#16 Jesus Teaches Right Conduct During Unanswered Prayer

Matthew 7:7-11

1. The setting:

a. Jesus’ disciples asked a question. Luke 11:1 says, “One day Jesus was praying in a certain place. When he finished, one of his disciples said to him, ‘Lord teach us to pray, just as John taught his disciples.’” NIV

b. So, the disciples’ question immediately precedes this teaching. They want the will of God for their lives and want to know about prayer.

c. God does sometimes delay answers to prayer for His own reasons. The Lord explains how disciples should respond when God does not seem to answer their prayers.

2. How our Lord encouraged His disciples to continue in prayer:

a. Jesus gives them a threefold exhortation. Matthew 7:7-8 says, “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. 8For everyone who asks, receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.” NIV

1) “Ask” is the present imperative form of aiteo, which you use when asking something of a superior. The word implies the idea of need. Since it is in the present tense, it has the force of “be asking.” In respect to God, we are beggars and should pray that way, but with faith.

a) Jesus gives us an encouragement. The Lord says to ask, and he will give it to you. He guarantees that God will give it. We must believe this.

b) Since we do not know what to pray for, God often translates the prayer, and gives us what we really need. Romans 8:26 says, “For we do not know how we ought to pray, but the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans too deep for words.”

c) This is in the same context as the things about which we might worry in Matthew 6:26-31, so perhaps Jesus speaks of food, drink, and clothing. We should always pray for grace and wisdom to live for the Lord. But, in its widest view, He is guaranteeing answers to all prayer.

d) There is a guarantee. We can be sure that whatever we request, God will give us. But sometimes we must continue to ask. It glorifies God when we do.

e) Once again, the Lord does not always qualify His discourses. That means that He does not always stop to explain the exceptions to the point He is making.

f) In this case, the exception is that, if it is His will, He will give it to us. He already taught us to pray saying, “Your will be done on earth as it is in Heaven” (Matthew 6:10). Everyone in Heaven does everything that God tells them to do.

g) The Leper in Matthew 8:2 prayed a correct prayer. He said, “Lord, if You are willing, you can make me clean.” You can never demand that God must do anything. Pray like the leper.

h) Another exception is “Forgive us our debts as we forgive our debtors.” (Matthew 6:12).

i) Also, we must ask in faith, believing that He wants to, and that He will answer positively. John 15:16 says, “….so that whatever you ask in my name, the father will give you.”

j) Unconfessed sin can hinder answers also. Isaiah 59:2 says, “But your iniquities have separated you from your God; your sins have hidden his face from you, so that he will not hear.”

k) And we must pray in Jesus’ name. John 15:16 says, “whatever you ask in my name, the father will give you.”

l) Ephesians 2:18 has the Trinity in one verse. And it shows the place of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit in our prayers. Ephesians 2:18 says, “For through Him we both [Jews and Gentiles] have access to the Father by one Spirit.” (Brackets mine.)

(1) We pray to the Father.

(2) We pray through the Lord Jesus Christ, that is, through His Person and His work on the cross for us. We do that when we pray in the name of Jesus Christ.

(3) And we have access to the Father by the Holy Spirit of God, that is, by the power of the Holy Spirit. God obligates us to believe that He hears us.

m) Note: It is possible that the Lord did restate the exceptions and Luke simply gave a summary of what He said.

b. The second exhortation and encouragement to pray goes with the first.

1) Jesus says, “Seek,” which means to “strive after” answers to prayer.

2) Since the Lord says to “strive after” the answer, we must treat unanswered prayer as something lost that we would stop at nothing to retrieve. We already have the answer. Stopping at nothing, of course, means stop at nothing legal and holy.

3) 1 John 5:15 says, “And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we already possess what we have asked of Him.” Since we know that we have God’s positive answer, we should go after it as something lost.

4) The main object of our search is God, through His only begotten Son, Jesus Christ.

5) Do ask and stop there. It is not a lack of faith to do everything lawful to get what you are seeking. It honors God when we not only ask, but also seek. An old saying is, “Pray as if everything depends on God and work as if everything depends on you.” Both are true. God works through our work as well as working through our prayers.

