5700 Rudnick Ave. Woodland Hills, CA 91367 (818) 346-6968 Home > Resources > Prayer Resources > Ask, And It Will Be Given To You PRAYER RESOURCES   ASK, AND IT WILL BE GIVEN YOU Maxie Dunnam Matthew 7:7-11:   Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks him for bread, will give a stone? Or if a child asks for a fish, will give a snake? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him!   There is not more expansive declaration about prayer that this word confronting us in the Gospel of Matthew. Nothing could be bolder. All the resources of God are available to those who will enter into a praying relationship with God. Since this is such an extravagant promise.   Those who have barely entered the door of Christ’s “school of prayer” may grab hold of this promise and begin to besiege the Father with all sorts of requests. That’s OK, provided we don’t reduce God to some sort of cosmic Santa Claus who is at the beck and call of selfish children. I personally believe that we should talk to God about anything we feel is important to us. I believe we should petition God for any gift we think we need. Anything that is important to us is important to God. Talking to God about anything and everything helps us find our way to a life of prayer.   The important thing is that we keep on talking with God, keep on bringing our desires and longings to God until we are clear in our own thinking about our needs. God does not grant us our wish list. However, God does meet our needs and fulfills our longings.   The power of the promise, “Ask, and it will be given you,” lies in the loving relationship between us as children and God as our Father. When we live in that relationship, we learn the spirit of the Father, we come to know his will, we act as a part of the family (the kingdom), we seek and find. So Jesus added that second word: “Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for bread, will give a stone? Or if the child asks for a fish, will give a snake? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask him” (Matt. 7:9-11).   We need to get firmly in our minds now the truly expansive power available through a prayer relationship with God. As we grow in the relationship, we will understand the conditions and boundaries which guide our use of God’s power (that is, we can’t seek to use this prayer power in ways God wouldn’t use it.) We will then begin to comprehend the wisdom of God in what appears to be unanswered prayer.   Here’s what the gospel challenges us to recognize: Don’t underestimate the power of God that comes to us through prayer. Don’t set arbitrary limits on God. Don’t box God into the confines of your present knowledge and imagination. Above all, let god be God! Let God determine the boundaries. (For example, God has set some boundaries in making you a free creature, capable of acting for or against God). Remember, “how much more [than we can comprehend with our human experience and reasoning] will the Father give good things to them who ask him”   The big meaning here is that too often we add more limits to prayer than God does. God’s answers to prayer are always better than our asking, and God is always more ready to hear than we are to pray