Matthew 6:7-8 “And when you pray, do not use vain repetitions as the heathen do. For they think that they will be heard for their many words. (8) "Therefore, do not be like them. For your Father knows the things you have need of before you ask Him.”
In the previous section we looked at the issues that need to be addressed before the saint can pray the prayer of faith. In this section we want to look at what the believer needs to do when they pray, so they can be assured that their prayer will be answered. And so in this first section we want to discuss a simple truth, which is that believers must ask. Many believers think erroneously that because God knows our needs before we ask Him, that it is therefore not necessary to ask. However, in the scripture quoted above our Lord Jesus strongly implied that even though our Heavenly Father knows our needs before we ask Him, He still requires us to ask Him to meet those needs. In Luke’s account of this same teaching, the needs that our Lord is referring to here are our basic needs of food and clothing (Luke 12). And so if God requires us to ask Him to meet our basic needs, then we can be assured that God requires us to ask Him regarding every other need as well.
Matthew 7:7-8 “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.”
In the above quoted passage of scripture our Lord Jesus taught us that it is when we ask that we will receive. And so conversely our Lord is implying that if we do not ask then we will not receive. Clearly our Lord is teaching us that it is only those who ask, that place themselves in a position to receive from God.
James 4:2 “You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask.”
In the above quoted passage of scripture the apostle James teaches us that believers do not have because they do not ask. It is surprising to see just how many believers don’t even ask. Many believers go through life hardly ever asking the Lord for anything. They do what all unbelievers do; they go through life in their own strength trying to make ends meet and worrying about how they are going to make it. However, that is not our Lord’s will for our lives at all. Rather it is the express will of the Father that we ask Him to meet our every need.
Mark 7:24-26 “From there He arose and went to the region of Tyre and Sidon. And He entered a house and wanted no one to know it, but He could not be hidden. (25) For a woman whose young daughter had an unclean spirit heard about Him, and she came and fell at His feet. (26) The woman was a Greek, a Syro-Phoenician by birth, and she kept asking Him to cast the demon out of her daughter.”
We have seen in this section that if we are going to receive from God then we must ask. In the passage of scripture quoted above we see the account of the Greek woman asking our Lord to cast the demon out of her daughter. If you read the rest of the account you will see that because this woman was a Greek she was not entitled to receive anything from the Lord at the time, nevertheless because of her persistence she got exactly what she asked for; Jesus cast the demon out of her daughter. It is very clear from this example that the reason her daughter was delivered was because this woman kept asking until she got what she came for. The point that I want to emphasize from this passage is that if God gave the Greek woman her request because she asked Him, then we are no different and God will give us our requests if we ask Him.
Michael E.B. Maher
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