Read Matthew 7:7-12
P. P. P. Prayer with Passion and Persistence.
Jesus says everyone who ASKS receives. Everyone who SEEKS will find. And everyone who KNOCKS the door will be open for them.
God wants us to pray and do so with a form of passion and persistence. Note the progression In this passage:
ASKING requires mere words. We just have to ask. James 4:2 says you don’t have it because you don’t ask, SO ASK!!! However God’s response is not in our timing. So if you ask and you don’t get an immediate response, do you quit? Where’s the persistence? Where is the passion?
SEEKING requires more energy than mere words. But what are you seeking for? An answer? Your answer? God’s answer? Your will? Or God’s will? God wants to give to you and when he gives it says he wants to give us good things. So if you ask for good things, then won’t your loving father give it to you? But what if what you’re asking for is not good? What if it’s very selfish and has nothing to do with furthering God’s Kingdom? James 4:3 says, you ask but don’t receive it because you ask with the wrong motives. It’s for your selfish pleasures and not for God’s purpose. Such people are called adulterers because we desire to fulfill Our Kingdom with worldly pleasures and not fulfill God’s kingdom. Remember the prayer Jesus gave us in Matthew 6:10 when he said pray for God’s Will and not our own? Jesus set the example at the Garden of Gethsemane when he asked for the cup of death to be removed, and ended with, “Yet not my will father but your will be done.” When we pray, are we willing to say that same prayer as Jesus did?
If Matthew 7 was the only example of Prayer in the Bible, then it seems like God wants to be our puppet and do whatever we ask him to do. But there are other passages in the Bible on prayer that need to be read along with this chapter.
KNOCKING is yet a stronger type of passion and persistence. It requires even more energy in our prayer. I truly believe we must pray with passion and persistence and trust it into the hands of God. Don’t give up!
God wants to respond. Sometimes it’s no.
God wants to give us good gifts and not ones that will hurt us.
God wants to bring glory to his name and not ours.
God wants to build his kingdom and not ours.
P. P. P.
