A.S.K. | Matthew 7
Matthew 7
Please comment below with your conversation with God and/or insights from today’s Scriptures.
You can answer the following:
What’s your first impressions about this chapter?
What happened in this chapter?
What’s a verse or passage that stuck out to you?
What is your prayer to God brought on by this chapter?
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Chapter Notables:
Self examination before judgment - verses 1-6
Confidence and perseverance in prayer - verses 7-12
The way is narrow - verses 13-14
Watch out for true versus false prophets and disciples - verses 15-23
The wise and foolish builders and the amazing Teacher - verses 24-29
Work It | Lemuel Ayudtud
Prayer is massive. But it’s not all spiritual. Yes, there is the asking part, but there is the seeking and the knocking that we often underestimate.
Maybe we can understand the teaching of Jesus about prayer when we consider His upbringing. Let’s consider the Man from Galilee. Raised in the rough part of town with most likely parents that worked hard for everything that came their way. Nightly prayers and daily Torah reading followed by persevering to live life everyday, keeping their children away from the harms and hurts of the dogged life of living in Nazareth. What else is there to do but to press on when life is hard? Nothing was easily handed to them. Can you imagine it?
Prayer is an expression of our internal need for God’s guidance and direction. It’s an act of yielding to the power and purpose of God in our lives. If we’re praying for real, we are actually surrendering to the will and plan of God. The deepest part of this understanding is that it’s not all internal, it’s not all spiritual.
Surrendering and the leading of God is also understanding that faith is an action word. That part of praying is participating in the outcome of the answered prayer. It’s knowing that changing the outlook of Nazareth is not just healing the sick, raising the dead, or turning water into wine; it’s also speaking against those who abused their powers against people, turning tables over because people are using God for their benefit, it’s bringing physicality to our expectation of answered prayers.
In this chapter of Matthew, Jesus continued His sermon with teaching people the deeper things of God:
He speaks of judgment and how we should consider ourselves before we point out the issues of others.
Jesus speaks on how the challenge of staying in the way of life is narrow and difficult when compared to the way of destruction which is more accepted. Destructive ways are easier to perform—when you consider that allowing yourself to do whatever you want doesn’t take much effort, but has implications that can last a lifetime or can even shorten one’s life. Of course many people chose themselves over God, which leads to eternal destruction.
Jesus continued by teaching people on distinguishing false prophets and disciples
Ending His sermon comparing the foolish versus the wise builder.
Digging deeper we find Jesus comparing God to loving, human parents who give good gifts. He brings our perception of prayer from the heavens aligning it with the earth.
Ask, and it shall be given
Prayer, we understand it, is not begging or demanding. It’s asking. It’s a conversational request before God. When we ask we should look forward for an answer: yes, and no. And with the “yes” there is a when, where, how, and who. That’s the tough part, right? Knowing that by His word God said, “Yes,” but you have to wait for it to manifest.
Do you keep on asking because it’s taking longer than you think it should? Should you ask more forcefully with a demanding attitude to make sure God is hearing? Fortunate for us, Jesus had already told us how to manage our expectation (earlier in this sermon as recorded in Matthew 6): Don’t be like the heathen who thinks the more he prays, the more he is heard; but to trust in God’s provision and plan knowing that if He cares for the birds, then much more does He care for us.
Seek and you will find
It’s apparent that God’s answers are at times not delivered, but found. If you are feeling some type of way about God’s timing, then take heart and know that God is leading you to get up from your knees to take action with your feet.
Waiting on God to deliver to you what you have been praying for may not come as you expect. Maybe it’s taking its time because God ain’t Amazon—He’s not about our comforts. God’s “prime” is about our growth and experience. Sorry, but next day guarantee is not in God’s plan.
Knock and the door shall be opened
You start school, maybe it’s your answer from God for promotion. Staying alert and pushing, is maybe God’s answer for your elevation and expansion. Maybe it’s going to the doctors or exercising or investing or whatever active thing you need to do in order for the answer of God to unfold.
Are there miracles? Are there instantaneous answers from God? Is there a flash of God’ s glory that happens immediately after we pray? Of course. He wouldn’t be the supernatural God without it. But considering the whole chapter and even the whole sermon and we notice that God wants us to take part in the miraculous.
Remember the “Beatitudes”? Yep, “Blessed are they that …” No passivity, no easy blessings. You do and God will bless. You act and God will bless. You move and God responds. Then we go to the Lord’s prayer pattern, “Forgive and you shall be…” We partner with God. We work. What do we do with the promises of God? Maybe just like in the corners and the alleyways of Nazareth where prayerful people are active people, we work it.
The answer of God is out there so get up and start looking for it. It’s possible that true faith in the promised answer of God is revealed not by waiting for it in the passive sense of the word, but it’s in the constant pursuit of it. Asking is active. Seeking is active. Knocking is active. Nothing is passive in the proposition of Jesus. Nothing is passive with an active God.
Lord, help me to be empowered to work. Help me to trust You when You send me out to go. Help me to rely on Your leading as I walk and move in world. Father, teach me to press forward, to move as I pray. Remove any thoughts in me to be passive about my walk in Your Word or my confidence in Your plans. Give me the grace to submit every action I take for Your glory. In Your Name, Jesus, I pray, amen.
