So please have your Bibles open then in Matthew chapter seven. Let's bow together in prayer and let's ask the Lord just for help this morning as we come to contemplate this theme. And I trust you will leave the building today with a greater enthusiasm to engage and the genuine privilege and duty of prayer which Christ has given His church. Our Heavenly Father, we bow before Thee today as we open up the sacred scripture. We are confident in Thy presence with us. There's no place like the gathering of the people of God. And Lord, we ask of Thee now to teach us, be our teacher. Pray, Lord, that as we look at a very, very familiar portion, nevertheless, Lord, it will challenge your hearts, it will redirect, or quiet times, or private times, or public prayer times. Lord, truly I plead and pray, I pray, O God, that every individual leave this place this morning advanced, matured, convinced, and convicted about the work of prayer and engage persistently and seriously in this work. Lord, help us to be a people who pray. Lord, remember us as we meet. We pray for those on holidays, those who are away, those who are in their own homes and encourage them to, in Jesus' name we ask. Amen and amen. Read with me please, Matthew chapter seven, just the verse seven. Ask, and it shall be given you. Seek, and ye shall find. Knock, and it shall be opened unto you. What's happening here is the Lord has a company of people around him, a multitude we're just told, and he is instructing them Not only on the importance of prayer, but he is exhorting and encouraging them to be persistent in prayer and that prayer works. That's what this verse is about. That people will be confident that prayer works. The Bible, I am told, has 650 prayers. I didn't count that. I don't know who does these things. If I was counting those, it would take me an awful long time. So I'm going on someone else's word here. But I am informed that there's 650 prayers in the Bible. 25 of those are Christ's prayers. Now even If that number's way out, even if 50% of that is an exaggeration, let's say there's 300 prayers. You have to readily conclude, prayer is a strong theme in this book. Why is that? Because the Lord, and here you have Christ himself on earth, the Lord is teaching his people, pray, pray, pray. If there's anything, if there's anything, your savior who died for you on the cross, if there's anything he wants you to be, is to be a prayerful individual. Prayerful. Remember that when you write. as God's will for you, pray. These prayers are made up of petitions, thanksgiving, they're made up of prayers of worship, of consecration, of intercession, et cetera. The Bible's full not only of prayers, but then on top of that 650 number of prayers, you have references to prayer. I think in Genesis 4, 26. Then began men to call upon the name of the Lord. Psalm 32, 6. For this shall everyone that is godly pray. Psalm 66, which we read. But verily God hath heard me, he hath attended to the voice of my prayer. Isn't that lovely? He heard me and he's attended. to my prayer. Matthew 6, the previous chapter, verse 6, one of my favorite verses on prayer. When thou prest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut the door, pray to thy father in secret, and thy father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly. Again, a great encouragement. Mark 15, 24, Therefore I say unto you, What things soever ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, that ye shall have them. Philippians 4, 6, Be careful for nothing, but in everything, by prayer and supplication, make your requests be made known unto God. Is any among you afflicted? Let him pray. And so on and so forth. So the Word of God is continually exhorting encouraging, emphasizing, pray, pray, pray. If you get nothing else today, carry that with you the rest of your life. Pray. Prayer is our expressing gratitude to God. It's expressing our dependence on the Lord. Prayer is the way to worship the Lord. It's our way to present or request to him. So minimum prayer. Understand this. Prayer is a huge privilege. It really, really is. We can get very used to praying, can't we? How does your Christian life begin? It begins by praying, Lord, save me. Lord, forgive me. And your Christian life has begun. Then it must continue. And you can get used to it. You have certain things you pray for, certain words and phrases you use, and it gets stale. It shouldn't be that way. You want to pray, Lord, help me to be fresh. Help me to value prayer. Help me to see it for the privilege it is. We are communicating with God. Dwell upon that this week. You are communicating with God. That's something else. Furthermore, It's a privilege because prayer is the evidence that God's interested in you. You know someone who's not interested in you when they don't listen to a word you say, okay? They might smile, they might look, but they have a blank look on your face. They're not really listening to you. They're not wanting to hear from you. They're not interested. But the Lord says, my ear! is open to the righteous. His eye is upon his people because he's interested in you. So prayer is an evidence of God's love. And we ought to always remember our position in prayer. He's the creator. We are the sinful creation who has offended him with a thousand falls. Remember your position. So I have to say, by way of introduction again here, Historically, every individual, man or woman, who has done great things for God knew how to pray. You'll always find that. Whether it's Calvin or Spurgeon, Amy Carmichael, whoever. They knew how to pray because they had a close relationship with God. And those who are like the Lord and close to the Lord will want to spend time with the Lord in prayer. Prayer is certainly key. It's