Ask and You Shall Receive

‘So I say to you: Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened to you. For the one who asks always receives; the one who searches always finds; the one who knocks will always have the door opened to him.’  Luke 11:9-10

Like most people, I lift up many prayers to God, mostly for healing, for I know many who are sick. I also pray for our Church, our country, people who are unjustly incarcerated, the terrible war in Ukraine, the persecutions happening in China, Afghanistan, Nigeria, etc. etc. The list is so absurdly long. Some of my prayers have not been answered in the way I want them to be answered. So this verse found in Luke 11 needs an explanation. It reads that the one who asks ALWAYS receives, the one who knocks will ALWAYS have the door opened to him. 

We know that God is good, and we can trust Him. But sometimes we question why He does not answer our prayers? He promised, after all! Does the answer to prayer depend on our heart, or does it depend on God’s heart? In Exodus chapters 7-12, we read the story of the ten plagues inflicted on Egypt because the Pharaoh did not let the Jews go free. In Exodus 7:13 and repeated in many other verses, we read, “Yet Pharaoh’s heart became hard”. In Ex 9:12, it says, “But the Lord hardened the heart of Pharaoh…”. I would say that was not fair at all if God hardened the heart of Pharaoh so as to show His power and thus inflict suffering on untold numbers. But first before we become too adamant about that, let us compare God to the sun. 

“Let it never be forgotten that, although we may do nothing about the Word we hear, the Word will do something to us. The same sun melts ice and hardens clay, and the Word of God humbles or hardens the human heart” (Vance Havner). It is certainly true that the Gospel can bring people down to their knees in repentance but can also make another dig his heels to do the opposite of what God wants, can make us stubborn and resentful even. So when we pray, we need to pray with a grateful and open heart, ready to accept God’s will, trusting that He will answer in the best time and place and circumstance. When we start with that premise, I have no doubt we will see God work in His mercy, infinite wisdom and power.