Ask. Seek. Knock. — Jesus' Simplest Teaching on Prayer

I'm glad we're together today in this space. My name is Mark Cummins. I'm the pastor at Church of Hope. And if you're a regular attender, welcome. So glad that week after week, we join together in this space. And if by chance, this is your first time, I'm really glad that we're beginning our friendship today. Understand that this broadcast literally goes around the world for free. See, we believe that life's at its best when people discover hope in Christ. There are people who give generously so this broadcast can be reached across every continent. If you've never given, I would invite you today to give. You can go to our webpage, hopeinOcala.com and drop down on the giving bar and give a one-time gift. Or you can give generously beyond just today. And if God's blessed you, help us as we give hope around the world. But for now, I want you to open up your heart and your mind. Let Jesus speak to you. Because what I believe is that when we open up our minds and let Jesus speak to us, life doesn't become perfect and all the problems don't go away, but you experience his presence in you, with you, and for you. Open up your heart. Let Jesus speak to you today. Peace.

Have you ever noticed how quickly we ask people for help before we ask God? Or is it just me? You got a question, something's going on in your life, and what do you do? Oh, you Google it. You phone a friend, you text somebody. You prompt AI, chat GPT, Claude, or your other best friend. How many times do we panic, we worry, we stress before we call our Heavenly Father? Doesn't it seem like prayer, get honest for just a moment, that prayer has become more of an emergency brake than a steering wheel? And Jesus knew this, and that's why in your copy of God's word in Matthew chapter seven, he gives us the simplest, most encouraging imitation perhaps in the Bible. You're in your Bible, Matthew chapter seven, notice what Jesus says to us, to you, to me. Ask, and it will be given to you. Seek, and you will find. Knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who receives, and the one who seeks and finds, and to the one who knocks, it will be opened. Ask, seek, knock. Three ordinary everyday words, one extraordinary promise. Not because prayer is some magical moment,

but because the Heavenly Father is good. Not because we're trying to persuade a reluctant God, prayer is about pursuing a loving Father. Let me illustrate, go back to your Bible, look what it says in verse nine. Or which one of you, if his son ask him for bread, put on your parenting hat, or which one of you, if his son or his daughter ask him, her, for bread, will you give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will you give him, her, a serpent? If you then, who are evil, right, all parents, as good as we might try and do our best, all of us have a sin tendency. If you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father, who's in heaven, give good things to those who ask him? One thing that's true in this space, or online, is that we're. We're all asking for something, maybe it's a marriage to heal, it's a prodigal son or daughter to return, it's direction for your life, it's perhaps a career change, it's where should I go to college, should I date her or date him, healing, peace, purpose in our life. Some of us are asking silently, very quietly. Some of us, maybe we've stopped asking all together, we come to the conclusion, maybe I don't get this prayer thing. Maybe God doesn't hear my prayers, and by the ways, if God knows everything and God knows me, he knows what I need, so do I really need to pray? The problem this morning as we begin to identify it in all of our life, it's not unanswered prayer. We think that's the problem.

The problem is I've prayed for this, I prayed for that, and God hasn't answered it, so I got to figure that out. No, no, no, no, no, no. The problem is not unanswered prayer, the problem is misunderstanding prayer. We've turned prayer into a transaction, a negotiation, a religious duty. You begin to think if I pray it just right, like a math equation, if I make sure everything's in its right spot, then God will show up. If I have enough faith, if I pray it in a certain way and at a certain time, if I promise not to eat any food, if I do a dog and pony dance show for God, he'll hear my prayers and then he'll give me what I'm asking for. Do you know what's happened? Prayer has become performance. It becomes pressure. Get it right. If we all got honest, it's become exhausting. It's why most of us just don't pray no more. We quit. Why bother? It must not work. Then Jesus barges into our life and he says out loud, here, I want you to do these three simple things. I want you to ask, I want you to seek, and I want you to knock. It's not just casual. In the English language, it can feel like it's a moment in time. Understand the Bible is written in Greek, particularly this piece here is in Greek, and it's a continual tense. It's a continual ask. It's a continual seek. It's a continual knock. Keep on asking this.