no surprise, with all that's just been said there, it's no surprise that during this Sermon on the Mount, that started in chapter five there, during this Sermon on the Mount, it's no surprise that the Lord, for the second time, comes to mention prayer. Remember Matthew 6 verse 6, I quoted it to you a minute ago there. Just go back to it, just turn in your Bible there to it please. And then Matthew 6 verse 6. These are conveniently easy to remember. Matthew 6-6, Matthew 7-7, these two verses in prayer. The Lord spoke about praying in secret and God will reward you openly. And now again for the second time in this phenomenal sermon, he says in Matthew 7-7, ask and it shall be given you. And when you understand the value of prayer, it's no surprise he dealt with it twice. I want to say this this morning. Don't allow the worlds, the flesh, and the devil to discourage you. Don't allow past discouragements. Perhaps there's things you've prayed for and you still haven't got the answer. Don't let those steal away your understanding of the value of prayer. Sometimes we pray, don't get the answer. And you think, well, what's the point in praying? Never. Allow that thought to seed and root in your heart. Prayer is of great value, and the Lord's assuring his people of its value in this verse. So firstly this morning, as we think about Matthew 7, 7, what we're seeing there specifically is persistence in prayer. Persistence. Ask. Seek. Knock. Keep on going. Continuance is the theme of this verse. You see, to mutter a wee request today and not pray it again for weeks, well, that's hardly persistent, passionate, powerful effect of praying, is it? But someone who's continually Going to the throne. Lord, save. Lord, sanctify. Lord, glorify thy name. Day after day, going to the throne. Fisting again. Throwing in the requests. Drawing down. Pleading. That's what the Lord's talking about here continually at the throne again and again and again being there. Worshipping. Requesting. Glory in God. You see, the Lord could have simply said here in verse seven, pray and you will receive. The Lord didn't say that. He didn't say just pray and you will receive. No, he's emphasizing continuance. Ask and then seek and then not. Just simply saying pray and you shall receive will not be as filling. It wouldn't be as sufficient as the exhortation here to ask and to seek. and to not. Can I have a look at Thelos just briefly here? Ask. What does it mean to ask? This really encouraged me. The word ask. I'm not going to try to say it in Greek. It's an unusual word for many reasons, but go back with me and let me show you how the Lord has been using the word ask in previous verses. Come with me please to chapter five. chapter 5 in the verse 42. So same Greek words and same word language as well. Verse 42 of Matthew 5, give to him that asketh thee, and from him that would borrow of thee turn thou not away. So the Lord is saying to his followers, when somebody asks you for something, give it to them. That's the standard he sets for the people of God. When there's a need, you supply it. Verse 41 talks about going that extra mile, about helping those who ask of you for help. And I want you to get that the first time the Lord mentions about asking in this sermon, He says to them, you do it. They ask, you give. Turn then to Matthew 6 and to verse 8. Still the same sermon, and the Lord said here to his congregation, be not ye therefore like unto them. And what he means there is the hypocrite who prays so that everybody sees them, they pray out loud. It's like the Pharisee who would have been standing in the street corners and he would have been saying, Lord, I give you my tithes. And he's saying it loud enough so that everybody can hear. Lord, I've been righteous all week. They don't even look at the hand, they just look at the reaction. I've been righteous all week, you know, Lord. Lord, I give my money to you. They're boasting before the people. The Lord says, don't pray like that. Don't pray to build up your reputation as you would see it. Don't let your ego motivate your prayer. No, look at verse 6. But thou, where thou prest, enter into thy closet. Okay, do it in silence, in quiet, in private. And when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret, and thy Father which saith in secret shall reward thee openly. Okay? Now look at verse eight. Be not ye therefore like unto them. For your father knoweth what things ye have need of before ye ask him. You see, the previous verse that we read in the previous chapter, the Lord said, when someone else asks you for something, you don't know they have that need. They've asked you, you give it to them. And then the Lord said, listen, I already know your needs. I know what you're about to ask me before you even ask. And let that encourage you. You're coming to someone who already knows. Now, with Mituartext, which is Matthew 7, 7, the Lord has been telling everyone else that when someone asks you, you give it to them. And now the Lord says, ask of me. I require you to help those who are needy. When they ask you, you ask of me and I help you. The Lord doesn't tell you to do something that he himself is not willing to do. And you know that from the moment you were saved. When you came to the Lord and you said, Lord, forgive me. I say this reverently, the Lord wasn't shocked. He wasn't shocked that you needed forgiveness. He wasn't surprised that you needed your sins to be forgiven. He knew that, but you still have to ask. And when you ask, he answers. The Lord knows what you need. He requires us to come and ask for it. I think there's something wonderful there. You and I, we come to a God who has invited us to come He already knows the need, can supply the need, and He assures you