Ask - Seek - Knock — John Follette

Prayer for the Needy World

Day, and as we venture out upon who commit our hearts and lives to Thee, and we ask that Thou be pleased once more to meet with us, and again bring the bread of life to us. We rejoice in these blessings that we've been considering concerning Thy Son, our lovely Lord.

And we praise and thank Thee that Thou hast invited us to eat and share in the fellowship with Him, for our fellowship is with the Father and the Son. And so continue with us again this day to make the things of Calvary real to us.

We pray that while we are secluded away in this quiet place for refreshment and strength and meditation and more perfect spiritual adjustments to Thee, that Thou wilt move out over this great needy world that is always with us.

We're conscious of it. We're not a part of it. We're free from it. However, Lord, we are yet linked with it. And we pray that today Thy grace shall move out once more. Let the compassion of the loving heart of Jesus Christ, let that compassion move once more.

For the world is in such need of chaotic, confused, crazed ambitions. It's wretched, Lord. And here are the great masses of humanity broken down, restless, full of sin and wickedness and wretchedness.

O dear Lord, we pray that today by the power of Thy Spirit Thou wilt be able to penetrate through. And wherever there is a heart of all yearning or looking or discouraged or desiring, we pray Thee to meet it.

Bless today all the workers, all of those who bear the good tidings and the glad news. We pray Thee to bless them. Bless every evangelist, every teacher, every preacher, every missionary. It doesn't matter in what denomination or group they may move, if they are only the ambassadors of the Lord Jesus.

If only they are in line with Thee and take the good news, we pray Thee that Thou wilt bless them and encourage them in their work and grant that they shall be able to touch many hearts even today. And while we pray and commit these things to Thee, bringing them before Thee, Thou art able to set in motion a whole chain of circumstances which perhaps would not be released if we didn't pray.

Teach us how to pray. Show us how to pray. Keep us in touch with Thee that we shall be able to pray along the lines of concern. Not so much the things that merely interest us, that keep us tied in our little egocentric patterns of life, but help us, Lord, to be moved along with Thee that the Spirit of God can give us the fellowship that's in Thy heart, a fellowship with Thee.

And so we pray in Jesus' name to brood out over the world. We pray for all those in authority. Give them wisdom. Give them great courage to stand by any conviction which you may rest upon. They need courage.

They need faith. They need strength. And we hold them up. They are rulers whom Thou hast arranged to be used in the patterns of these grave problems and the working out of Thy purposes and Thy schemes.

And so what little we can do, we want Thee to know our hearts are with Thee, our desires are with Thee. We choose that Thy will shall be wrought. Now we pray, Lord, for all those who are of the household of faith.

They are members of this mystical body of Christ. They are incorporated in this strange, wonderful group who have found the Lord. They have found a fellowship with Him. They are members. They are only little tiny cells in the grave body.

But let life and strength from the living head of victorious Christ. Let that life flow today silently. Some may not know how or why, but let it move. Let it move down to the weakest members. Let it move down to the tired ones, to the feeble ones, to the babes in Christ.

Those who have been brought into some of the initial relationships with Thee, bless them and strengthen and encourage them. Now we pray, Lord, for our own little group here this morning. Our hearts are all needy.

They have peculiar individual needs. But Thou art able to minister to each one because You know them. We don't know our own hearts and lives. We don't know sufficiently how to pray that we can open our hearts and lives to Thee.

So we ask You that during this day, Thou will minister to us in any way which is good, any way which You find is able to reach us, we pray, to minister to us. And in the end, we want our hearts and lives to reflect Thee, to give Thee back the thanks, the praise, the worship, the love, the adoration, the devotion that we would like to bring.

Receive us, therefore, in Jesus' name. Hear us in Jesus' name. And work in us for Jesus' glory, we ask it. It's wonderful to have this sweet, quiet atmosphere. You know, we're almost unconscious of the fact that there's a world outside.

We get rather spoiled here. We forget that there's a great world of confusion, turmoil, distress, and restlessness. That's all very present. And while we're in peace and joy here, there is intense suffering, disappointment, heartache.

I suppose some of our boys will probably be killed today. The Lord has led me sometimes in the morning hours when I pray. This is rather personal. But He's led me to pray that, Lord, today, some of these spirits will have to be taken up from their bodies.

