Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you. Sermons
I. THE CALL TO PRAYER. 1. Thrice repeated. This threefold invitation shows us (1) the importance of prayer; (2) the backwardness of unbelief; (3) the gracious kindness of Christ. It is not only permissible for us to pray; we are invited and urged to avail ourselves of the great privilege. 2. In varied forms. (1) Ask. There are things that we want to receive. The simplest prayer is to ask for them. (2) Seek. There are truths we desire to know - hidden treasures out of sight which urge our pursuit; and God himself is unseen, and at first seemingly distant and hidden behind the clouds. The soul cries in its distress, "Oh that I knew where I might find him!" This is a deeper, a more spiritual prayer. (3) Knock. Now we have reached the third stage of prayer - not to obtain a gift, not to reach after the hidden treasure, but ourselves to enter the kingdom. Nothing apart from God will satisfy. Our great evil is not our poverty, but our exile. Our great blessing is not an enrichment where we are, but our reception into the Father's home. 3. With promise of success. Prayer is more than confiding in God. It is not a voice crying in the dark for its own relief, and satisfied without any reply. It must be answered, or it will despair. Christ teaches us that God gives in response to prayer what we should not receive without it. This cannot be because God is ignorant of our needs (Matthew 6:32), nor that he is reluctant to help. It must be because he sees that blessings which it would not be fitting to bestow on the careless, the distrustful, or the self-satisfied, may be bestowed with wholesome results on those who humbly trust him and prepare themselves to receive them. II. THE GROUNDS OF CONFIDENCE. 1. The Fatherhood of God. This is a greater reason for confidence than any definite assurance of help. We delight to plead the promises; but what if we need something lying outside the range of them? or what if we dare not apply some of them to ourselves? We assure ourselves by meditating on the Divine covenant. But how can we be certain that we are parties to the covenant? And are there no blessings to be had that are not named in that deed? Here we have assurances of uncovenanted mercies. The father does not bind down his kindness to the limits of his promises. Because God is our Father, there is no limit to his willingness to help and bless. 2. The analogy of human families. It is customary with Christ to use his parables as arguments. He is often found reasoning from what is generally accepted among men. With him religion is so natural a thing that the very course of nature is a ground of assurance. It would be quite contrary to nature that God should not show his love as a Father. To disbelieve it is to believe an amazing monstrosity of unnatural heartlessness. 3. The superior goodness of God. The argument is a fortiori. Blind unbelief will not credit God with the common paternal instinct found even in sinful human parents. Thus it places him below man. But he is infinitely above man. Then he must be a better Father than the best of human parents. If imperfect fathers on earth will not deceive their children, much less will the perfect Father in heaven. Apply this (1) to the cry for forgiveness; (2) to the pursuit of the better life; (3) to the hunger for a future life. - W.F.A.
Ask, and it shall be given you. In certain states of the body men lose all appetite for food. Are they to yield to this want of appetite? If they do yield to it, they are soon starved to death. Sometimes without appetite, it becomes necessary for them to take, day by day, nourishment. Just so with prayer. If I cannot pray as a privilege, I am to pray as a duty.Watch in prayer to see what cometh. Foolish boys, that knock at a door in wantonness, will not stay till somebody cometh to open to them; but a man that hath business will knock, and knock again, till he gets his answer.(T. Manton.) Keep up the suit and it will come to a hearing-day ere it be long.(T. Manton.) 1. Every promise is attached to a duty.2. That concerning any duty it is not enough that you do it, you must do it scripturally. 3. It does not say when you shall receive. 4. The whole Trinity combine before there can be prayer. 5. This is the language of entire dependence. "Ask." Man is empty. 6. It is God's method to try the grace which He intends to crown. "Seek." 7. Never be afraid of being too earnest. "Knock." 8. God wishes you to have a clear understanding about the certainty of prayer. (J. Vaughan, M. A.) I. Ask, WHOM? Not to angels, saints. God is the only Being who is everywhere present, and therefore the only one to whom we should pray.II. Ask, WHEN? Any time; some times better than others. Morning, etc.; the time of perplexity, etc. III. Ask, WHERE? "I will that men pray everywhere." IV. Ask, How? 1. Orderly; think about what you are going to ask. 2. Earnestly; not carelessly. 