pastor's note: this sermon is based on Chapter one of David Jeremiah’s book, The Prayer Matrix
My daughter turned five this past November, shortly after we moved. I remember the conversations that began months earlier:
"Marissa, what do you want for your birthday?"
"Dora chutes and ladders."
"What else would you like for your birthday?"
"Just Dora chutes and ladders."
Well, her birthday came around and she was sitting on the floor at Grandma's house, opening her presents. She spotted a long, thin box and tore into it—just clothes. Another, similar box—just clothes. Then my wife, Michelle, handed her a box. Her eyes lit up as she tore away the paper and squealed with delight. Mommy, Mommy, it’s Dora’s chutes and ladders.
Jesus teaching at the end of the sermon on the mount contains three small but powerful words: ask, seek, and knock. These words are in the imperative, i.e., they are commands. Jesus didn’t say, “If you feel like it, ask.” He didn’t say, “When you’re in the mood, seek.” And he didn’t tell us, “If you get around to it, you might want to try knocking.” Instead, he commands us to ask, seek, and knock.
Whatever it is that we need, we must learn to ask for it. When we don’t, we’re disobeying Christ’s command to us. But it’s much more than a matter of obedience and disobedience; our heavenly Father wants to hear us express what we truly want and need.
The three powerful words are not only commands, but in the original Greek, they are in a tense that gives a sense of repeated action. These words translate, keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking. Don’t ever stop.
There is a story that’s told about a father who was getting his son to bed. After tucking him in, his son said, “Daddy, I need a drink of water.” A short time later, he heard, “Daddy, I need to go potty.” It continued like that for about thirty minutes until, finally exasperated, the father said, “Son, you are fine. Lie down and go to sleep. If I hear one more sound from you, I’m coming up and giving you a spanking!” All was silent for about five minutes. Then a little voice called down the stairs, “Daddy, when you come up to spank me, could you bring me a drink of water?”
That’s just how children are. They never quit. It doesn’t matter how many times they’ve asked before; they just keep on asking. They ask and ask and ask. Yet we, who are God’s children, seem to think that we shouldn’t ask, despite what the Bible actually says!
The continual commands of Matt. 7 also have a sense of progression. Ask is strong enough, but seek is even stronger, and knock is even more intense. Most of the time, we just ask, but there are times when we must begin to seek or even knock for the answer we need; asking just isn’t enough. This progression is illustrated and reinforced by simply writing down the commands in a row. What are we to do? A..S..K!
Finally, we must make prayer our first resort. Oswald Chambers wrote, “We pray when there’s nothing else to do, but Jesus wants us to pray before we do anything at all.” I’ve been amazed in my ministry by how often people have come to me to ask advice when facing some big life choice. Even more amazing to me, however, is that when I ask, “Have you prayed about this yet?” the answer is more often than not, “I guess I really haven’t thought about that.” Why would anybody come to me, especially before they went to almighty God, who created the universe? I mean, God has all the blessings of heaven at his disposal. What do I have that compares to that?
So ask God for whatever it is you need. Ask and keep on asking, seek and keep on seeking, Knock and keep on knocking. And as you do, just watch how wonderful our God is as he answers again and again and again.
