Ask, Seek, Knock

Faith 101

Matthew 7:7–12 NLT

“Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened. “You parents—if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead? Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not! So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him. “Do to others whatever you would like them to do to you. This is the essence of all that is taught in the law and the prophets.

ASK - beg, call for, crave, desire, require.

SEEK - to find… by thinking, meditating, reasoning, to enquire into, to crave, demand something from someone

more forceful

KNOCK - a primary verb; to rap, to knock at the door

The understanding is to come to Him in prayer (v. 7ff.).

Three words—asking, seeking, knocking—are laid out before the wondering disciples.

You ask.

If God seems remote, You seek,

and even if He seems to have locked you out, knock.

In other words, keep on praying until you get the wisdom and strength you need.

These verbs teach persistence.

They are not verbs that express actions but verbs that express HABITS:

* keep on asking, keep on seeking, keep on knocking.

God answers all prayers.

But He does so according to His timetable.

Matthew Henry’s Concise Commentary on the Bible (Chapter 7)

Prayer is the appointed way for obtaining what we need.

Pray; pray often; make a business of prayer, and be serious and earnest in it.

Ask, as a beggar asks alms. Ask, as a traveller asks the way.

Seek, as for a thing of value that we have lost; or as the merchantman that seeks goodly pearls.

Knock, as he that desires to enter into the house knocks at the door.

Sin has shut and barred the door against us; by prayer we knock.

Whatever you pray for, according to the promise, shall be given you, if God see it fit for you, and what would you have more?