Scripture For Today: Matthew 7:1-11
“7 Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you: 8 For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. 9 Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? 10 Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? 11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?”
Matthew 7:7-11
Oswald Chambers wrote, “God’s silences are His answers. If we only take as answers those that are visible to our senses, we are in a very elementary condition of grace.” God sometimes answers our prayer long before we see the answer. When He manifests His answer it will be clear that it is His working; “The manifestation of the answer in place and time is a mere matter of God’s sovereignty.”. These quotes from Oswald Chambers reveal to the waiting trusting Christian that God has not forgotten, nor has He said no just because He is silent. It is Satan who wants you to believe that silence means “no” when it often means that God is working the answer out to be manifest at the best time in the best way for you. “God has trusted you in the most intimate way He could trust you, with an absolute silence, not of despair but of pleasure, because He saw you could stand a much bigger revelation than you had at the time.”1.
Don’t presume God’s silence is “no” pursue God until His answer is manifest by Him for your life.
In Matthew seven Jesus speaks to the Christian who is seeking to live for Him and is in need of divine help to live their divine nature in Christ. In the first six verses Jesus tells them to live with compassion and humility among men. Not believing you can rule over them and that you have any standing to judge their worth using yourself and your understanding as the unbending measure of others value and righteousness. Instead consider that you also have shortcomings and yours might be more significant to your overall life and testimony than theirs. This truth is not instruction to be tolerant of clear belligerent unrighteousness and rejecting of Christ. We are taught in verse six that there are some so entrenched in the pigpen of their iniquity that we are not to spend our whole life trying to reach them but having proclaimed truth we must move on and not spend our whole life among the unrighteous. This is not about their value, it is about the value of all those who need to hear and see the gospel of Jesus Christ from your life. This instruction means making some hard choices and needing the clear guidance of our God as we live our life pursuing Him and His glory. We will have to decide when to stay and labor in a persons life and when to keep our pearls for another day and person. We will need to hear and discern God’s guidance and provision. These decisions will be made in error if we are simply deciding them based on our own understanding. In order to live the first six verses of Matthew seven we need to follow the wisdom of Solomon written long ago: “5 Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. 6 In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.” Proverbs 3:5-6.
It is at this point that the next verses of Matthew Chapter seven begin to be applied to our lives. It we are to follow the wisdom of Proverbs three, we will need to constantly seek the answers and guidance from the God whose ways we are acknowledging and from whom we are seeking direction. The way we live the truths of Proverbs three is in prayer. But at times when we are diligently seeking God’s paths and ways for our lives we ask, and God is silent. How do we respond then? Do we assume that God has said “no”? And if He has not said no then why haven’t we seen the guidance or provision that we need? That is the purpose of Matthew chapter seven verses seven through eleven, to teach us how to proceed when God is silent.
There are a few principles for you to live by when God is silent. First, when God is silent, keep asking. Ask, Seek, Knock are increasingly determined and overt actions. To ask means to beg, call for, desire. To seek means to look for in order to find, to endeavor, inquire, think, meditate, require. To knock means to rap as on a door that you are seeking entrance into. They are all written in a tense that teaches us that this is to be a continual action. Ask, Seek, Knock until you see the manifestation of God’s answer. Second, don’t minimize God’s love for you. If you would desire to give good things to those who ask of you don’t assume that God loves you less and is less desiring of your joy and provision than you are of others. God is righteous and good, remember who He is and that He wants to give you the desires of your heart as they are in harmony with the desires of His heart. Remember who the God you pursue is, He loves you and seeks you and your best. Third, count on the faithfulness of God to answer the prayers of His people. Verse eight gives us assurance that God will answer us. “For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened.” Christian, when God is silent, you keep on asking, seeking and knocking until He manifests His answer in your life. This is faith for living that is met by God’s grace for living as He in His time, for His glory, and for your good answers your prayer for guidance and provision in your life. Don’t presume God’s silence is “no” pursue God until His answer is manifest by Him for your life.
1 Quotes in this paragraph from “If You Will Ask” by Oswald Chambers.