They'll have to go. And He's helped me to pray for them, to pray for their release, pray that they shall have some kind of an adjustment with Him. Sometimes we've got to pray for them. And so, very often, He lets me pray in the morning for just those who are going to suffer.

I don't pray for so many, but He makes me go to the hospital. And I'll go all through the hospital in my spirit, and I put my hands out over them and pray for them. We are not tied to these bodies, you know.

We think we are, but I don't think we're to be too tied to them. I like the idea that I can move away from them. And so I feel that we can go into this community to help to prepare them for their release.

So we have a good time here, and I'm enjoying it. The Lord's refreshing me in it. But at the same time, I'm mindful of the little lad in the corner in the dark. We will rejoice in what He's giving us, and at the same time, be concerned.

Concerned for the other groups. They're all different groups. God can work to move where we couldn't possibly go. We can go by His Spirit. We can move out of His Spirit. This morning, I'm getting a little scared.

Ask, Seek, and Knock as the Pattern of Prayer

I haven't given you the Scripture verses that I promised you for two days. And before it slips my mind, I want to give you the Scripture references for a night before last night's talk on prayer. Do you remember?

I gave you the Scripture verses which I would use in connection with the prayer topic, Ask, Seek, and Knock. And I was showing you that is the general overall pattern for our prayer life. It's the overall pattern.

All that we have pertaining to our prayer life will be included in it. It is inclusive. It may have a hundred ramifications and modifications and enlargements, but it all falls within the concept of the prayer, of asking the prayers, of seeking the prayers, and knocking.

I have some references. You can multiply them. You can use them as you please. These are the references which I have found in my study. And I'll pass them along, but you can use more of them. Always free to feel that when I teach and give you the lessons and the truth, I have no corner on the truth.

I'm giving you what has come to me in my study and in my meditation and in my communion. Yours, you have a right to yours totally. So I only share with you. I don't want you to feel this is dogmatic. Thus, that's prayer.

That would be a very dreadful thing to do. I don't like you to do that. And I don't want you to believe or teach or disseminate truth just because I've said it. I want it to become a part of you, so that out of the authority of your own heart and life, you know the meaning of it.

Now, that doesn't mean it is exhaustive. It means we have tasted of that truth, and we know in essence its reality and its power, although not all that it could do for us. We can teach many things which are quite beyond us in actual experience, but we teach it from the authority of what?

Of the fact that it is of the Lord. That I call the subjective aspect of the truth, which is always right and correct. That's truly a subjective statement of the fact. And since God has given it, we have a right to teach it.

But more than that, it has to become objective in actual living. And that is done by Spirit and by our faith, by the operation of the Holy Spirit, by the operation of our faith. We can reach up our hands of receptivity to that lovely truth as it stands before us, and it is the truth.

But you see, this isn't ours yet. It has to become ours as we possess it. It is ours in the statement, here it is. But it is only ours as we personalize it. And when we personalize that truth, then we have it.

So I'd like you to teach, and I'd like you to give the word out. I want you to rejoice in that. I want you to be satisfied with it. I want it to minister to you, because it has been personalized in your life, in your own being.

Then it's yours. Now, that is the way with truth. I've said it before, it seems a strange statement, but here's a glorious fact, a statement of God. Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world. Well, that's a glorious statement, a beautiful statement.

That's eternally settled in the heavens. That's an eternal truth. Well, now we can stand before that and say, Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world, and believe it. But you see, that has not become an objective reality to us, because it is not personalized.

By faith, we have to say that Jesus Christ, who is the Savior of the world, has become a Savior of me, because I am a part of the world, and my little part has received what that truth says. Not Jesus Christ is the Savior.

Jesus Christ is my personal Savior, because by faith I have been able to personalize the truth, which is there in its broad statement. Now, the devil could stand right by me, and he could also say, Jesus Christ is the Savior of the world, couldn't he?

I know he could say that. Does that do him any good? No, that's what's the matter with him. He knows that, you see. He knows that. And he can say it because it is a fact. He can say that. But you see, it reveals nothing, because it is a bare statement of truth.

It's like the letter of the word. But all truth has to come down into our being, and by the operation of the Spirit and faith and subjection to it, let it bring all of its reactions that are necessary in us.

