I have never washed a dirty vessel.

I love to help my wife, Shelia. But I refuse to wash a dirty plate. However, I will put it under the faucet and rinse it well to get all the nastiness off of it, and then wash it. I won’t even hand-wash my truck when it’s really dirty. I know that the grit will scratch it all to pieces, so I spray it all off first and then I wash it.

“Sometimes, you gotta pray before you pray.” — a quote from my dad, John Wynn, about three years ago.

When I was younger, I loved to go barefoot. I’d go all kinds of places without shoes, on gravel, on pavement. My feet were so calloused that I could run down Highway 60 when the pavement was hot and it didn’t hurt. 

If we aren’t careful, life will callus our hearts.

When your heart gets hard, it’s hard to get close to God. When your heart is calloused, it’s hard to be soft and tender before the Lord. 

Isaiah 59:1-3. Psalm 66:18. Sometimes we have to pray before we pray. Sometimes before we go to God’s throne, we need to do a deep heart search. The throne room of God is a place where angels fear to trod. It’s the most sacred and the holiest place. Isaiah 6:2-3. 

How is your relationship with Jesus? Have you been reading your Bible? Have you been worshipping the Lord? Have you been fasting? Have you been faithful to God? Is your heart clean?

Psalm 139:23-24. Psalm 26:2. The presence of God is so clean, we need to be spiritually sensitive to the fact that God is holy, mighty, and worthy to be reverenced. We can’t come into the presence of the Lord without our thoughts and lives holy before Him.

Right now is a good time to humble ourselves before the Lord wishing to be close to Him in these troubled times. Psalm 51:9-10. 

As husbands or wives, if we aren’t kind to one another, then it can hinder our prayers. If friends let things get between them, it can hinder their prayers. If we let the enemy pull at us, it can hinder our prayers.

Yes, there are sick people and lost people. There are hurting people and broken people. But before we go into God’s throne room, we need to be right with Him.

So before you pray, pray for God to search you. Pray that He will create in you a clean heart and that He would renew a right spirit within you.

–Pastor Anthony Wynn