6) Do not believe that God will give it to you instead of you getting it yourself. God works in you to give it to you. You receive the thing for which you pray 100% from God, and 100% from you, as He works in you.

7) 1 Corinthians 15:9-10 says, “For I am the least of the apostles and am unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace to me was not in vain. No, I worked harder than all of them—yet not I, but the grace of God that was with me.”

a) There are two causes of answered prayer.

(1) The primary cause is God. He is the only one who answers prayer.

(2) The secondary cause is you. He sometimes answers your prayer by making you willing and able to do what you need to do to get the answer to prayer.

(3) You pray and ask God to give you what you need, like a house.

(4) You plan the house. You begin to build it when you believe that you have the means to complete it. You are not a fool. Luke 14:28 says, “Which of you, wishing to build a tower, does not first sit down and count the cost to see if he has the resources to complete it?”

(5) God had put it in your heart to believe it was a sensible goal. That was answer to prayer.

(6) You work and persevere in your work. God makes you an expert builder in answer to your prayer. It is like Noah building an ark.

(7) So, when it is all done, your family thanks you. You are a real cause. It is right for them to thank you.

(8) But when you have a dedication ceremony, everyone thanks God for the house, because you know that it was God who really built it. Without Him, you could have done nothing.

(9) Your house was 100% completed by the primary cause, which was God. You did it but God did it, and you were the second cause. It is not that He answered your prayer and did 60% of the work. He did it all. And you did it all.

(10) That is why Paul said that he worked harder than all the other Apostles. He was a real cause. He was the 100% cause. From the human viewpoint, you were the 100% cause.

(a) Paul says, “Yet not I, but Christ” was the one who did the work (1 Corinthians 15:10).

(b) Christ is the mysterious primary cause of all the service to God that a Christian does.

(c) And Christ works through your prayers, your obedience, your knowledge of and obedience to His Word, your fellowship with the saints, and your participation in His ordinances.

(d) He is so great that He does not have to make you a robot to control you. He controls you without eradicating your free moral agency.

(e) He is the primary cause of everything good in your Christian life, including the building of your house.

(f) On Thanksgiving Day, you can thank God for it all, because He mysteriously provides it for you in answer to your prayers. And you have no right to food unless you first thank God for it.

c. The third exhortation and encouragement to prayer:

1) We must knock as at a door that God has locked. We know that God, who is inside comes to the door if we knock and keep knocking. He is good and wants to help.

2) See Luke 11:5-8 below, as the Lord teaches persistent prayer:

a) Luke 11:5-8 says, “Then He said to them, “Suppose one of you has a friend, and he goes to him at midnight and says, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread,’”

b) Luke 11:6 says, ‘Because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.’

c) Luke 11:7 says, “Then the one inside answers, ‘Do not bother me. I already locked the door, and my children are with me in bed. I cannot get up and give you anything.’”

d) In Luke 11:8 Jesus says, “I tell you, though he will not get up and give him the bread because he is his friend, yet because of the man’s persistence he will get up and give him as much as he needs.” This is incentive to repeat our prayers for our needs.

3) Remember that you are knocking at the door of mercy. And the one behind it wants to help, but He is evaluating you. Keep asking to pass the test.

4) Remember to trust God. God respects the prayer of faith (James 5:15).

d. Notice the following explanation concerning unanswered prayer.

1) Our Lord gave a threefold exhortation to encourage persevering in prayer. It is not that He merely wanted us to pray. He encouraged us to pray for the same thing.