We get this, particularly as parents, because like our kids, they specialize in keep on asking. But why? Can I? Please. Are we there yet? This plan, ask, seek, knock, Jesus invites us into dependency. He's not turned off by us being dependent on him. The half-brother of Jesus, James, says it this way, you don't have because you don't ask. Sometimes the miracle is waiting in heaven, is waiting for you and I just to step out on earth and to ask. We get this in the business space, businessmen and women, you understand that in the marketplace that you are asking, asking is your superpower. Every salesperson in this space watching online, you don't just ask the customer or the client once, you ask over and over and over. You seek new clientele. You pursue, right? You keep on knocking on those doors. If that's true in the secular sales space, how much more true is it in our spiritual relationship with God? Seeking, right? Ask, seek. Seek requires movement. We're told today, some of us have been set our watches, right, that it beeps if we're sitting still too long. We're told we need to get up and move our body around. Again, if that's true physically, how much more true spiritually? Prayer isn't passive. Note to all of us, following Jesus is not a spectator sport.

I know here in the West, we've turned it into that. I know some of us think that like showing up, quote, on Sunday at church, that this is what it looks like to follow Jesus. It's important to gather together, but let me introduce you 167 other hours in this week. It's all about you seeking after Jesus and then knocking. One thing I know about knocking is it requires perseverance. Doors don't always open the first time that you knock, and sometimes while we're knocking, whatever it is that we want, that we think that we need, sometimes the change that happens isn't in the circumstance, it's in me. If there's one thing I would want you to know and to take with you this week, it's simply this, prayer is not about persuading a reluctant God. Prayer is really about pursuing a loving Father. And I think this is where we've got it wrong, and this is what has to change in our lives. Listen, John 1, verse 12, but to all who believed him and accepted him, that's Jesus Christ, he gave the right to become the children of God. If you've asked Jesus to save you of your sins, you have become a part of God's family. In the book of Romans, you receive the spirit of adoption. We've been adopted. That's why we cry, Abba, Father, the most endearing Abba, Father, I need you, Daddy. And then in Galatians, because you are, present tense, because you are his son, and you are his daughter, God sent the spirit of his son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father. See, what I hope to change in all of our life today is we stop praying as strangers, and we start praying as sons and daughters. That'll change everything, everything in your life. I think a lot of us, we kind of walk our way up to God, we're kind of looking down, we're shuffling our feet, and maybe he's busy doing something else, I don't know, not really sure. If we start showing up like the way our kids and your grandkids show up in your life, not as strangers, but as sons and daughters. Why can we pray this way? It goes back to what Jesus says here in verse 9.

Father, if your son or your daughter asks you for bread, would hand him a rock. No dad in this space would do that. What if a child asked you for a snack, one of those fruit chewies, or something tasty? You're not giving them a worm, a serpent, a snake, of course not, why? Inside of you, as a parent, as a grandparent, it warms your heart. You delight in giving goodness to your kids. Scripture says that the Heavenly Father, he delights in satisfying us. The challenge that we've got to wrestle with for just a few moments before we apply some action steps to our life is, it's not lost on me that the picture of God as a Heavenly Father is skewed, perhaps, by some through your earthly father. God is a perfect father, but every earthly father is imperfect. Some of our dads were absent. Unfortunately, some of our dads were abusive. Some of them were passive. Some of them, they tried hard, but they failed. What I'd like to say this morning is this. No matter what place you come from, maybe your dad was a rock star. You understand that you hit the lottery, knowing that your dad... I want to say to all the dads in the house, you can be successful as an athlete. You can be successful as an investor. You can be successful as a business person. You can be crafty with your hands, but there is no success like a dad living in such a way that his sons and his daughters and his grandchildren want to be close to the Heavenly Father. The greatest work you will ever do as a dad is setting up your kids and grandkids to want to have an up-close, personal relationship with the Heavenly Father. That is ultimate success. But if your dad fell short, if you've got a wounded heart this morning from a relationship with an earthly dad, if it's been tainted, that picture of a Heavenly Father, would you this morning make perhaps the most important decision of your life?

Would you let Jesus repair? Repair the damage. Would you just sit right where you are watching online? Would you just say right now, Jesus, repair the damage that's within me as a son, as a daughter? Don't make it about your dad. Don't make it about what you experienced. Just say, Jesus, I've got wounds. I got scars. I'm inviting you to come in right now and you repair the damage. Because I will tell you this, God is everything your earthly father wasn't. He's always present. He's always wise. He's always loving. He's always forgiving. He's always patient. He's always truthful. He's always available. And I know what some of you are thinking right now, because the temptation is like, well, if he's always that, then why hasn't he given me what I've been praying for? Let me just give you a very quick practical illustration. Your five-year-old child asks you to play with your chainsaw. Are you saying yes or are you saying no? Because you said no, does that make you unloving? No, it makes you loving. It makes you a dad that understands that this would hurt and harm them. Sometimes God says no to protect us. Sometimes God says wait to prepare us. And yes, sometimes what we all want, God says yes, and it blesses us. But it's always according to his perfect love and timing in our life.