And I've said truth is the most terrifying thing you'll ever get to handle. The most terrifying thing that ever struck me was the truth, because it did all this devastating work in me, in order to release me and then bless me.

Then when that comes, then I can say that's enough. The husbandman must be first to partake. And so, because that is a reality in life, it gives you a sense of authority, not because it's yours, but because it's God's truth in you.

So, these lessons now about prayer, those are broad statements of truth. And when Jesus was teaching, he gave that pattern of prayer from its breadth, merely a broad scope. He never exhausted all that could be crammed into that at all.

But he says, here is a flash of truth for you. Here is a little light concerning your prayer life. And those statements, ask and seek and knock, were the general overhaul. Now, in there. So, elaborate upon them as God gives you time for your meditation, because the meditative power.

And you can make, well, not only outlines of 1, 2, 3, 4, but 1A and then 1A in parenthesis, B. You can just work that all the way down until you have a real system that always remembers it's all under the one item.

It's all under the one item. Now, concerning this, the prayer, he said, ask. I told you that the asking was the elementary level. That's the first level. Matthew 7, 7 and 8. The simplest and easiest form of your prayer life.

That's included in ask. And here are some texts to put under that. Matthew 7, 7. Matthew 18, 19. Matthew 21, 22. John 14, 13. John 15, 7. John 16, 24. Ephesians 3, 20. James 1, 5. James 4, 2. 1 John 3, 22.

And now you can add as many more as you want. I made that selection because in that selection of verses, we have ample provision for us, as we've said, to bring us into salvation, carry us through, and land us in glory.

All because every one of those verses were based upon the idea of the gift. Ask and you shall receive. You receive a gift. You don't seek for a gift. You don't seek for it. You don't knock for it. You receive it.

Because Christ is openly manifest to give it to you. That's that. That's the provision. So I've selected these scriptures. You can add to them. I selected these because they cover the general needs of the life.

Salvation is a gift. The baptism of the Spirit, that's a gift. Healing is a gift. Wisdom to direct, that's a gift. All those things that pertain to our welfare, while we're here, that's all on the gift level in response merely to the asking and the receiving.

Because we can't merit it. We can't earn it. We can't do a thing to get it. But then as I developed it the other night, he didn't leave you there. He said ask. That was lovely. But then he said seek and you shall find because now he's bringing us into another phase of it where the result, you shall find, the finding, the discovery does not depend upon asking.

But the finding and the discovery depends upon a seeking attitude of the heart. These are all attitudes. The seeking is the attitude of your heart. Now don't get into bondage and think that the words ask and seek have to be in your mouth.

Do you get me or don't you get me? He's not saying the thing you have to say. I'm asking this Lord. Now I'm not seeking. I'm asking. Don't be silly. That's fanatical. The asking, the seeking, the knocking are the attitudes of your heart.

I don't care what language you use. Neither does he. How many know you can seek without saying anything at all? Well of course. Get it past your technicalities like that. Well now Brother Paulette, I don't know how to pray now since you've talked.

I don't know whether I should ask the Lord or speak to the Lord. Whether I should say Lord, I'm seeking you. Don't be silly or I won't talk to you. I just can't talk to you if you're going to get funny like that.

I just can't talk to people like that. I want you to know these are words which he uses to express the general attitude of your heart as it moves to God. There are things which he will give us because the attitude is that of reception because it's only asking.

Now ask for the thing which is already provided and I will give it. But he just doesn't come down and throw more at us. He doesn't come down and just throw everything at us. No he doesn't. He says here it is.

The ample provision in Christ. Ask and I'll give it. That is you shall receive. You receive the gift. I give. Give means give. But now he says I'll give you some other scripture verses too by way of promise.

They're beautiful promises but they don't have any asking in them and they don't have the asking attitude. They have the seeking attitude. And whenever he uses the word seek the very meaning of the word I'll give the different variations of the meaning of the word seek from its Greek formation.

The Greek casting of that word. He didn't have to use the word seek if he didn't want to but he wanted to use the word seek. He doesn't use this as repetition for emphasis. He doesn't say ask and seek and knock and that's all emphasis upon the fact it's all prayer anyway.

