Why should the great God listen to you?

He is holy and you are full of sin.

He is of purer eyes than to look upon iniquity, but your heart is full of it.

Why should he pay any attention to what you say to him?

On what do you base your hopes of being heard by such a God as this?

If you argue that you pray often, or sincerely, or with energy, and this is why God should listen to you,

then you may know that you do not yet have faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.

If you rely upon the fact that your life is not as bad as others, 

or that you are a Bible-reader or churchgoer, 

this also is a proof that you do not yet have saving faith.

Perhaps you think that God must listen to you because of your great need;

but even this will not do.

The problem with all this is that you are pointing to something about you 

as the reason why God should hear.

Your hopes of being accepted by him are to do with yourself.

This is not faith in Christ.

But if all your hopes of being accepted by God are to do with the Lord Jesus Christ, 

this is the faith of which we are speaking. 

Do you see yourself as filthy in God's sight? 

Do you see that there is nothing about you which he will ever find attractive?

But do you say in your hearts, 

'Yes, but the Lord Jesus Christ has taken upon himself the punishment that I deserve.

What is more, his perfect life has been reckoned to my account.

It is on the basis of who Christ is and what he has done, that I expect God to receive me.

God will not turn away a sinner who comes to him through Christ. 

It is on him that I rely.

I look outside of myself and away to him. 

I have no other hope than him'?

This is how faith speaks and behaves. It does not think about itself. Its attention is all fixed on Christ.

Stuart Olyott, Alive in Christ