He always answers us. But that no might be his greatest act of protection. Perfect father. He sees you. He knows you. And so Jesus steps into our life and he gives us these three simple profound words. So if you're taking notes, I want you to write them down, and this will become the application in your life this week. Number one, he says that we're to ask. Ask God first. Stop Googling and start God. The temptation is for real. I live it every single day. It's easy to pop into Google something that you're looking for, something that you want. This week before the meeting, ask God to guide you. This week before all the responsibilities, ask God to guide you. Before responding, before sending that text, before firing off that email, ask God. Build this habit. Go to the gym of life and build the habit of asking God before anything else. That's what we're doing on 3G Sunday, August 9th. I hope you're registered. We're asking God before the school year, before the students walk on campus. Why? Because God guides us to. God asks us to. Before school starts, before the first day of class, before the first test, before the first report, before anything, we're going to step on and we're going to begin to ask God to protect our students. We're going to ask God to get in the middle before homecoming comes, before some girl, some boy gives away their intimacy on homecoming night.

We're going to ask God to give them the courage to say no to those sexual advances. Before somebody is bullied, before somebody is marginalized or minimized, before they are in a point where they don't want to live any longer, we're going to walk through every hallway. We're going to walk into every classroom. We're putting our hands on every single chair and desk because God says, before the problem, before it happens, ask. This week, before you step out in any moment, before you call a friend, ask somebody for their advice, ask the Father, what would honor you today? As Philippians, do not worry about anything but by prayer. Ask God for everything you need, always giving thanks. I'm telling you, if you want to revolutionize your life, if we really want the world to become better and brighter, it starts when we become more like Jesus, and Jesus asked God the Father for everything. James chapter 1. If any of you lack wisdom, if there's one thing we need today, it's wisdom. Wisdom is the proper application of knowledge. We know a lot of stuff. We are educated. in many ways, far beyond our ability to obey God. We need the wisdom, the courage to obey God. If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask God who gives generously to all without reproach, and it will be given him. Prayer is less about getting God into your situation and it's much more about getting you into God's presence. That's what prayer is. Prayer's not just, God, I got this problem, I got this issue, I need this, I need that. It's not about God getting in on your situation,

it's about you and I getting in on God's presence. So we ask. And then secondly, he says that we should seek. We seek God before the solutions. Now, this is challenging. I am solution-orientated. I want to fix it and I wanna fix it yesterday. Do you understand? Like, let's just get it fixed. Why would you ever wanna keep living with the problem? Let's just fix it. And in some ways, I kind of try to fix things around me so I can go back to the Heavenly Father, my dad, who I'm looking for his approval, and say, hey, dad, I fixed this. Aren't you proud of me? Hey, dad, here's my paper, gold star right here, right? I fixed it. But that's not what God's asked. God, note to self, surprise, surprise. God's never asked you to fix anything. Think about your theology. Does God really need you to fix anything in this universe? But the only thing that needs fixed is my perspective and mindset towards God. And so he says to seek him before solutions. Instead of asking, how do I fix this, begin asking this, whoo, this is tough. What are you teaching me here, God? I just wanna have a jam.

I just want my world back in a place that I'm comfortable. I want it back in the context that I prefer. Rather, hey, God, what are you trying to teach me? Teach me, or more pointed, who do you want me to become? Rather than getting out of this fix, getting on this jam, hey, hey, God, as I'm sitting in this space, your son, your daughter, who do you want me to become? How are you shaping me? See, prayer shifts your attention from outcomes to transformation. And that explains why some of us have attended church week after week, month after month, year after year, decade after decade. In many ways, your life is no different today because you have focused on outcomes with God rather than letting the spirit of God and the word of God transform you into who he wants you to become. Yeah. Jeremiah 29, you will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart. Did you see it? This is one place where just a dab won't do. A dab will do in my hair. I put a small little dab of gel in my hair a little bit earlier today, and I dabbed it to do up in my hair, and it's staying just in place. Now, I know some of y'all don't have that issue because you don't need no dab, no do. You need shine.