3. Repeatedly: until you receive an answer. 4. In your own style — as children. 5. In faith. 6. In the name of Jesus, the only Mediator, etc. (A. McAuslane, D. D.) A man said to me the other night in the inquiry-room, "Mr. Moody, I wish you would tell me why I can't find the Lord." Said I: "I can tell you why you can't find Him." "Why is it?" "Why, you haven't sought for Him with all your heart." He looked at me, and said he thought he had. "Well," said I, "I think you haven't; because you will surely find Him when you seek for Him with all your heart. Now, my friend, I can tell you the day and hour you are going to be converted." The man looked at me, and I have no doubt thought I was a little wild. Said I: "The Scripture tells me, 'He that seeketh findeth.'" It don't take a man long to find the Lord when he makes his mind up to do it.1. Life is a research.2. Not get some one else to seek for you. 3. The Lord assigns no limit to the research. (A. Coquerel.) In May almost always the Rogation Days come. The fitness of this. These days are meant to prepare the people's hearts for the coming festival of the Ascension; but mainly to be days of intercession " for the fruits of the earth, which are then tender, that they may not be blasted," as well as for health and peace at that season of the year when war and pestilence may be expected to begin. These intentions are indeed closely blended, for when our Lord ascended up on high He received gifts for men.I. We pray for a blessing upon the fruits of the earth. We can scarcely help it unless we are untrue to nature. Man's heart is on his fields; he has done all his work as far as crops are concerned — now he can only hope, watch, and pray. Now all depends upon what God will be pleased to do. We are not powerless: prayer is left to us. Thirteen centuries ago Rogation Days were first appointed; it was then felt that prayer was a power to secure peace and plenty. Though there is no service for these Days, there is nothing to prevent us from keeping them. Our great authority for them is found in the first and second chapters of Joel. In these days of agricultural depression we have need to remember them. (E. T. Marshall, M. A.) When thou standest before His gate, knock loudly and boldly, not as a beggar knocks, but as one who belongs to the house; not as a vagabond, who is afraid of the police, but as a friend and an intimate acquaintance; not as one who is apprehensive of being troublesome, or of coming at an improper time, but of a guest who may rest assured of a hearty welcome.(Dr. F. W. Krummacher.) I. THE PRECEPT.1. The nature of the duty. 2. A few of our obligations to this holy duty: (1) (2) (3) 3. Some of the motives by which it is enforced: (1) (2) (3) (4) II. THE ENCOURAGEMENT which the text affords us. 1. The promise itself. 2. Its Divine fulness. (1) (2) 1. How happy is the believer. 2. How important to know the medium of acceptable prayer. (J. E. Good.) I. PRAYER IS RELIGION IN ACTION. It is the soul of man engaging in that particular form of activity which presupposes the existence of a great bond between itself and God. It is the noblest kind of human action, in which man realizes the highest capacity of his being. This estimate of prayer not universal amongst even educated people. They regard it as an outlet for feeling, a means of discipline; but less worthy the energies of a thinking man than hard work. But prayer is indeed work. The dignity of labour is proverbial.1. Is it true that prayer is little else than the half-passive play of sentiment? Let those who have truly prayed give the answer. Jacob wrestled with an unseen Power (Matthew 11:12). 2. Take prayer to pieces; it consists of three different forms of activity.(1) To pray is to put the understanding in motion, and to direct it upon the Highest Object. How overwhelming are the ideas which thus pass before it. The issues are realized. This an absorbing occupation for the understanding.(2) To pray is to put the affections in motion, it is to open the heart; this movement of the affections is sustained throughout prayer.