Ask God for It

“ …  you don’t have what you want because you don’t ask God for it.”

–James 4:2 NLT

My wife and I were in the Philippines ear­lier this year to attend WIM’ s Asia Conference. I wrote about it in another post. What I didn’t tell you was the story behind the story.

Mary Nell and I did not have the money for both of us to go to the Philippines. However, even though it would dou­ble the cost, I felt strongly we both were to go. After a time of prayer and wait­ing, we received con­fir­ma­tion from the Lord that Mary Nell was to go with me. I then prayed that we would receive the money for the trip, and we both made plans to go. Not long after that, we received what we needed!

Many times we do not have what we want because we have not asked God for it. James, the brother of Jesus and the leader of the church in Jerusalem wrote, “You do not have, because you do not ask” (James 4:2 ESV).

Using a para­ble, Jesus taught His dis­ci­ples to ask (Luke 11:9–10):

“A man had unex­pected com­pany arrive at a late hour and found him­self short on food to serve his guest. The host ran to his friend’s house, knocked on the door, and boldly requested to bor­row pro­vi­sion. The friend had already gone to bed and refused to get up and grant the request. However, because his friend kept both­er­ing him (con­tin­ued to ask), he got out of bed and gave him what he wanted.”

The point Jesus is mak­ing is that if an earthly friend responds to bold per­sis­tence, “how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask Him” (Matthew 7:11)! The theme of Jesus’ teach­ing in Luke 11 is per­sis­tence and bold­ness in ask­ing.

Not long ago I was pray­ing about our plans for the next month. It was obvi­ous we would need more money if we were going to do what we had planned. I asked the Lord for an increase in funds. A fig­ure came to my mind.  Although it was much more than what we usu­ally receive, I asked God to give us that amount. I don’t always feel the faith I felt that day, but this time I knew I would receive what I had requested.

For the next sev­eral weeks I con­tin­ued to pray and thank God for the money I needed. At the end of the month that amount came in, and more. I must add, it did not just fall out of the sky, nor did we send out a plea for extra money. We had asked God in pri­vate, and He used our faith­ful part­ners in this min­istry to sup­ply what we needed.  I am very thank­ful for them.

I want to encour­age you, “Don’t limit God!” If you think God wants you to do some­thing but you do not have the money, ask God for it. He stands ready and will­ing to help you with what­ever you ask.