I understand this. I understand this. I understand this. I understand this. There is a time when a dab will do. But pursuing and following after Jesus, it's not about a dab. Hey, listen, following Jesus is not a weekend hobby. Following Jesus isn't the salt and the pepper and the spice that you sprinkle on your steak called your life. There is only but one way to follow Jesus. It is all in or none at all. You've got to wrestle with that. Those aren't my words. Those are the words of Jesus. He said, because you're lukewarm, neither hot nor cold, I'll spit you out of my mouth. You've come to a very false conclusion that somehow you can kind of just sort of follow. You can sort of seek him. The Bible says you only find him when you seek him with all of your heart. I wonder what happened to my spiritual relationship with Jesus if I pursued Jesus the same way I pursue my favorite show on Netflix, why I follow college football. Hey, I wonder if my relationship with Jesus would go to a whole nother level

if I was as interested in following Jesus as I am in who wins Argentina, Spain, sorry, USA. in the final championship this afternoon. See, we need to stop chasing answers and start pursuing a father who already knows them. Again, that's what 3G's about. We're seeking God's presence on the campus. I'm seeking what he can do before the security officers are employed, before Ocala and Marion County's finest are deployed on campus to protect our sons and daughters. We are going to seek him. And the Bible says that we find him, we seek him, it's in a small, still voice. And to seek him means you have to eliminate distractions. So many of us are trying to multitask with God. You know, it's a habit for many of us, you're watching a movie, you're watching a show at home, and you know, you got your phone on as well. And you're kind of looking at some things and you got to get away with it at home. But then you go to the movie theater and they always tell you to do what with your phone? Silence it and put it away, but there's that person. And they always sit in front of me. And that movie theater is dark, dark, dark, dark. Do you know what I'm talking about? And they turn their phone on. And everything inside of me just wants to be like, really? Like this is going on and maybe they got a good reason

they're trying to see what's going on on the scores or keeping up with their kids or their texts. But we're multitasking rather than being in this space and focusing on the movie. When you decide to focus, nothing else is gonna get your attention. So we ask, we seek. And then the last thing he tells us is that we keep on knocking until God makes the next step. And again, we're better at this than we think. Matter of fact, we're hardwired to do this. That's why Jesus is teaching this. We are hardwired to ask, to seek, and to knock. Let me illustrate. Maybe you have kids, maybe you don't. But if you have kids, have you ever had that moment where maybe you're sound asleep, you're on the couch, or you're in your bed and all of a sudden you kind of feel this little presence next to you? I mean, you finally got in that good nap. You've been waiting for a long time for that nap and they're right there, right? And sometimes they don't say nothing, they're just there. And all of a sudden you open your eyes and it's like, oh my goodness, right? Or they kind of nudge you, right? Or they ask, how many times in your life, dad, moms, how many times in your life have you said, if you ask me one more time? Now let me ask you, parents,

did you like have a class with your kids? Okay, come here, Bobby, Susie, and Sally, sit down. Today, mom and dad are gonna teach you how to ask us all the time. Here's how you do it. When dad is finally fall asleep, you come in and you kind of be kind of quiet and gentle. Then you jump on top of dad. Okay, let's do some reps. You've never done that. Kids are hardwired to ask, to seek, and to knock. That's why Jesus is teaching this. It's our DNA as kids. But along the way, somebody told you, stop asking. Along the way, you got in trouble for seeking too much, for asking too many questions, for raising your hands. The friends in the class, they kind of laughed at you because you asked the question. And here Jesus is. I don't have the time to teach it, but Jesus, later in the Gospel of Luke, teaching his disciples about what it meant to be persistent, he tells a story about a neighbor who had some friends show up in the middle of the night. You know what that neighbor did? He did not door dash. That neighbor, at one o'clock in the morning, he goes to his next door neighbor, he starts knocking on the door. The neighbor doesn't answer.

He knocks on the door some more. Hey, man, I got some out-of-town guests, they showed up. I need some Twinkies, I need some Ho-Hos, I need some chocolate milk. Man, go back to bed. My family's all asleep. If I get up, I'm going to walk all over them. We ain't having this kind of disruption. What does the neighbor do? He keeps on knocking. And finally, the neighbor gets up, goes to his cupboard, gets his Jewish Twinkies and Jewish Ho-Hos. ho-hos, goats milk, goes to the door and says, here, leave me alone. And Jesus taught that principle to illustrate how we're supposed to pray. To ask, to seek, and to not. Don't confuse delay with denial. Keep praying, keep trusting, keep believing. Not because you understand. You don't understand. That's why you keep asking. That's why you keep seeking. That's why you keep knocking. Not because you understand. Because you know who you're talking to. Your dad, Abba, Father. You're not approaching as a stranger. You're approaching as a son, as a daughter.

