How to Pray – 6. Ask

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How to Pray – 6. Ask

Asking God, or bringing our request unto God is basically one of the main literal meanings of prayer, and indeed we should. Not complicating ourselves but in a simple sense, we can ask from God, what we need or desire.

God loves to hear us calling on Him and He will answer us. God is glad when we look to Him and put our trust in Him. 

Jer 33:3 Call to me and I will answer you and tell you great and incomprehensible things you do not know (CSB)

So we can boldly come before God to ask with understanding of Who God is.

Hebrews 4:16, So let us keep on coming boldly to the throne of grace, so that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.

Ask God, Knowing 

  • God loves us and desires that we come and ask Him – Jeremiah 33:3
  • God knows before we even ask Him.
    • Matthew 6:8, .. for  your Father knows what things you need before you ask him.

Yet God still wants us to come and ask Him 

  • James 4:2, You do not have because you do not ask. (CSB)

Asking God shows we are acknowledging God and trusting in God, instead of our own strength.

  • There is nothing that God would not do for us
    • Romans 8:32,
      He who didn’t spare his own Son, but delivered him up for us all, how would he not also with him freely give us all things? (WEB)

We are able to see the future or what is best for ourselves, or even for others. So we should not insist in our own way thinking that we know. But rather trust God that God will grant us according to His way, what is best for us, and when is best for us to have. When God does not answer our prayer, or delays answering, we should resolve that God must be having a better plan or timing. Nevertheless, that does not mean we should just stop asking but press on to continuously bring to God because sometimes God is stretching our faith in Him to make us grow. (See later part, Luke 181~8, Lord Jesus teaching on praying persistently and not giving up)

  • God desires to bless us and give us good things
    • Matt 7:7-   Ask, and it will be given you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened for you. For everyone who asks receives. He who seeks finds. To him who knocks it will be opened. Or who is there among you who, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, who will give him a serpent? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! Therefore, whatever you desire for men to do to you, you shall also do to them; for this is the law and the prophets.
  • Matthew 7:11, If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! (WEB)
  • 1 Chron 4:10 Jabez called upon the God of Israel, saying, “Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my border, and that your hand might be with me, and that you would keep me from harm so that it might not bring me pain!” And God granted what he asked. (ESV)
  • God honors when we put God first on our lives
    • Matt 6:33, But seek first God’s Kingdom and his righteousness; and all these things will be given to you as well.

So How do we ask? 

  • Believing, and not doubting
    • Matthew 21:21  So Jesus answered and said to them, “Assuredly, I say to you, if you have faith and do not doubt, you will not only do what was done to the fig tree, but also if you say to this mountain, ‘Be removed and be cast into the sea,’ it will be done.  (NKJV)
    • Matthew 21:22 (NKJV)  And whatever things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive.”
    • James 1:6, But let him ask in faith, without any doubting (WEB)
    • Mark 9:23, All things are possible for the one who believes. (NASB)
    • James 5:15, the prayer of faith will [n]restore the one who is sick, and the Lord will raise him up, and if he has committed sins, they will be forgiven him. (NASB)
  • Persistently with Patience, trusting in God’s timing & His way
    • Luke 18:1~  He also spoke a parable to them that they must always pray, and not give up, … 

Lord Jesus spoke about a judge who is least willing to help anyone but helped a powerless, poor widow. Not because he wanted to, but it was to save himself from trouble since she kept bothering him.
Luke 18:7, Won’t God avenge his chosen ones who are crying out to him day and night…

  • God hears us and sends answers but God sometimes allows delays
    Daniel 10:12~  from the first day that you committed yourself to understand and to humble yourself before your God, your words were heard. I’ve come in answer to[g] your prayers. However, the prince of the kingdom of Persia opposed me for 21 days.
  • Sometimes we need to patiently wait for God’s timing, for there is an appointed time for everything.
    Eccl 3:11, He has made everything beautiful in its time (BSB) 
  • Ask first for God’s Will to be done
    • When we take care of matters of God, God will take care of everything else, Matthew 6:33
  • According to Word of God

Both Nehemiah and Daniel prayed according to the what God said in the Word of God, and they were answered

  • Nehemiah 1:8~9, Please remember what you spoke in commanding your servant Moses. You said, ‘If you rebel, I will scatter you among the nations but if you return to me, keeping my commands and doing them, even if your exiled people are in the farthest horizon, I will gather them from there and bring them to the place where I have chosen to establish my Name.
  • Daniel 9:2~ I, Daniel, understood from the books according to the word of the LORD to the prophet Jeremiah that the number of years for the desolation of Jerusalem would be seventy.
    So I turned my attention to the Lord God to seek him by prayer and petitions, with fasting, sackcloth, and ashes. (CSB)
  • Sincere and earnest
    • James 5:16, The effective, fervent prayer of a righteous man avails much.
  • In the name of Lord Christ Jesus

John 14:13, Whatever you will ask in my name, I will do it, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. (WEB)

  • In troubled times.
    • Psalms 50:15, Call on me in the day of trouble. I will deliver you, and you will honor me. (ESV)
    • Philippians 4:6 In nothing be anxious, but in everything, by prayer and petition with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. 7 And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your thoughts in Christ Jesus. (WEB)

So whatever situation or status we are in, we can come to God just as we are and bring our request unto God, whether it is for healing, help, deliverance, provision, protection, blessing, or any other.

It is God’s delight and not dread to hear and answer our prayer. Then when our prayers are answered, our faith will grow, we will grow in God, and we should give thanks to God, as well as testify to others of how real and good God is.