God Hears the Prayers of the Humble

Our first thoughts when someone mentions the name Daniel are usually about the story of what happened when he was thrown into the lion’s den as a punishment for not bowing down to an idol. Daniel was more concerned about his relationship with God than he was about his own personal safety. Daniel’s relationship with God was lived out at an unusual level of intimacy and fellowship. He wasn’t interested in protecting himself if it meant that he would be betraying the God he loved. What an example he is to us all.

Through his well-established pattern of living in relational obedience to the Lord, Daniel had grow into having an unusual level of awareness of the spiritual realms. He was able to hear and understand what God was saying through dreams and visions and at times he was able to see the angelic beings and hear what God was saying to him through them. And when Daniel prayed it was as if there was an open door into the heavenly realms - he had an exceptional level of earned authority with the Lord. When he prayed - things happened!

In our Scripture for today we discover the key to Daniel’s effectiveness as an intercessor - as a man who could not only speak to God in prayer, but who also heard God’s answers with amazing clarity - whether those answers came to him directly from God or through the intervention of God’s angelic messenger, as happened here in Daniel 10.

The key is one that is there for each and every one of us to use! The key of humility! Humility is the opposite of pride. Pride says, ‘I know best’. In pride people rise up in their own authority, oblivious to the fact that there is a higher authority than any human authority. Humility recognises that God is the source of all power and all authority and that as we come before Him, in holy fear of the Lord, then we are putting ourselves in the place where our ears can be open to hear His voice in response to our prayers and intercessions. Derek Prince used to say, ‘The way down is the way up.’ Daniel was a dynamic example of how when he humbled himself before the Lord, God raised him up!

Prayer: Thank you, Lord, for the example of Daniel and for his humble submission to your authority. Help me, Lord, to walk in a similar way in my own life, recognising that pride is a barrier to effective prayer and that humility opens the doors of the heavens to those who know and love the Lord. In Jesus’ Name. Amen.