1 Thessalonians chapter 5. Always be joyful. Talk about making the world better and brighter. The Apostle Paul says, always be joyful. Never stop praying. Be thankful in all circumstances. For this is God's will for you who belong to Christ Jesus. I'd write that down in my journal. I'd put that as a screensaver. This isn't a suggestion. How many times have you wondered what is God's will for your life? Well, God just told you. More than being single or being married, more than living in this state compared to that state, more than going to this college or that college, all the things that we're trying to find God's will in, God's will says this. I want you every single day. I want you to be joy-filled every single day. I want you to search me, seek me, ask for me, knock. I want you to talk to me. I want you to be thankful in everything. Why? Because it's not about the outcomes. It's about this amazing relationship that we have with God. See, I know this about faith. Faith keeps knocking long after feelings would have walked away.

We put such a high premium on our feelings. Hey, how do you feel? Listen, don't ignore your feelings. Your feelings are like that little red indicator light on the dash of your car. It indicates something's going on. But certainly, don't let your feelings direct your life. Just follow your feelings. How do you feel? How do you feel about it? Just trust your feelings. A lot of the pain that you have right now has nothing to do with the government, has nothing to do with your parents, has nothing to do with anything other than you have put too high of a premium on your feelings. And your feelings have given out on God. That's why God's given us faith. It's the substance of things hoped for. It's the evidence of things not yet seen. See, the greatest miracle isn't always that circumstances change. Sometimes the miracle, you ready for it, is you change. I change. The greatest answer to prayer may be the person you become while waiting. The greatest answer to prayer might be the person that I become while I'm waiting on God. That's what happened to Noah, 120 years, no rain, building the ark.

Moses, rejected. He's walking through the desert, the Red Sea moment, the people complaining to him. Along the way in the wilderness, God's changing Moses. Joseph, for 13 years, from the moment his brothers threw him in the pit to ultimately him becoming second in command, it was 13 years that God is shaping his character and who he would become. Esther, orphaned, sexually objectified, discriminated against. But in the process along the way, the gallows were built. Haman had a plan, but it was Esther and her courage that changed. Paul, beaten, stoned, imprisoned and diseased along the way. This one who was so anti-God wrote most of the New Testament. And then our savior, Jesus, betrayed, abandoned, falsely accused, rejected, ridiculed, crucified, and died. We rush through the story. We rushed through Easter. But those 72 hours, those three days that he laid dead, the transformation… See, to that point in time, there had been all kinds of world leaders. There had been phenomenal world leaders of nations. There had been spiritual and professional and entrepreneurial and athletic. There had been all kinds of world leaders, and what they all have in common is they died. But three days later, the transformation, that one day, whether or not you believe or don't believe, one day every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that he, Jesus Christ, is the Son of God for all of eternity, like forever and forever and forever. We will declare his greatness and his goodness.

Keep knocking. Faith keeps knocking long after feelings would have walked away. The greatest answer to prayer may be the person you become while you're waiting. Three words. Ask, seek, knock. The question is, what will you do? You can ignore all of this and go on with your way and keep living your life the way that it is. Or this morning, you can pivot and you can trust God at his word. The story of your life is the story of your life. It's the sum total of the decisions that you're making. If you'll stick with me in the next several moments as Corbin and the team and as we sing and pray, and as you respond to this invitation, I've got three gifts that I'm going to give to you if you stick with me here to the end. If you do some time with God, I've got three resources, one video, one gift that I think will radically change everything that happens inside of your home, and another tool to make prayer very, very, very personal. I'm glad we're together today in this space. My name is Mark Cummins, and I'm the pastor at Church of Hope. And if you're a regular attender, welcome. So glad that week after week, we join together in this space. And if by chance, this is your first time, I'm really glad that we're beginning our friendship today. Now, understand that this broadcast literally goes around the world for free. See, we believe that life's at its best when people discover hope in Christ. There are people who give generously so this broadcast can be reached across every continent. If you've never given, I would invite you today to give. You can go to our webpage, HopeInOcala.com and drop down on the giving bar and give a one-time gift. Or you can give generously beyond just today.

And if God's blessed you, help us as we give hope around the world. But for now, I want you to open up your heart and your mind. Let Jesus speak to you because what I believe is that when we open up our minds and let Jesus speak to us, life doesn't become perfect and all the problems don't go away, but you experience His presence in you, with you, and for you. Open up your heart. Let Jesus speak to you today. Peace.