No he doesn't. It is prayer. But there are things you see we receive from him that we can't ask for. They come as the result of the seeking attitude and the seeking process. Whenever he says seek that means difficulty.

That means something that entails on my part some kind of a cooperation which causes me an inconvenience. I have to do something in order to get the thing that I discover. That is you hunt for it. Now seek for it.

Don't come and say oh give it to me. He can. He can. Because the seeking has a reaction in you which will build a receptivity. All the while you're seeking you are exercising a quality of faith a quality of expectancy a quality which makes it possible that when you strike that thing how many know you you'll say oh I found it.

Of course. You don't ask and then you found it. You ask and then you receive it. But when you seek you found it. And so in the word seek as used in the scripture these are the meanings which you will find in the scripture in various places.

To seek. Go in search of. It means an activity on your part and going out. You're moving. You don't sit still. No. It's your whole being taking now an attitude toward God in quest. In quest. In quest.

You search it out. You seek it out. That's your attitude. To try to find is another meaning and you'll find that used. To try to find. To inquire for. To solicit. To beseech. To try to gain. To aim at.

Seeking Hidden Wisdom and Revelation

Those are all phrases or shadow shadow lights side lights but it all comes from that same word. Now with that you might use as your caption over the little study I used to say a verse or two over asking.

Well now over asking I would use the verses such as Jesus Christ was manifest to bring or to give. How many see the openness of that? He was made manifest. It was open. It was free wonderful disclosure.

And salvation and all those things are openly manifest. They're preached. They're given to you. They're paraded. They're put on track. They do every possible way to bring it to your to your consciousness.

That's beautiful. All right. Use the word then if you want it for that asking. I put 1 John 1, 2 1 John 3, 5 1 John 4, 9 all of those. I'll read them again. 1 John 1, 2 1 John 3, 5 1 John 4, 9. Now all of them carry the same idea that the work of Christ was not a secret mystical thing.

It was an open glorious display of God to the whole universe. It was to the heavenlies. It was to God. It was to broken humanity. It was to the devil. It was openly glorious, beautiful, wonderful triumph of God in the gift of his son and the working out of salvation.

Now all that we have in that realm is openly manifest through the word the crucifixion the manifestation of the Christ. But now when we come to this of seeking I would use as a choice word to characterize that Colossians 2, 3 in whom I am in this is interior I am in whom are his they're not disclosed they're not open but treasures that means a valuable thing in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge and so forth and so on.

Colossians 2, 3. Now that is to preface your attitude now moving to God because what you're going to get through seeking is not openly disclosed. You have to exercise faith study openness patience surrender all those things you keep doing that that's the preparation in your seeking and as we do that that brings again a reaction in us that when we have come to those places it makes a discovery or a finding and by doing that I have found how many times God has permitted the most difficult thing to come like a darkness that we have to hunt our way through find our way through.

But in the end it has brought light it's brought a revelation it's brought a consciousness of God. It's brought a new contact with it. Well that is. Well doesn't he want to make himself known. Surely nothing delights the Lord more in this world I think than to reveal himself to us.

He loves to reveal himself. But he has methods of revelation. He has methods. He will bring you and me into difficult places into the dark places. He'll do all kinds of things in his permissive will because it's a part of our school.

What? To torment us? To punish us? To make us unhappy? To tease us? Oh how silly people who have those attitudes don't know anything about God. They certainly don't. He does it because he loves us. Well he loves you.

So he puts you in the dark. Well I am a God like that. Hallelujah. I am a very sweet Jesus. Well these people have such a lovely sweet Jesus who never does anything. I think they got a funny kind of a Jesus.

I have a Jesus who dares to do things with us. But somehow I have one who dares. Have you ever noticed how very daring he is. How many of you have had this experience. That after the thing is all over.

You wonder how in heaven you ever got in and went through it. Did you ever have that? Well sure. Well he knew that all the time. But after we say oh I found something. Well you found something that you would never have had in the world.

Well I was never never in the world. But that was the meaning in that seeking. In all of that you have made it possible for the revelation to dawn for the thing that the Lord wanted to bring to make it possible.

Now here are your scripture verses that are good to help you in your study. Use these as study. Meditate upon them. That one in the 27th Psalm. One thing have I desired of the Lord. That I will ask him about that he will give it to me.