and me that when you ask, it shall be given to you. When you're coming, come with your begging bowl. You're the pauper. You're the poor one with an empty bowl. You're not coming with a great wage in your pocket to reward God for giving you. No, He's giving you, and you have nothing to give Him. It's an act of God's goodness and grace towards you. You turn with me to Matthew 14 then. Because here you have the same word used again. Matthew 14. The verse seven. Now look at this. Whereupon he promised with an oath. Now hang on a minute. I'm gonna take that back, because that is not speaking about Christ, okay? That's a different situation. I've just noticed that there now. But here you have a man, he's promising to give what he has vowed to give. And although the man who said that was a wretch there, that is also true of Christ. You see, the Lord keeps his promise. When the Lord says he'll do something, he will do it. I want to keep that in your mind for a minute or two. Because maybe you're sitting there thinking, well, there's things I have asked for and God hasn't given them to me. The Lord will give you according to his will. When you ask, he knows what's good to give you. And sometimes the Lord will say, here's something better. Here's something else. But the Lord is not a liar. Prayer is valuable and he gives when you ask. Now back to our text, Matthew 7, 7. What do they ask? And we're told to seek. The idea of seeking is a little bit different from asking. You see, when you ask, you are verbally articulating a particular desire. But when you're seeking, you're reaching out to get it. You're looking for it. You're there to obtain it, to bring it away. And that's the idea when you're asking, have an expectancy, a prayerful expectancy. Go to the Lord again in prayer and say, Lord, I've asked you for this and I'm not seeing it. I'm coming, I'm seeking for it, Lord. I have asked you for that loved one to be saved a thousand times. I'm coming again to seek for it. He's not saved yet. He's not saved yet. Lord, I'm seeking you and I'm asking, Lord, for you to help me to understand the Bible, to grow in my knowledge of God, to love you more. And we're praying, Lord, I'm here to get, I'm here to draw it down. I don't have it yet, Lord. Where is the answer? And that's what the Lord's saying. Don't give up. Keep on coming back until you get what it is you know that you need. loves to hear you pray. Now when you seek for the thing you're asking for and you have that expectancy, that will certainly wean out things that are foolish and silly. Listen, if something's not worth asking for, it's not worth having. But if something's worth having, you'll go back and you'll keep praying. For example, You're told you've got an illness and you're going into an operating table the next day, you'll pray with passion. You'll not be flippant about it. You'll pray with zeal. You'll pray with power. You'll pray with every fiber pleading with God. That's the idea here. We're praying and we're seeking for the answer. We're not going away. Daniel, I read it this morning actually in chapter nine, verse three or the other morning. where he sought the Lord. God had promised to bring his people back from captivity into the promised land, and the Bible says that Daniel went to seek the Lord for that. He went to wrestle with God. Again, go back to our text, Matthew 7. We're asking, we're seeking, and then we're knocking. Think about that for a minute. Knocking. When do you knock somebody's door? You only knock a door when the door is closed. You've been asking. You've been seeking. It hasn't been given yet. You haven't found it. It feels that the door is closed. So what do you do? You pack it in. Forget about it. Just give up. Forget about praying. Go and have a wee cup of tea instead. No. You keep knocking. Lord, it appears the door's closed, but I'm not going. And I'm not going, Lord, because you're the one who told me. You keep knocking until the door is opened. What I find intriguing about that, men and women, is this. Remember in Revelation 3.20, it says that the Lord knocks on the door. He knocks on your door, times you're cold, times you got away from the Lord, the Lord's knocking to get your attention again. He might enjoy fellowship with you and Him, you with Him. Here we're given the opportunity where the tables have turned and we're knocking down the Lord's door. He permits us to knock on His door, to be persistent, to keep pleading and praying. Secondly, and finally here, I want to show you the promise. Because the theme here is persistence. Ask, seek, knock. But with those exhortations to ask, seek, and knock, the Lord gave a promise with each one of them. Look at them again. Ask, and it shall be given. And you shall find and the door shall be opened. It's repeated actually in verse eight. For everyone that asketh receiveth, and he that seeketh findeth, and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. The Lord's emphasizing, yes, that you ought to persist in prayer, and he gives us the encouragement to do it by telling us you will find the answer, you will prevail. So the Lord is affirming, and he hears, and he responds to prayer. When you and I ask in line with his will, don't read this verse in isolation to every other verse in the Bible. This is not your name it and claim it. I don't even need to say that, you understand that, but just for clarity this morning, whenever we ask, seek, and knock, when we ask, seek, and knock according to his will, According to that which he knows is good for us, and according to his glory, obviously the Lord is not going to give you something that hurts you, unnecessarily. He's not going to give you something that will wound you and bring you down. He's not going to give