Before entering into this series, let me address a rapidly-growing situation.  Over the past several weeks I have received a much welcomed flow of positive comments relative to what visitors to this website are reading.  Some of you have expressed a wish to contact me personally.  I have found that I cannot get through to you through the internet address posted on your messages.  For unknown reasons my return messages will not go through.  Therefore, I suggest that you use my normal email address–  lpj4142@gmail.com  –when you want to contact me on a personal level.  I will be happy to respond to you in the normal way.

In the fifth chapter of Matthew’s gospel we find Jesus speaking to His disciples while a multitude of people listen in on what would become known as “The Sermon on the Mount.”  The theme of His message to His disciples concerned the life of holiness they would be required to “walk”  (1 Jn. 2:6) following their conversion in order to receive eternal life.  His words to His ancient disciples apply to His modern day disciples.  We are told elsewhere in the Scriptures that holy living, if continued “until the end” (Mat. 10:21.22), will qualify the saint (“holy one”) for salvation at the return of Jesus Christ to earth.

In Matthew 5:45 Jesus answers the question asked in the title of this series: Does God bless sinners?  Does He hear and answer their prayers?  Here He tells us that His Father: “… makes His sun to shine on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the just and the unjust.”  Notice that the same sunshine and rain that falls on the good and just(ified) also falls on the evil and unjust(ified).  Note: “justification” means that one’s PAST SINS have been forgiven (Rom. 3:25).  Justification is designed to lead to conversion which, if maintained through obedience to God’s Word, leads to righteousness (Rom. 5:20) which, if continued and increased, leads to holiness which, if maintained to the end of life, results in salvation (Rom. 6:21).  Mini lesson: faith without holiness does not result in salvation.  Read James 2:10,14,17,18,20,24,26 for proof of this Bible fact.  No one is saved or born again in this life.  Read Hope and Salvation.  Key word–“Hope.”  If you are part of Satan’s Catholic/Protestant Church System you’ve been lied to about the faith=salvation, grace-enables-you-to-sin doctrine, blame-your-sin-on-Adam heresy.

The vast majority of church people believe that the New Testament replaced the Old Testament which was “nailed to the cross.”  This website has proven that theology false in numerous Scriptural ways.  In that the “Old Testament” and “New Testament” are in fact ONE COVENANT WHICH GOD HAS ESTABLISHED BETWEEN HIMSELF AND HIS OBEDIENT SAINTS, we will begin our explanation to the Lord’s “Yes” answer to the title question in the Old Testament.  Note: The two testaments should be viewed as one entity and called “The Holy Scriptures” as the Apostle Paul makes clear in his second letter to Timothy the evangelist (3:14-17).  These were the same “Holy Scriptures” upon which Timothy’s grandmother Lois had based her faith (1:5), the same Holy Scriptures the apostles used in teaching the New Testament Church and, along with the teachings of Christ and the Apostles, form the foundation upon which the New Testament rests (Eph. 2:2o).  Timothy’s grandmother believed the writings of the prophets long before Jesus came on the scene.  Read The Significance of the Old Testament.  Key word–“Significance.”  I will continue to use the terms “Old” and “New Testament” because we are all familiar with those terms.

We know from the Lord’s Words in Matthew 5 that the Father does indeed bless and hear the prayers of sinners.  The ultimate question is: WHY?  We will save that most important bit of information for the next posting.  Let us return to the Old Testament to examine the first recorded incidence of God answering sinners’ prayers.  Following the first example I will condense each of the following incidences down to the bare minimum in order not to belabor the point.

In the third chapter of Exodus we find that the children of Jacob (renamed “Israel”) have been held captive in Egypt for several hundred years.  In this episode God appears to Moses in a burning bush and says to him, “I have surely seen the affliction of My people which are in Egypt, and have heard their cry by reason of their taskmasters, for I know their sorrows.  I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them out of that land ….” (vss 7,8).  The story of their deliverance is well-known so I will not go into it.  Let us notice that when the situation turned negative the people turned against Moses (5:20,21), which meant that they turned against God who had promised to free them through him.  Nevertheless, the Lord eventually brought them out of slavery in spite of their sinfulness.

Many years later we find that the descendants of those Israelites had settled into the land God had promised their forefather Abraham.  But by this time they had forgotten how God had blessed their ancestors and, instead of honoring Him, were living among the heathen, intermingling with them, intermarrying with them, worshiping their gods, etc. in defiance to His commands to the contrary.  Their sin-ladened lives are summarized in Judges 3:7 where it is written: “And the children of Israel did evil in the sight of the Lord and forgot the Lord their God and served Baalim and the groves (where heathen gods were worshiped).” As a result of their sins God caused them to be defeated and enslaved.  In verse 9 we find them crying out to Him for deliverance.  Hearing their prayers He raised up a man named Othniel who led them to freedom.  In 3:12 we find that the Israelites have once again abandoned the Lord and have once again been defeated and enslaved.  Once again they cried out for help.  This time He raised up Ehud who led them to victory.  The Israelites’ cycle of national sin–defeat and enslavement–crying out to God–being delivered by Him was repeated many times over many generations until He finally sent them into Assyrian and Babylonian slavery and eventually scattered most of them throughout the world where their descendants remain to this day.  The hundreds of millions of Israelites on earth today are known as the “Lost Tribes of Israel” because they lost their Israelite religion, language, customs, etc. and became Gentilized in all aspects of their lives.  The world’s Israelites are so deeply involved in the Gentile religions, social customs, etc. that they believe that they are Gentiles.  Neither the world nor the Israelites themselves know who they are.  Only God’s Very Elect know who and where they are.  Read Who and Where is Israel Today?  Key word–“Where.”

From this point on I will simply mention the person and the situation involved when showing how God occasionally displays His mercy toward sinners.  Ahab, the vile king of Judah (the Jews), has sent a man to his death in order to take over his property. Because of his extreme sinfulness he is described as one who “worked wickedness in the sight of the Lord and did very abominably.”  But there came a point where he humbled himself before the Lord, causing Him to withdraw His hand of vengeance from him–for the moment (1 Ki. 21:13,25-29).  With that instance as a prime example of God’s mercy, I will mention a few more instances: King Manasseh’s cry for and receiving mercy (2 Chron. 33:9-13/ Jesus forgiving the sins of a prostitute (Lk. 7:36-50)/ and of a publican (Lk. 18:9-14)/ His healing of the son of a nobleman (Jn. 4:49-53)/ God’s healing of Naaman the leper/ Christ’s healing of the Canaanite woman’s daughter/ His healing of the man at the pool at Bethesda/ God’s forgiving of King David and Christ’s healing, delivering and feeding of the multitudes who followed Him, even  though He knew that they only did so in order to be healed.  He fed some 12,000 men, not counting their wives and children.  Yet He did not ask them to follow him “because He knew (the hearts of) all men (Jn. 2:24).

By this we know that God does indeed hear and answer the prayers of sinners on occasion.  The question now becomes: “WHY?”  L.J.