Magazines · Matthew 7:1-12

The Lord had previously given His disciples instructions as to prayer, but in the verses we now come to they are very blessedly encouraged to pray. "Ask, and it shall be given you" (verse 7). Oh, if we always acted on it! The apostle James says, "Ye have not because ye ask not," and he also adds, "Ye ask and receive not because ye ask amiss, that ye may consume it upon your lusts" (4. z, 3). Now the way to ask rightly is the secret shown in John 15:7. "If ye abide in me" a life of dependence — "and my words abide in you" — they are formative and produce right desires — "ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you." And this corresponds with Psalm 37:4, because if I am delighting in the Lord, right desires will be created. Neglect of the word of God would be neglect of the true safeguard. "Ask" implies something I desire to have; "seek" something I have missed, and "knock" wanting an entrance. It means increased importunity. There is more intensity in "seeking" than in "asking;" and again, in "knocking" than in seeking.