In Matthew 7:7, Jesus tells us “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you.” This verse is often referred to as the “Golden Rule,” and serves as a reminder to us believers that God is always there for us and that He will answer our prayers.
in this article we are going to study the meaning of Matthew 7:7, so join us in reading to discover that nothing should prevent us from praying, because although a believer may be surrounded; there will always be a way up to the throne of grace of the Father and the Son.
The expression “ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find; knock and it will be opened to you means that God hears and answers the prayer of his people, that is, that our Father loves to answer our prayers and give us what we seek according to his will.
Matthew 7:7 Explanation and Meaning
The Lord Jesus explained to his disciples that just as a good father gives good things to his children, so does the heavenly Father when we sincerely ask, seek, and knock.
During his ministry, the Lord Jesus twice mentioned these words saying: “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it will be opened to you. Because everyone who asks receives; and he who seeks, finds; and to whom he knocks, it will be opened.” (Matthew 7:7,8; Luke 11:9,10).
The first mention of these words was made on the occasion of the sermon on the mount (Matthew 5:1–8:1), while the second occasion was in a place where Jesus was praying and when he finished praying, one of the disciples told him to teach them to pray.
These two verses which are in different situations should not be interpreted in isolation and out of context.
In the contexts of both verses in the expression “ask and it will be given to you” does not mean that God will give everything, we ask for because our requests must be submitted to His will and not to our delights.
What does it mean in Matthew 7:7 to ask, seek, and knock?
First of all, for someone to really ask God for something in prayer, it is necessary to have faith; not just any kind of faith, but faith in a personal God who hears and answers the believer’s prayer.
To ask from the Greek ” Aiteo ” means to ask urgently, to the point of demanding. The Greek word suggests the attitude of a supplicant, that is, one who begs or asks with sincere humility. Asking refers to invoking a response, which indicates that we believe that there is someone, a God, who listens to us and also implies that we expect him to respond.
Second, you have to go beyond the state of asking; Let’s search. To seek from the Greek “Zeteo” means to wish to have something or to try to obtain something from someone. Seeking is asking for more acting, which implies a sincere request along with an active effort to meet the needs of the one we ask for. When you are looking for something, you rearrange your things so that you can find what you want until you get it.
Third, you have to knock on the door. Knocking from the Greek ” krouó ” means knocking on a door to enter and therefore implies an even greater and more repetitive intensity than asking or searching.
Knocking represents standing in front of a door and knocking on it repeatedly with the knuckles of the hand. You knock and wait, then you knock again, then you say, “I know you’re there,” then you knock again and say, “I can hear your voice. Come on, open the door.” So you call back. If you’re on the other end, you know how annoying it can be to hear someone call and call and keep calling.
But that is precisely the image behind Jesus’ command to keep calling. The idea could involve praying in the face of difficulty and even resistance. If you call like that, your desire to enter must be very great. Calling makes a reference to an even more intense and explicit desire. Calling includes asking, seeking, and persevering.
Meaning of Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you shall find; knock, and it will be opened to you
If we carefully analyze the phrase of the Lord Jesus, we can see that it is a triple request (ask, seek, and call) that contains three promises (it will be given to you, you will find and it will be opened to you).
In asking, the promise is it will be given to you, this means that if we ask well (James 4:3) the Lord will grant us the request because it is a prayer according to his will, a humble and sincere prayer for a real need.
In the seek, the promise is you will find, which is very important, because it is necessary to seek the will of God in order to find what we really need, the Lord also said: Seek first the kingdom of God and all things will be added, clothes, work, everything is supplied by the Lord as we seek his perfect will in us.
In calling, the promise is it will be opened to you, perhaps the lesson is persistence. It is necessary to knock and keep knocking until the one inside wakes up, as in the parable of the midnight friend. Then he will open for you and invite you in.
The good Father never gives everything his son asks for
Does the phrase “ask and it will be given to you, seek and you will find” mean; knock and it will be opened to you” that we can ask and receive anything from the Lord? The answer is definitely no.
In fact, what Jesus teaches in this sentence is that the Father will always listen and answer the prayer of his people. But this answer does not necessarily mean that he will grant everything that is asked of him.
Jesus Christ himself explains why this is so. He says that no father will give his son a stone instead of bread, or a snake instead of a fish. If a sinful parent acts like this, what can we expect from the righteous Heavenly Father? God is a loving Father who gives his children “good gifts” (Matthew 7:11). This means that God will never give anything harmful to his children.
What should we ask for, look for, and call?
A son does not always really know what he is asking of his father. Therefore, it is the father who must judge what is the best way to satisfy his son’s request.
So a father, according to his son’s request, can answer with a “yes”, with a “no” or even with a “maybe”. It is exactly the same with our Heavenly Father.
He knows things we don’t know. He knows us better than we know ourselves. For this reason, when we ask, search and call, he responds to us in the most appropriate way, even protecting us from ourselves and denying certain requests.
In addition, based on the text of the Gospel of Luke, it is clear that by saying “ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you” what Jesus promises is that the Father will give his children the Holy Spirit and all his benefits (Luke 11:13). He will supply the needs of his children and will grant them everything that is asked of him, as long as it is according to his sovereign will.
Therefore, we must ask, seek and knock knowing that our Sovereign God will answer our prayers in the best way, not based on our personal and often selfish desires, but according to his good purpose.
Conclusion:
This verse is a reminder that God will provide us with what we need if we simply ask Him and seek Him out. In this passage, Jesus is teaching us to be persistent in our prayer life and to trust that God will answer our prayers in His own time. This verse encourages us to be patient and to trust that God will provide us with what we need, when we need it.
