7 “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.
9 “Which of you, if your son asks for bread, will give him a stone? 10 Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 11 If you, then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good gifts to those who ask him!
I have found over the years that the way I think about God affects the way that I pray. If I don’t believe that God wants to heal me, then I will not ask him for healing. If I think that God is mean spirited or angry with me, then I will find that I have absolutely no confidence to ask God for anything, In fact, I would be unlikely to even bother praying because I might believe that God doesn’t really care about me. Into this context, Jesus explains to crowds of people that God cares for their needs. Jesus encourages us to ask, to seek, and to knock.
I remember a conversation with a friend of mine from school who was brought up a Catholic. He had been taught that it was wrong to pray for our personal needs and that we should only pray for others. I am sure that not all Catholics believe that, just as I am sure that some Protestants do. Such a belief is wrong because Jesus himself teaches us to ask God for our needs. You see, God is a good God! We need to know this and to experience this fact because a bad concept of God affects our relationship with Him and it affects our confidence in spending time with Him in prayer.
For many of us, we might pray for a need once or maybe even twice. After which, we would probably give up, but we should realise that Jesus wants us to ask and keep on asking, to seek and keep on seeking and to knock and keep on knocking.
Ask, seek, and knock! Don’t give up asking. God is a good father who wants to give his children good gifts!
