Prayer: Source of Power for Kingdom Living Matthew 7:7-11

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Matthew 7:7-11
Prayer: Source of Power for Kingdom Living

What is the most recent answer you have had to prayer? What is the greatest difficulty you experience with prayer?

My greatest difficulty is that I just don't devote myself to prayer! You may be like me: constantly sending up little prayers all through the day. But I think the tone of Scripture is that it is fervent and earnest prayer is what is truly effective. Why? Because we are really engaged in the relationship during times of intense prayer. Earnest prayer treats God with the reverence that he deserves. Such times of prayer can be like wrestling with God (Genesis 32:22-32).

These verses are not disconnected from the rest of the block of teaching in Matthew chapters 5-7. Jesus teaches on prayer here because the kingdom life style demanded by the Sermon on the Mount is humanly impossible. The power for living what we read here can only come from God.

What are some of the "humanly impossible" demands placed upon the life of the disciple in the Sermon on the Mount?

The verbs in verse 7 are in the present progressive tense and should be rendered: Be asking, be seeking, and be knocking.

Be asking – Continue in fervent and sincere prayer.

Be seeking – Continue in active, diligent seeking of God in study and prayer. Live in pursuit of God.

Be knocking – Continue to strive to be "let into" the life of the disciple.

So prayer is not some passive, inert state. It is an active engagement with God. There is a synergy to prayer. As we apply ourselves to the discipline of prayer, God graciously pours out his presence and favor upon us. We do not earn God's response (that would be works righteousness which is contrary to scripture), but we exercise a means of grace through prayer. "For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened." (Matthew 7:8)

The following story may help to illustrate this truth.

From about 1981 to 1984 I was at a spiritual lowpoint. I was not living for God, in fact I was angry and hostile towards God. I was, to use the old expression, "backslidden". Then in January of 1985 our first daughter, Rebekah, was born. Cuddling that tiny, newborn child I realized that she shouldn't have the kind of man I had become as a father. Nevertheless I felt that I was so far gone that I could never have the same relationship with God that I had before.
So one evening I made up my mind and had a terse conversation with God. It may not have been theologically sound, but it was what I was feeling at the time and it was sincere. "Dear God, I don't think that I can ever have the fellowship with you I once had. In fact, I probably am damned to hell. But if I am going to hell, let me tell you how I'm going to do it: I'm going to pray every day, read the Bible every day, go to church every Sunday, and be the best man I can be. I don't deserve to ever feel the kind of love and joy I felt before. I'm not in this for feelings or for anything for myself. I just want to do what is right."
And so, I secretly began my daily discipline of prayer and Bible Study. My wife was surprised when I suggested that we find a local church to attend. I didn't want her to know what I had prayed because I didn't want to get her hopes up. Then, not even a week had passed by, when as I prayed one evening God "turned my lights back on" and restored me completely. It was a glorious resurrection and renewal of my spiritual life. And it all came because I had unwittingly fulfilled the pattern established in Matthew 7:7,8.

The point of this story is that as we give ourselves to asking, seeking and knocking, God honors those disciplines and we receive, find and have the door opened to meet our deepest yearnings and needs.

Why do you think God wants his children to "ask, seek and knock"? What qualities will this kind of prayer develop in us (think about each of the words and apply a positive character trait)?

We have to ask in prayer, not because God has to be informed of our needs, but because God trains us through prayer. The relationship God wants to have with us, and the kingdom lifestyle God desires are taught in prayer.

So why aren't some of our prayers answered?

We are not persistent. A lack of persistence means that we really don't care about what we are praying for or that we mistakenly think that asking again is a sign of faithlessness.

The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. James 5:16b

We pray with wrong motives. Look up James 4:2-3.

We ask for what will actually be harmful for us. God only answers in a way consistent with his good will for us. God actually answers our prayers BETTER than we ask them. Often our prayers would hurt us if answered the way we desire. God always answers to our good.

We have a distorted view of the God whom we address in prayer. We conceive of God as stingy or too busy or too stern to care about our needs. This is where the rest of Jesus' words really offer a correction:

Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a snake? 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! Matthew 7:9-11

Even sinful human beings know how to give good gifts to their children! Don't we believe that a loving God will do at least that much for us? Look up Luke 11:11-13 for another rendering of the same concept.

Stone = that which is useless

Serpent (probably refers to an eel) = that which is useless because it is forbidden. Eels, although they lived in the water, were/are not kosher food. God will not answer our prayer by asking us to compromise our integrity. In other words, the answer to financial prayers will not be "cheat on your income tax".

Scorpion = that which is harmful.

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	Be asking – Continue in fervent and sincere prayer.
	Be seeking – Continue in active, diligent seeking of God in study and prayer. Live in pursuit of God.
	Be knocking – Continue to strive to be "let into" the life of the disciple.

	We are not persistent. A lack of persistence means that we really don't care about what we are praying for or that we mistakenly think that asking again is a sign of faithlessness.
	The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much. James 5:16b
	We pray with wrong motives. Look up James 4:2-3.
	We ask for what will actually be harmful for us. God only answers in a way consistent with his good will for us. God actually answers our prayers BETTER than we ask them. Often our prayers would hurt us if answered the way we desire. God always answers to our good.
	We have a distorted view of the God whom we address in prayer. We conceive of God as stingy or too busy or too stern to care about our needs. This is where the rest of Jesus' words really offer a correction:

	Stone = that which is useless
	Serpent (probably refers to an eel) = that which is useless because it is forbidden. Eels, although they lived in the water, were/are not kosher food. God will not answer our prayer by asking us to compromise our integrity. In other words, the answer to financial prayers will not be "cheat on your income tax".
	Scorpion = that which is harmful.