The Promise

Mt. 7:7-8

Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.

What a grand promise! Yet I think that the scope of this promise is much different than many people think. In the context of the Sermon on the Mount, this promise comes at a time when the disciple of Jesus truly knows that living as Jesus is teaching is impossible! How can I be meek, peaceable, merciful, pure in heart? How can I hunger and thirst after righteousness? How can I endure persectution for His sake? How can I practically be salt and light in this world? How can my righteousness exceed that of the Scribes and Pharisees? Who can live knowing that anger is the same as murder, and lust is the same as adultery? How can I keep artifice out of my prayers and truly understand what it means to pray to God as my Father? How can I seek only heavenly treasure and never worry or be anxious about this world's system? How can I quit judging others? How can I rid myself of this heinous self-righteousness? It is impossible!!!! Perhaps that is what Jesus wanted me to see, that I can't do it! He wants me to see my extreme and all-consuming poverty of spirit! He wants me to see myself for what I truly am!! So what is my recourse? I think it is in this promise! If I want to be His disciple and live as He would have me to live, then I need to ask, seek, and find. It comes in praying and in living in His power and grace! It comes in my abdicating the throne of my life and putting Him and Him alone on that throne. If I want to live as He would have me live, then my mind, spirit, and soul must be transformed through His saving power. I must be radically changed by the gospel so that I can truly say with Paul, But by the grace of God I am what I am, and His grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. There it is! Through the grace of God, I ask, seek, and find!

Father,
Give me Your power to work hard but only in Your grace. This is still hard to understand, so teach me. I am asking, seeking, and waiting to find.
In Jesus name,
Amen