you something which is contrary to his will and his plan, obviously. So we ask, we seek, and we knock with skill and wisdom, praying the Lord would open our mind to pray according to His will. But when you and I have a strong conviction and a clear understanding of the truth of persevering and the encouragements are given here, it gives you a cheerful persistence in prayer. You see, maybe, maybe you are being persistent in prayer. That's drudgery to you. Here I am Lord, I'm praying the same thing again. I've been praying this same thing for a decade. I'm still waiting for the answer. And it's, it's wearisome to you. But when you understand persistence, and when you understand the premises, all of a sudden, it becomes a cheerful exercise to go again and plead the same things, knowing that he hears the answer's prayer. to be encouraged. Look at these words here quickly. Ask and it shall be given. We were given. It doesn't say it'll be loaned to you. It doesn't say when you ask, the Lord will put it up for you to purchase it and pay for it and earn it. No, the Lord says when you ask and it is according to his will, he will freely give it to you. Freely give when something's given, you don't pay for it. That's reassuring. The second one there is find. Seek and ye shall find. And I love that phrase because it just assures you and me that your prayer is not labor and vain. It's not time wasted. When you seek, ye shall find. Our time's not wasted time. When you knock, the door's opened. You see, why do you keep doors closed? Well, more than that, you might do it to keep the rain out, to keep the draft out. But the idea of closing something, a door over, is to keep something or someone out, to keep the enemy out. And the verse is making it clear that when you knock, you'll not be treated like an enemy. You'll not be treated like the thief. You'll be treated like the friend, like the child, and it will be opened. Can I say something? Remember that game? Maybe you didn't play it. Maybe you were a good kid. You know that game you would go around to your neighbor's house and you would knock the door and scamper off, okay? Dennis the Menace did that a lot, okay? Don't you do that. Don't do that when you pray. Sometimes we go to prayer and we knock the door and we run away. Don't even think about it again. Lord, today, help me to know you better. And we don't think about the Lord one more time. Lord, today, save that soul. And we never make any effort to share the gospel with them. Don't knock and then run away. You've knocked. You wait. Have a ready eye for the answer. When it comes, you take it. Enjoy it. But can I say this to encourage you as well? Habakkuk. Right in the heart of the Old Testament there. Habakkuk chapter two in the verse three. He says there, though it tarry, wait for it. because it will surely come. Isn't that good? Though it tarry, though the answer perhaps to your prayer, you're not seeing it. Though it tarry, it shall come, it shall come. Verse eight there. Did you notice those first three words? In the first three words, he said to us, seek and knock, and he reassures that that's not just the Jews. Verse eight, for everyone. It's not just for those old mature saints. It's not just for the theologically strong. For everyone, young, old, rich, uneducated, well-known, not known, whatever the case is, for everyone, that's you, that's me, Christ, the Son of God, came to earth and stood on earth and said, everyone that asks, seeks, finds, knocks, find the door open. So in conclusion, Why was the Lord preaching in this subject of prayer? Why did the Lord take two verses to deal with prayer? Very simple. Because Christ, your Savior, wants you to pray. God has designed this wonderful tool of prayer for your good. For your benefit. For your opportunity. See that. Prayer is your opportunity that God has given you. Approach Him. To worship Him. To enjoy Him. And so every time you pray, you understand this. The Lord wants you to pray. Your flesh might not want you. The devil certainly doesn't want you. The world has no time for prayer. But the Lord says, You pray, he welcomes those who kneel before him. The Bible describes prayer as being a sweet-smelling savor, like a perfume in the nostrils of God. That's how it's described in the Bible. He loves your prayer. He designed prayer for us. I'd encourage you men and women, pray privately. As that verse said, there's also public prayer. Join with us as we pray as a church family. Pray together for the work of God and for the glory of God. But it's your responsibility, it's your responsibility to prioritize structured, serious, confident prayer. It's God's part to respond, as he alone knows best. There's an African, a region in Africa I read about, and when the people there were first converted, they were very diligent in their prayer. And they were very diligent, encouraging each other to prayer. And it was said that they had a place to go and pray. Everyone had their own area to go and pray. And you had to walk across some grassland to get there. And it became, I suppose, an unusual saying amongst them. That if they would walk down the street and they would see your path, where your individual prayer place was. You would walk across the grass and tread the grass down, but when a friend would walk by and they would look and they would see the grass growing up, they would go to that friend and they would say, see the grass is growing, and you're a prayer path. You mustn't be walking to prayer very often. The Lord in this text, that's what he's saying. You get to prayer often. Tread that path well. Don't let the grass grow on it, but be often found in the place of prayer, praying persistently. God will answer. Please take your 10 books this morning.