Getting ME Out of the Way

Matthew 7:7-8 Ask. and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; he who seeks finds; and to him who knocks, the door will be opened.

In the Christian world we like to quote this scripture from Matthew often. I think it is a beautiful verse encouraging people to pray. Sadly, there are those that believe it is guarantee that God will give you anything you want, rendering it more like a child’s wish list for Santa - seeking His hand of giving, rather than words to bolster faith and seeking His face.

Oh, yes, we do have the confidence that our God is ready, willing and able to meet our needs and longs to give us the desires of our hearts. Scripture says so:

Psalm 37:3-5 Trust in the Lord and do good; dwell in the land and cultivate faithfulness. Delight yourself in the Lord; and He will give you the desires of your heart. Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He will do it.

This passage in Psalms is loaded with action verbs and you know how I love those action verbs! God will faithfully do His part and we are to Trust in the Lord…Do good…Dwell in the land…cultivate faithfulness…Delight yourself in the Lord…Commit your ways to the Lord…Trust also in Him. Then my friends, notice the biggest word in the verses…AND. Once we are trusting, doing, dwelling, cultivating, delighting all in the Lord and He will give you the desires of your heart. When we have committed our ways to the Lord, trusting in Him and He will do it.

We cannot make out our ‘wish list’ of what we want to see God to do in our lives and sit back and wait. We cannot walk out our carnal desires and expect God to rain down blessings on us. We can’t live and act like heathens all week and then approach the alter on Sunday with a To-Do list for God.

1 John 5:14-15 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us-whatever we ask-we know that we have what we asked of him.

Notice: if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. There it is…bold type, red, and underlined. He hears us when we ask according to His will. Our prayers and our lives and our request must all line up with His will. HIS will, not yours or mine…HIS will. We can play mind games with ourselves and others and pull scripture out of context and quote it till the cows come home, makes no difference if we are not in line with the Will of GOD.

And there, my friends, is where we have to step aside, lay down our free will, and give ourselves unconditionally to His will. We have to be willing to step aside of what we desire for our lives and commit to His will for us. His desires for our lives is far better than anything we could come up with anyway when we desire what He wants for us. Here I sit, committed to getting ME out of His way…that is my prayer and it is one I know He will hear.