Let Us Pray ( 4)
Jesus said: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 8: For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened,” ( Mat 7: 7,8). 7: 7- 8 “Ask … seek … knock.”
JESUS encourages perseverance in prayer. The tense of the Greek verbs in v. 8 designates continued action. This means, we must keep on asking, seeking and knocking. Asking implies consciousness of need and the belief that God hears our prayers.
Seeking implies earnest petitioning along with obedience to the will of God. Knocking implies perseverance in coming to God even when He does not respond quickly. Christ’s assurance that those who ask will receive what they ask for is based on:
I. Seeking first the kingdom of God and His righteousness ( Mat 6: 33).
II. Recognising God’s fatherly goodness and love ( 6: 8; 7: 11; John 15: 16; 16: 23,26 f; Col 1: 9- 12).
III. Praying according to God’s will ( Mark 11: 24; John 21: 22; 1John 5: 14)
IV. Maintaining fellowship with Christ ( John 15: 7).
V. Obeying Christ ( 1John 3: 22).
If you fail in your prayer life, you become fainthearted ( Lk 18: 1- 8) and tormented by worries ( Mat 6: 25- 34 and Phil 4: 6,7). If you are not committed to prayer you will become a prey to spiritual weakness as faintheartedness and worry will soon follow ( Mat 6: 25; Acts 8: 1) like Jonah ( Jonah 2: 1- 10) and fall into various temptations ( Mat 26: 36- 41). Jesus told His disciples that they should always pray and not give up ( Lk 18: 1- 8). You don’t pray only when you need something or when you feel like. God is our Father ( Lk 11: 2; Mt 6: 9). You don’t communicate with your earthly father only when you need something from him. To persist in prayer and not give up does not mean endless repetition or painful long prayer sessions. Always praying means keeping our requests constantly before God as we live for him dayby- day, believing he will answer. When we live by faith, we are not to give up. God may delay answering, but his delays always have good reasons. As we persist in prayer we grow in character, faith and hope. “Nevertheless, we made our prayer to our God and because of them, we set a watch against them day and night,” ( Neh 4: 9). Nehemiah constantly combined prayers with preparation and planning. His people trusted God and at the same time kept vigilant watch over what had been entrusted to them. Too often we pray without looking for what God wants us to do. We show God we are serious when we combine prayer with thorough, preparation and effort. You do not have to spend hours on your knees, or weave Bible verses into your prayers, or use the jargon, verbal marathon or secret codes, pious clichés, high- sounding phrases with which other people seemed familiar.