“Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For every one that asketh, receiveth; and he that seeketh, findeth; and to him that knocketh, it shall be opened.”—Matthew vii. 7, 8.

Prayer is one of the vital elements of the Christian life. It mingles with its first impulses; it is the secret of every step in its development, the hidden germ of the grain of mustard-seed, the sap that nourishes the growing and the perfected tree from the furthermost fibres of its roots to the topmost shoot of its branches. A sapless tree is not a living one, but dead; a prayerless Christian cannot be.

As might have been expected, the New Testament is remarkably plain in its teaching on this subject of prayer. The difficulties connected with it which exist in our minds are not difficulties which it creates or even sanctions. A simple reverence for its utterances is almost all that we need for their removal. Let us inwardly pray for this while we study the question now.

The form in which our Lord presents His exhortation in the text is interesting and suggestive. He uses three words—“ask,” “seek,” “knock,” which seem to intimate a gradation, and to lead up to a climax. The word “ask” indicates the felt want of a good which may be obtained; not purchased, but obtained as a free gift. The word “seek” indicates the continuance of the asking, with the added idea, perhaps, that our need is our fault, and that what we seek has been previously lost. The word “knock” supposes a difficulty in obtaining, the delay of the answer, a blessing shut up, and not immediately forthcoming. Here, then, is a hint of possible difficulties. Nevertheless, a promise is annexed, which is all-sufficient. “Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” Christ’s word is assurance enough for us; but He condescends to append an argument drawn from a comparison between man and God, between imperfect earthly parents and the infinitely perfect Father in heaven; an argument which ought to be conclusive. “What man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father who is in heaven give good things to them that ask Him?”

The facts as they lie open on the surface of the text are among the most solemn and momentous facts of our life and thought. There is a God, holding in the universe a position which is exclusively His own, the great and only Giver of all good. Man’s position is one of dependence; in no sense is he self-sufficient. As it is God’s prerogative to give, so it is man’s duty and interest to ask. There is a possibility of communion between Him who gives and him who needs; the hand of want brought into contact with the hand that supplies. Then we have the fact that God is both able and willing to satisfy man’s want out of His own fulness. Further, we have the tender solicitation to trust on our part—the absolute promise that such trust can never be misplaced—and the encouraging assurance that the God who gives is moved towards His creatures who ask by all the sympathies of a Divine Fatherhood. Every ground of the confidence that children have in their parents is consolidated into a rock of immovable repose when the Heavenly Father comes in question. These facts enter into the common substance of our Christian belief and thought. As Christians, we never deny and never dispute them. We hold them in a measure unconsciously till the crises of life bring them into prominence. But they are inconceivably marvellous. As mere conceptions they are grand; as realized grounds of hope they are inexpressibly helpful. They are full of greatness and tenderness. Each of us may say to himself: “My soul, with all thy manifold infirmities and littlenesses, thou canst pray to the great God! Ay, thou canst come to Him as to an infinite Father!” Surely that is distinction and consolation enough.

Comparatively few Christians, however, understand prayer as they should—either as a duty or as a privilege. With tens of thousands amongst them it is to a great extent an unappreciated boon. Even many devout Christians—anxious to use it to more effect—have their difficulties. I want to offer some help to such as these. The scope of prayer, unanswered prayer, delayed answers, etc., all are subjects of anxious questioning.

I. Prayer, according to the teaching of Scripture and of experience, is a simple transaction of asking and receiving. It indirectly serves other ends, as we shall see shortly; but it is first of all, and all through, just what I have stated. We pray because we want; we pray in order to get what we want; and we pray with the feeling that we shall not get it unless we pray. There is no mystery in such a view as this. The transaction between the Christian and God, involved in prayer as thus described, is as natural, as simple, as well defined, and as easily understood, as the action of a child when it asks its parents for what it needs, and when its parents give what it needs in answer to the asking. The holy men of Scripture understood prayer in this way. Their prayers are full of simplicity, both as to their structure and their spirit. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Samuel, Elijah, all simply asked for such blessing as they felt they needed; asked for the sake of receiving, and feeling that the reception of what they wanted was dependent upon their asking. They unquestionably believed in an invisible Hand, and felt that the Heart that guided that Hand delighted to be trusted and appealed to in every, and for every, kind of human need.

