God judged them” (Ezekiel 22:30 paraphrased).
Nobody prayed.