Jesus said “Seek and you will find”. Matthew 7:7
Do you have a favourite saying of Jesus? If you’ve been a Christian any length of time, and have got used to reading the Bible, I would be surprised if you haven’t. He said many great and memorable things...
“You must be born again” (John 3:7). “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God” (Matthew 5:8). “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). “I have come so that they may have life, and have it to the full” (John 10:10). “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
There’s a handful, chosen pretty much at random. Once you start, it’s hard to know where to stop! - just writing them down has lifted and challenged my heart, and I hope it’s had the same effect on you. Some of his sayings, of course, can be hard and puzzling, but many are wonderfully full of comfort and hope.
For some reason, very early in my Christian life the little saying “Seek and you will find” lodged in my mind - just five words (or a mere three in Matthew’s Greek!). It is, in fact, part of a triple set of promises, bracketed by “Ask and it will be given to you” and “knock and the door will be opened to you”.
Basically those three sayings amount to much the same thing; perhaps it was the sheer brevity and simplicity of the middle one that specially appealed to me.
What does this promise of Jesus mean? I hope it goes without saying that he isn’t promising we will immediately get anything we happen to want. No, God isn’t in the business of writing blank cheques! - the Bible gives us plenty of examples of God not answering wrong or misguided requests.
But God is our loving heavenly Father, so we shouldn’t be shy about laying before him our needs, like any child with an earthly parent. Are we perhaps sometimes too hesitant to make our everyday needs known to him? Could it be that - who knows? - it actually leaves him a little disappointed? Let’s be bold in our praying!
The promise “seek and you will find” is one that can be claimed in all sorts of situations, but I like to apply it especially to the honest seeker after God. Jesus is saying, among other things, that anyone with a humble and genuine desire to find God will in fact do so.
Every so often we meet people who tell us frankly that they just aren’t convinced that God even exists. Fair enough - if I hadn’t become a Christian very young I can well imagine that I might have been in that situation myself for many years. But if they are genuinely open to the possibility that he does exist, I personally would have no qualms about suggesting that they pray something like this: “Oh God, I don’t honestly know if you’re there at all, but if you are I pray now that you will make yourself known to me.”
How and when that prayer is answered - well, that’s for God to decide. But if Matthew 7:7 is true, then answered it will be.
There’s one important proviso attached to this threefold promise: it comes with the expectation that we will persevere in our seeking. One commentary I looked at in fact translated it: “Keep on asking, and it will be given to you; keep on seeking, and you will find; keep on knocking, and it will be opened to you.” The language experts tell us that this represents a slightly more accurate translation.
Put it like this. A teacher trying to sort out a playground fight might say “Tell the truth!” - meaning a one-off, here-and-now event. But a parent might say to a child “Tell the truth” - meaning make it the habit of a lifetime, always tell the truth. In Matthew 7:7 the shade of meaning is like the second example: “never stop seeking”.
Jesus is saying, then, that the person searching for God needs to mean business; they need to be determined. The whole matter of undertaking the greatest exploration a human being can ever undertake - the quest for the very creator and sustainer of the universe, the God of all power, majesty and love, the meaning of life itself - is not to be undertaken in a casual or shallow way. This isn’t a promise for people who feel like a bit of a dabble in spiritual things.
But in a way that just makes it all the more wonderful. If you truly want to know God, you can. He won’t deny himself to you.
Here are two short prayers. Perhaps you would like to pray whichever one is appropriate for you...
Lord God, I really don’t know if you exist. But if you do I ask now with all my heart that you will make yourself known to me. Amen.
Loving Father, many people are genuinely confused and unsure about you. Please help me, by my words and by the very person I am, to be a signpost for them, pointing them to Jesus. Amen.
Do you have a favourite saying of Jesus? If you’ve been a Christian any length of time, and have got used to reading the Bible, I would be surprised if you haven’t. He said many great and memorable things...
“You must be born again” (John 3:7). “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God” (Matthew 5:8). “Love your enemies, and pray for those who persecute you” (Matthew 5:44). “I have come so that they may have life, and have it to the full” (John 10:10). “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest” (Matthew 11:28).
There’s a handful, chosen pretty much at random. Once you start, it’s hard to know where to stop! - just writing them down has lifted and challenged my heart, and I hope it’s had the same effect on you. Some of his sayings, of course, can be hard and puzzling, but many are wonderfully full of comfort and hope.
For some reason, very early in my Christian life the little saying “Seek and you will find” lodged in my mind - just five words (or a mere three in Matthew’s Greek!). It is, in fact, part of a triple set of promises, bracketed by “Ask and it will be given to you” and “knock and the door will be opened to you”.
Basically those three sayings amount to much the same thing; perhaps it was the sheer brevity and simplicity of the middle one that specially appealed to me.
What does this promise of Jesus mean? I hope it goes without saying that he isn’t promising we will immediately get anything we happen to want. No, God isn’t in the business of writing blank cheques! - the Bible gives us plenty of examples of God not answering wrong or misguided requests.
But God is our loving heavenly Father, so we shouldn’t be shy about laying before him our needs, like any child with an earthly parent. Are we perhaps sometimes too hesitant to make our everyday needs known to him? Could it be that - who knows? - it actually leaves him a little disappointed? Let’s be bold in our praying!
The promise “seek and you will find” is one that can be claimed in all sorts of situations, but I like to apply it especially to the honest seeker after God. Jesus is saying, among other things, that anyone with a humble and genuine desire to find God will in fact do so.
Every so often we meet people who tell us frankly that they just aren’t convinced that God even exists. Fair enough - if I hadn’t become a Christian very young I can well imagine that I might have been in that situation myself for many years. But if they are genuinely open to the possibility that he does exist, I personally would have no qualms about suggesting that they pray something like this: “Oh God, I don’t honestly know if you’re there at all, but if you are I pray now that you will make yourself known to me.”
How and when that prayer is answered - well, that’s for God to decide. But if Matthew 7:7 is true, then answered it will be.
There’s one important proviso attached to this threefold promise: it comes with the expectation that we will persevere in our seeking. One commentary I looked at in fact translated it: “Keep on asking, and it will be given to you; keep on seeking, and you will find; keep on knocking, and it will be opened to you.” The language experts tell us that this represents a slightly more accurate translation.
Put it like this. A teacher trying to sort out a playground fight might say “Tell the truth!” - meaning a one-off, here-and-now event. But a parent might say to a child “Tell the truth” - meaning make it the habit of a lifetime, always tell the truth. In Matthew 7:7 the shade of meaning is like the second example: “never stop seeking”.
Jesus is saying, then, that the person searching for God needs to mean business; they need to be determined. The whole matter of undertaking the greatest exploration a human being can ever undertake - the quest for the very creator and sustainer of the universe, the God of all power, majesty and love, the meaning of life itself - is not to be undertaken in a casual or shallow way. This isn’t a promise for people who feel like a bit of a dabble in spiritual things.
But in a way that just makes it all the more wonderful. If you truly want to know God, you can. He won’t deny himself to you.
Here are two short prayers. Perhaps you would like to pray whichever one is appropriate for you...
Lord God, I really don’t know if you exist. But if you do I ask now with all my heart that you will make yourself known to me. Amen.
Loving Father, many people are genuinely confused and unsure about you. Please help me, by my words and by the very person I am, to be a signpost for them, pointing them to Jesus. Amen.
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