Day 8 - Effective Prayer

Well, good morning, and hopefully you're doing well.

Thank you so much for joining us this morning for Wednesday, March 9th.

Hopefully the weather isn't getting you too down, and hopefully warm weather will be back with us soon.

Um but today we're looking at Matthew chapter seven, the end of the Sermon on the Mount, and we're looking specifically at Matthew seven, verses seven through eleven, which say this Keep on asking and you will receive what you ask for.

Keep on seeking and you will find.

Keep on knocking, and the door will be open to you.

For everyone who asks receives, everyone who seeks finds, and everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.

You parents, if your child asks for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead?

Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake?

Of course not.

So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly father give good gifts to those who ask him?

Have you ever noticed how audacious a child can be with a parent sometimes?

Usually they have no problem asking for what they want when they want it.

They have no concern for timing or how much something might cost, or whether they deserve it or not.

They just ask.

Sometimes it's not just something they want, but something they need.

For example, a child does not care that it's 3 30 in the morning and you're asleep when they want a glass of water.

They are going to keep crying out until you get out of bed and give them what they want.

Earlier in the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus teaches his disciples a framework for prayer.

He begins with our Father, as we should be reminded that when we pray, we are to see ourselves as God's children, and that prayer is ultimately a position of a child communicating with their father.

In this portion, Jesus continues to emphasize this idea and gives us a picture of what effective prayer looks like in the life of a disciple of Jesus.

In verses 7 through 9, Jesus gives us three directives of effective prayer and three promises.

As for the first directive and promise, he tells us to keep on asking and you will receive what you ask for.

This seems pretty straightforward when you ask, we receive.

But most would say there are a lot of things we ask God for that we did not receive.

So what does Jesus mean when we are to ask?

When we ask someone to help, two things are really happening.

One, we become aware of our own neediness or that we lack the means to accomplish our own goal.

Two, we are admitting that we can't do something on our own.

We need help.

Asking requires humility.

We often miss out on the opportunity to experience the richness of prayer because we are too filled with pride to admit our need.

The second directive and promise say, seek and you will find.

What does it mean to seek?

When I was younger, I loved to play the old pastime, hide and seek.

The seeker was responsible for finding the hider.

The game would not really have worked well if the seeker did not play the part of going to find the hider.

In the same sense, seeking invites an active responsibility in prayer.

Seeking connects our prayer with responsible action in pursuing the will of God.

This means prayer is not some one-sided passive conversation, but an invitation to actively pursue God's will for our lives.

Praying God's will is being honest with Him about what we want in prayer, but also surrendering our lives and outcome of our prayer to Him.

It's wanting our lives to align with God's will more than our own desires.

The last directive we see Jesus give is knock.

Knocking implies that all the directives Jesus mentions, persistence and perseverance.

Knocking gives us this image of a door to a house.

In Luke 11, Jesus tells a parable of a man who boldly and audaciously goes to a friend's house in the middle of the night to get some food for a guest.

The friend turns him away, but he persists until finally he opens the door.

Jesus says, But I tell you this, though he won't do it for the friendship's sake, if you keep knocking long enough, he will get up and give you whatever you need because of your shameless persistence.

The message is this if the friend opens the door to the persistent neighbor to get him what he needed, how much more would our Heavenly Father?

Hebrews 4 16 tells us we can come boldly to the throne of our gracious God.

There we will receive his mercy, and we will find grace to help us when we need it most.

Persistence is the promise of prayer.

We can ask, seek, and knock boldly because our Father loves us.

He does not grow weary or annoyed with our persistence.

He actually invites it.

So to recap, effective prayer looks like a child speaking boldly with their father.

We can come confidently into God's presence and ask him with the authenticity of a child that Jesus invites us to.

Ask in humility, aware of our need and limited ability to provide for ourselves.

Seek His will, aligning our desires with God's, and knock and boldly and confidently entering His presence that in Christ we have been invited into.

God is a good Father who always keeps His promises.

And so our action this morning is this spend some time today asking the Holy Spirit to reveal what you have been unwilling to seek the Lord about.

Be honest about what keeps you from bringing that to him.

Make a list and commit them to prayer in this season of fasting and prayer.

Be persistent and confident that our Father hears you and loves you.

And so this morning, Father, we pray, saying thank you, that I can come boldly into your presence like a kid with their dad.

Thank you for hearing my prayers and never growing weary of my persistence.

You are so kind to listen and even more gracious to respond and act.

Please give me the boldness to ask, seek, and knock in confidence and hope.

I am believing that you can do more than I can ask or imagine according to your power at work in my life.

Amen.

Thank you so much for joining us today, and we pray that you have a fantastic rest of your day.

We'll see you back tomorrow as we look at Matthew chapter eight.