Promises, promises

Matthew 7:9-11 Which of you, if your 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!

Here is another positive promise of God; God’s provision.

Jesus does not say that we will be given precisely what we ask for; or that we will find exactly what we are looking for; or that the particular door we want will be opened to us. But we will receive ‘good things’!

He says that we will not ask without receiving what God knows is best for us. We will not seek without finding what God knows we most need. We will not knock without having the most worthwhile way opened to us. Can I trust in this radical goodness of God. 

We see here from Jesus this instruction to actively ask God for His blessings.

Jesus gives us three specific types of soliciting God for His gifts: ask, seek, and knock. 

We are to ask. That’s simple enough to understand, is it not? We simply ask God for His blessings. 

We are also to seek. When you seek something, you intentionally look for it. You go out to find it because you want it so much. 

We are also to knock. Knocking means that we want to come in somewhere. We know that we need permission, so we seek that permission. We seek permission to enter!

Prayer won’t win me the lottery. Nor will it save me from dying. God is not a Santa Claus who gives us just what we happen to want. Instead, the promise is that God will never give us bad things, only ‘good things’. God is infinitely good, and works for our long-range good always.

‘Do to others as you would have them do to you.’ This is the Golden Rule, however we tend to follow another Rule: the rule of tit for tat. But as Christians we must instead try to take our cue from Jesus. His goodwill toward us is not conditioned by the way people respond to him. I must try to be like God in this.

Seeking One,

you are the beginning and the end of our search.

Finding One,

you are the alpha and omega of all discovery.

Asking One,

you are the voice and the silence of our exploration.

Giving One,

you are the fullness and the emptiness of all yearning.

Persistent One,

you never abandon your search for us,

nor tire of our repetitive to-ings and fro-ings.

Receiving One,

you endlessly welcome us home,

and spread before us a feast 

in the face of our constant requests for mere morsels of bread.

Search us, O God,

and find within us the secrets we hide.

Ask us, O God,

and receive from within us the pain we bear.

Keep knocking at the door of our lives 

until we open our wills to your purpose,

our lives to your life, and our yearning to your hope.

Strengthen our courage; bolster our endurance;

spur us onward in your way in our world

through the power of the Holy Spirit

and the name of Christ. 

Amen.