(3) To pray is to put the will in motion, just as decidedly as we do when we sit down to read hard, or when we walk up a steep hill. It enters vitally into the action of prayer, and is in proportion to sincerity. Now these three ingredients of prayer are also ingredients in all real work, whether of brain or hand; in prayer they are more evenly balanced. The dignity of prayer as being real work becomes clear if we reflect on the faculties it employs; and clearer if we consider the effect of it upon the habitual atmosphere of the soul. It places the soul face to face with facts of the first order of solemnity; with its real self and with its God. And just as labour in any department is elevating when it takes us out of and beyond the petty range of daily and material interests, while yet it quickens interest in them by kindling higher enthusiasms into life, so in a transcendent sense is it with prayer. It is so noble, because it is the work of man as man; of man realizing his being and destiny with a vividness which is necessary to him in no other occupation. The nobleness of his best form of toil must fall infinitely below that of a spirit entering consciously into converse with the eternal God. II. But granted the dignity of prayer even as of labour: WHAT IF THIS LABOUR BE MISAPPLIED? 1. There is here no question as to the subjective effects of prayer; this is admitted by all. 2. Prayer is not chiefly a petition for something that we want and do not possess. It is intercourse with God, often seeking no end. 3. If prayer is to be persevered in, it must be on the conviction that it is heard by a living Person. We cannot practise trickery upon ourselves with a view to our moral edification. If God exists, if He be a Personal Being, then surely we may reach Him if we will. Where is the barrier that can arrest our thought, as it rises to the all-embracing intelligence of God. And if God be not merely an infinite intelligence, but a moral Being, a mighty heart, so that justice and tenderness are attributes of His, then surely we appeal to Him with some purpose. It is on this ground that God is said to hear prayer in Scripture. That He should do so follows from the reality of His nature as God. He who has planted in our breasts feelings of interest and pity for one another cannot be insensible to our need and pain. III. But will God answer prayer when it takes the form of a petition FOR SOME SPECIFIC BLESSING which must be either granted or refused? 1. The first presumed barrier against the efficacy of prayer to which men point is the scientific idea of law reigning throughout the spiritual as well as the material universe. But the laws of nature are not self-sustained forces; God can use His own laws. They have not escaped His control. 2. A second barrier to the efficacy of prayer is sometimes discovered in the truth that all which comes to pass is fore-determined in the predestination of God. Prayer, too, is a foreseen action of man, and is embraced in the eternal purpose of God. 3. The third barrier is the false idea of the Divine dignity which is borrowed from our notions of human royalties. Need not depreciate man's place in the universe; God's best creature, and He cares for the lowest. 4. A fourth barrier to the efficacy of prayer is thought to be discernible in an inadequate conception of the interests of human beings as a whole. But Christian prayer is conditioned. 5. The last barrier is really to be discovered in man's idea of his own self-sufficiency, 6. That prayer is answered is a matter of personal experience. (Canon Liddon.) People JesusPlaces GalileeTopics Door, Knock, Open, Opened, Request, Searching, Seek, SignOutline 1. Do Not Judge7. Ask, Seek, Knock 13. Enter through the Narrow Gate 15. A Tree and Its Fruit 24. The Wise and the Foolish Builders 28. Jesus ends his sermon, and the people are astonished. Dictionary of Bible Themes Matthew 7:7 5299 door 5325 gifts 1660 Sermon on the Mount Library November 22. "Cast the Beam Out of Thine Own Eye" (Matt. vii. 5). "Cast the beam out of thine own eye" (Matt. vii. 5). Greater than the fault you condemn and criticise is the sin of criticism and condemnation. There is no place we need such grace as in dealing with an erring one. A lady once called on us on her way to give an erring sister a piece of her mind. We advised her to wait until she could love her a little more. Only He who loved sinners well enough to die for them can deal with the erring. We never see all the heart. He does, and He can convict without … Rev. A. B. Simpson—Days of Heaven Upon Earth January 12. "Ask and it Shall be Given You" (Matt. vii. 7). Judging, Asking, and Giving The Two Paths The Two Houses The Christ of the Sermon on the Mount On the Words of the Gospel, Matt. vii. 7, "Ask, and it Shall be Given You;" Etc. An Exhortation to Alms-Deeds. Known by their Fruits. Casting Blame. False Prophets A Man Expects to Reap the Same Kind as He Sows. The Mote and the Beam Doctrine of Non-Resistance to Evil by Force must Inevitably be Accepted by Men of the Present Day. Fifth Lesson. Ask, and it Shall be Given You; Sixth Lesson. How Much More?' The Beggar. Mt 7:7-8 Here Again Arises a Very Difficult Question. For in what Way Shall we Fools... Asking, Seeking, Finding. --Matt. vii. 7, 8 Assurance and Encouragement. --Matt. vii. 7, 8 The Strait Gate; Parting Counsels Author's Preface. 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