TABULAR VIEW OF THE LORD JESUS SUBMITTING TO HIS FATHER’S WILL THROUGH PRAYER

Scripture	Quoted	Comment	Result
Mt 26:39	“My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from Me. Yet not as I will, but as You will.”	He prays not to drink the cup but adds, “as You will.”	He wants God’s will but also wants no cup. So, He prayed again.
Mt 26:42	“My Father, if this cup cannot pass unless I drink it, may Your will be done.”	He prays that it might not be possible to avoid the cup, but He wants His Father’s will.	He resigns Himself to the cup (cross). He prayed again.
Mt 26:44	He “prayed a third time, saying the same thing.” “My Father, if this cup cannot pass unless I drink it, may Your will be done.”	He kept asking, seeking, and knocking. He learned in His heart that His Father’s will for Him was crucifixion (Hebrews 5:7-8).	Now, knowing His Father’s will, He resigns Himself to the cross. He now approaches His suffering as a conquering hero, knowing this is God’s will for Him, and having peace about it in His heart (Colossians 3:15).

2) God’s reasons for delay in answering some prayers are:

a) God assesses us by delaying.

b) Delay time helps us refine our prayers so that eventually we find His will. See below how our Lord learned obedience through the things that He suffered.

(1) First Jesus prayed “Let this cup pass from me; nevertheless, I want your will” (Matthew 26:39).

(2) Then He prayed, “If it is not possible for this cup to be taken away unless I drink it, may your will be done” (Matthew 26:42). Here He simply asks for God to do His will. He is now closer to resigning Himself to God’s will. The Lord Jesus agreed to drink the cup of suffering on the cross if there is no other way.

(3) Then He prayed a third time. He prayed the same prayer as (2) above. He has learned that it is not God’s will to find another way, as He did with Abraham. The obedience that the Lord learned was death on the cross. Philippians 2:8 says, “And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death – even death on a cross.” NIV

(4) Finally, having learned obedience to God’s will (Hebrews 5:7-8), He rises and says, “The hour is at hand” (Matthew 26:46). Having prayed in what He knows is God’s will, He optimistically marches full of faith to the battle at the cross.

3. The promise of answered prayer

a. The threefold guarantee

1) God will give it if you ask.

2) God will show it to you if you seek.

3) God will open it if you knock.

b. General propositional promises (Matthew 7:8)

1) All who ask will receive.

2) All who ask and seek will find.

3) All who ask, seek, and persistently knock will see the door opened and the Father grant the request.

4. Jesus teaches the character of His Father (Matthew 7:9-11).

c. The case of the human father:

1) If his son asks him for bread.

a) In those days, his son learned his father’s trade, learned his teaching, received his inheritance, and could stay under his roof until death.

b) What the normal human father will not do is mock his son by giving his son a stone instead of bread.

2) If his son asks him for a fish.

a) He will not mock his son and give his son a serpent.

d. If the human father is evil, and all are:

1) Evil is the Greek word poneros, which is a strong, malignant, and moral evil.

2) Specifically, it is the nature of a human father to keep what he has for himself.

3) But the human father does not do what his evil nature dictates, because God restrains his sinful nature (Romans 1:24). He gives good gifts to his children.

e. The case of God the Father: Matthew 7:11 says, “So if you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask Him!”

1) He is our Father. Fathers are good but God the Father is infinitely the best.

2) He is in Heaven. There is no sin in Heaven. God is there in all His wondrous attributes and being.

3) “Much More,” He has promising character. Matthew 5:45 says, “He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” God is even good to His enemies. Surely He will answer His children’s’ prayers.

4) He gives bread, not stones to His children to eat.

5) He gives the children much more than they ask or think. Ephesians 3:20 says, “Now to Him who is able to do so much more than all we ask or imagine, according to His power that is at work within us,”

6) God wants to hear fervent prayers that are for real needs. He does not want to hear notional desires.

7) He wants everything for His children that is good for our spiritual and eternal good.

NOTES

[1] Genesis 22:13 says, “Then Abraham looked up and saw behind him a ram in a thicket, caught by its horns. So, he went and took the ram and offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son.”

[2] Hebrews 5:7-8 says, “During the days of Jesus’ earthly life, He offered up prayers and petitions with loud cries and tears to the One who could save Him from death, and He was heard because of His reverence. 8Although He was a Son, He learned obedience from what He suffered.

[3] Romans 1:24 says, “Therefore God gave them over in the desires of their hearts to impurity for the dishonoring of their bodies with one another.”