II. The simplicity of their view of the nature of prayer is no greater than that of the view they took of the scope of prayer. A feeling has grown up in the minds of many that we cannot ask with confidence for temporal blessings, and that the only blessings for which we may be sure that it is right to ask are those which are spiritual. But that was not the idea of the praying men of the past. There was not a blessing, material or spiritual, for which they hesitated to pray—life, health, food, rain, fruitful seasons, success in battle, peace of soul, forgiveness of sins, strength for holy work—all these, and indiscriminately as to any special privilege attached to the prayer for one or another. Just so taught Christ. “The Lord’s Prayer” asks not only for the glory of God and the forgiveness of trespasses, but also for “daily bread.”

These considerations must neither be misunderstood nor overlooked. Prayer is a direct, specific, simple act. Men say that well-wishing, right-living, work, and such like, are prayer. Not so. A prayerful spirit may be, and ought to be, blended with the whole of our life; but we must not so shade off the act into something else as to take away its point and its reality. Prayer is the concentration of the soul upon its present need, whatever that may be, and then bringing it to God, naked and undisguised, for Him to meet it. The faith that prompts and backs up such prayer hangs every circumstance of life, the most minute and the most momentous alike, on the direct and immediate control of God, in whose great foresight all our little plans are lost, and in whose hands we become the instruments of our own well-being.

III. It is demanded by such a view of prayer as that which has now been given, that we should confidently expect the answers to our petitions. This seems a simple, trite thing to say; but it is here especially that we fail. The attitude of looking for answers to prayer is not a common one. How is this? Partly because our prayers are often so vague that we do not know precisely what to expect; partly because the habit of prayer is largely formal—a mere piece of religious routine; sometimes because we misapprehend the form in which the answer may come; and sometimes because, in impatience, we lose heart and hope. We should ever remember, however, that the promise to hear and to answer is positive and unrestricted. This fact leaves ample room for the truth, which we should also ever remember, that the mode and time of the answer remain with God, and must be left to His loving wisdom. If He should see that what we ask will strengthen our faith in Him, bring our hearts nearer to Him, and help us to fulfil His will, He will grant the answer directly, and in the form in which we look for it. He has done so in numberless cases. Sometimes He does so in special and unmistakeable instances, of which, perhaps, George MÜller and his orphanage is the most prominent in our time. On the other hand, if He should see that an answer of this kind would encourage worldliness, or in any way lead to evil, as it might sometimes do, then He will delay the answer, or will change its form into one of greater safety for us, at the same time speaking with His “still small voice” words of peace to our hearts. One thing is certain; namely, that if the worldly advantage be first in our view, it will be well for our prayer to be denied, and God will deny it.

IV. One condition, then, of answered prayer is that we must be loyal to God, and this loyalty includes submission to His will—a willingness to receive, and a willingness to be denied. We may ask what we will in such a spirit as this; for in such a spirit we shall be sure that any refusal from Him will be a blessing to ourselves.

