Text:John 16:22-ff.; James 1:1-12
So far on our journey of Thanksgiving we have discussed the ideas of appreciation and acknowledgement. My prayer is that we all are challenged to live a more grateful life and depend on our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. This is where we find great joy and gratitude comes from a pure and trusting heart. Today we are adding the idea of asking. Now you may wonder how asking ties in to being grateful and having a heart of thanksgiving. This is a good question and may the Lord guide us and teach us.
Too many christians have this idea that asking is a free pass to gain stuff, Matt. 21:22; Matt. 21:17-22. When we pray and we do not get, we blame God. We blame God because the car breaks down. We blame God when our bank accounts are empty. We blame God when someone is not healed and so on.
What asking does is it brings us to the point of interdependence upon God the Father and we have to trust in His goodness and grace. By the design of our Father, we cannot do this life or the next without Him and He chooses to need us to fulfill His plan. This involves great trust and care.
Asking brings us into the presence of God, John 16. Jesus is talking to His disciples just before His death, burial and resurrection. Things were about to change drastically and Jesus was fulfilling the law which opened the presence of the Father so that all His children can enter in. When we understand our dependency upon the Father and actually ask according to His will we will experience great joy. Trust in the Lord with all our hearts and do not depend on our own understanding.
The choice is to depend on ourselves and this world, or God. We cannot be divided for then we will become like the waves of the sea driven and tossed about, James 1. When we depend on God our Father, we gain wealth that is not of this world. True, eternal wealth that does not diminish and the Father receives all the glory. Ask and be dependent upon our Father this week. May we enter into His courts with true thanksgiving and dependency upon His holy name.