V. One difficulty in relation to prayer of which anti-christian people make much, and which often occurs even to the most devout, is as to how these specific answers to prayer can be made to agree with the regularity of God’s laws and the order of His Providence. This question introduces us to a mystery which we cannot hope fully to solve. We have no idea that prayer alters either the perceptions or the will of God; neither do we imagine that it interferes with natural laws, so as to prevent their due and natural operation. The operations of nature are often affected by the human will, both directly and indirectly; yet no one supposes that to that extent the order of nature is disturbed. Why may not the influence of the human will upon nature act through the medium of prayer to the great Author of nature, as well as in any other way? No objection of this kind lies against prayer which does not equally lie against all human enterprise; yea, even against the daily work by which we live! It is a sufficient reply to every objection of this kind that it is founded in a philosophy of fatalism. Surely if man, within the limits of his power, can use nature for himself, God, whose power is infinitely greater, can use nature for him, if He be pleased on any terms to do so; and there is no more interference with the order of nature in the Divine use of it than there is in the human. Prayer may have its part to play in the great system of causation as well as work. It may be a part of the foreseen chain of causes and effects by which God unfolds His eternal purposes. The good order of a family is not disturbed by the margin given to the children’s wishes and requests; and when we are wise enough to know, we shall see how it has been even so in the greater family of God. God is love before we pray as well as when He answers; and yet it may be according to His will, because it is according to His beneficent wisdom, that there shall be many blessings unreceived by us until we ask for them.

VI. How do these thoughts bear upon the subject of importunity in prayer? Such importunity is not discountenanced, but rather encouraged, by the very form of our Lord’s exhortation. “Ask; seek; knock.” I have said that this series of words intimates a gradation, and constitutes a climax. Seeking is more than asking; knocking is more than asking or seeking. “Ask and ye shall receive.” Yes, but the “asking” which is to be followed by receiving may be such as to include both “seeking” and “knocking.” God is not reluctant to hear and to answer; but that is no reason why He should not require sometimes to be importuned. Christ gives His special sanction to this importunity through the medium of two parables, both of which were spoken for the express purpose of urging it. The first of these is the parable of the man who disturbs the repose of his friend at midnight for the purpose of obtaining from him the means of showing hospitality to an unexpected wayfarer; the second is the parable of the injured widow and the unjust judge. In both these parables, the suppliants are represented as prevailing; but the point to be noted is that the power by which they prevail is their earnest and persistent importunity. Why does Christ illustrate prayer to God by the pertinacity which is needful to arouse the affections of sinful man? We may be sure that He does not ascribe any thing of human imperfection to God. Our Father in heaven slumbers not, and is never weary. He is love. Christ simply puts Himself in the feeling of the man who knows by experience that God often delays the fulfilment of prayer, and shows, by parabolic teaching, that to pray well we must be fervent and not “faint.” The lesson is impressive. If between man and man importunate prayer prevails, how much more will it prevail with God who is perfect, and who will not make us wait except for the sake of our highest well-being. The man goes to his friend with confidence because he has faith in the friendship; how inconceivably strong may this confidence be when we repose it in God! The plea was the stress of his need; the same stress belongs to many of the needs which only God can supply. Our praying-time, like that of the friend at midnight, is often that of the deepest darkness; but we pray to God and not to man, and need not fear that He, in His deep, heavenly repose, will fail faithfully to hearken to our supplications—supplications which, because they proceed from the holiest solicitudes of love and duty, are inspired by Himself. Christ bids us reason from both bad men and good men to God, and it is well for us that He does so. On the bad side, man’s love is weak, his judgment faulty, and his selfishness deep-rooted; God is infinite both in His wisdom and His love. On the good side, earthly fathers give bread, not stones, to their children; how much kinder is He to whom we look up and say, “Our Father which art in heaven”! “Yes,” you say, “He is good and kind; but He makes us wait.” It is so; and why? We are feeble in our desires, and changeful in our purposes. We soon give up. We want faith, patience, perseverance. The uniformly immediate fulfilment of our petitions would leave no room for the cultivation of these quiet, unobtrusive virtues of the Divine life within us. God makes us wait, that we may become importunate, and that importunity may nourish the virtues which are as yet too feeble. Besides, delay gives purity to our motives, and intensity to our desires. A blessing which is easily won is likely to be unappreciated. God would not have us treat His gold as though it were stones. Delay is not refusal; it is discipline. Moreover why speak we of delay at all? What we so designate is not delay from the Divine point of view. He never postpones any asked-for good for one moment beyond the fit time for bestowing it.

VII. What, then, is the character of the prayer which avails? That some prayers are “hindered”—so hindered as to be unsuccessful—we know full well. This may be accounted for partly by mistaken notions about the Scripture theory of prayer. For example, Jesus says, “What things ye desire, when ye pray, believe that ye receive them, and ye shall have them.” The teaching of these words is that the inspiration to true prayer is God’s pledge of the blessings sought, and that we must be prepared to take it as such. The prayer of a man who has not full faith in prayer falls short of its mark. Hindrance may also arise from mistaken notions as to the primary use of prayer. Prayer is not an end in itself, but a means to an end. It is true that the holier we become the more shall we find ourselves accustomed to an atmosphere of prayerfulness as the normal condition of the soul. But we shall not pray aright, if we pray under the impression that we are holy because we pray. We must rather pray in order to be holy. The hindrance may also arise from the absence of a supreme anxiety and of a constant effort to honour God in all our relations. Peter speaks of obedience to the duties which spring from the conjugal relation as being necessary to prevent the “hindrance”—the ineffectualness—of family prayer. This is but a special application of a great general principle—namely, the connection between holy conduct in society and the efficiency of our social devotional exercises. These two act and re-act upon each other. To secure the true, full benefit of prayer, we must strive to live holily in all the society with which we mingle. This point touches upon the value of intercessory prayer. Suppose that there is a want of correspondence between the interest in the welfare of those around us which we express in our prayers on their behalf, and that which we show in our intercourse with them; can we rightly expect such prayers to prevail? The deficiency is too frequently manifest in our relations both to the Church and the world. How often is Church brotherhood nominal rather than real! How many pray for the salvation of souls, without caring to do anything else! There is one thing which will always, in so far as it exists, be a barrier to the acceptableness of prayer, and that is the wilful and persistent violation of any of the Divine commands—the refusal to perform Christian duties incumbent upon us, or the cherishing of some habit or propensity known to be wrong. “If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will not hear me.” The success of our prayers does not depend upon our learning, or upon the skill with which we can express our petitions, or with which we can string them together. It depends rather upon the state of our hearts—the vivid consciousness of need, the deep feeling of dependence on God, the supreme desire of the heart to be right with Him, faith in His promises, trust in His power and His love, gratitude for His goodness, an unfainting perseverance in appealing to His throne, and a willingness to wait His time for the blessings thus humbly, trustfully, and earnestly sought. These are the elements of the true spirit of prayer. “Ask” thus “and it shall be given you;” “seek” thus, “and ye shall find;” “knock” thus, “and it shall be opened unto you.”

I alluded in the beginning to the indirect effects of prayer, and these are too valuable to be overlooked. Prayer, pervaded by humility and trust, is always strengthened by its own exercise. All Christian graces are beautified by it; all Christian virtues are stimulated by it. It is a Divine provision for rousing the slumbering affections of the renewed heart, and keeping them awake. Prayer, too, is its own reward, and a blessed one. How holy and how happy must they be who are on intimate terms with God! Their faces catch His glory, and their every tone and step the impress of the sanctity of the Divine companionship. The Christian can tell his Father all! And because he is so near to God and to heaven, he can put and keep the world beneath his feet.

Even delays and seeming refusals are not without their salutary influence. Some persons pray for specific blessings year after year—“pray without ceasing”—and are often staggered at the fact that their prayers remain unanswered; and yet we see them growing in spirituality, purity, fortitude, faith, and we hear them say, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him.” And so their faith—the most precious thing they have—is tried and refined as in a furnace. Surely such an answer to prayer is sublime!

I have been speaking to many a doubt, to many a perplexity, with which I am familiar in my own experience and in that of others. God grant that my words may be helpful! What we all want in regard to this great subject is clearer views and a more unquestioning trust. God courts our utmost confidence, and He will not fail to reward it.