No version got that. Even the revised version hasn't got that. One thing have I desired of the Lord. Desire is basic. You have your desire first. That is first. One thing have I desired of the Lord. Desire in your life is paramount.

Even your desires are only released by will your desires rise up and say let me out. I desire let me out let me out. How many know every desire is released by will. That's a bad business. That you might as well take desire is after all.

That's the paramount thing. How many know we are all moved all the time by the continual urge. All these urges that pulsate through us the basic desires of life they are desires. That's alright. That's the way we are made.

Now don't quarrel with it and fight with it and have a bad fit. That's the way it is. We'll be done with it. Alright. What's going to govern that that little thing you call my power to choose to will.

I can say yes. Come out. I say no. You can't. If I let you out you will wreck the whole thing. Why did we get made that way now don't go back to that. He purposely has made it that way for our development.

Well wouldn't it have been lovely if there had been just a lot of sweet angels sitting around here for a long time. Then we'd be in heaven. No that would have been a silly thing. No that's necessary. So one thing have I desired of the Lord.

How did you get that. Because he has reduced all your other desires in life. Legitimate artificial poor ones good ones bad ones. Because we are driven by the desire. The urge to out extroversion the urge to out through any kind of a channel.

All these desires that say this is the way out. Come on move out. Well you can't afford to do that. How many of these things have to be taken care of. And that property channel. You'll get somewhere. So due to a process of elimination subtraction evaluation this man had considered the desires of life.

He considered all the good ones all the poor ones. He said life is made of 10 ,000 428 ,000 desires more or less. And they keep urging pulsating moving. But I found something life does not consist in the satisfaction of all of these but portable exhaustion.

But there must be some reason. And there must be some centralizing. There must be some objective there must be some focusing. And so after due consideration he came to this conclusion that if life is made livable is made.

I like the word meaningful these things have to be reduced and reduced and reduced and reduced and so through a process of reduction. And that is very trying a process of reduction. He has reduced all desire aim ambition all that thirst that hunger that out that that which is God given.

He said bring it down here. Let it be focused. There's a focal point for that it's not to be thrown out and dissipated in 10 ,000 ways. Life doesn't consist of that. He says bring it down to a focal point a meaningful point a correct objective toward which it can move.

And he did that in one lesson. He said one thing have I desired to be a great king. That's on the earth level. One thing have I desired to do a lot of things for the Lord. Now there's your activity. Now don't get agitated.

One thing have I desired of the Lord. And that.

Will I seek after.

It's not something he's just going to throw in my lap. No sir. Because it takes a seeking attitude and heart to realize it. One thing have I desired of the Lord. And it has so captured me it has so activated me it has so intrigued me and charmed me and holds me that all the seeking powers that are in me now by the grace of God and I was made a seeking creature.

Don't ask the Lord forgive you for seeking. You were made to seek. Yet you're seeking where it belongs in God. One thing out of ten thousand I've got it reduced it has become focused. One thing have I desired of the Lord.

That will I seeking drive is God. That's the way we're made now. Don't fight with it and have it eradicated and pulled out and crucified and shot. Let alone the way we're made I'll be still one thing all of this seeking urge of life.

I'll focus it to it. What is it. I mean you know it was a spiritual it had spiritual value that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life. The beauty of the Lord. Well now you see he has wisdom to know that life consisteth not in the abundance of things.

You see that through the process of elimination he's made that discovery. He's found the philosophy of Jesus the lovely teacher. The Christian philosophy of living life consisteth not in the abundance of things.

That's the lower level. That's the material side of life. That is not life. Jesus said so don't be deceived. That is not life. How did you see him teaching it again in the wilderness in our temptation.

He was teaching the same philosophy. And the enemy tempts him from that same angle again all this philosophic tradition. The devil knows that. And what does he say. Change these stones into bread. Now.

That's all materialism. That's the exercise of the life powers the ambitions, the gifts of life to be dissipated upon a material manifestation down here and this ends it. How do you get that make the bread.

You have the power use these gifts. Well he says back to the enemy. Listen. I want to tell you something man now he's not talking now as Jesus the lovely savior of the world. He's talking about the role that he plays as we have in these offerings.

When he talks now he's talking as the burnt offering. The burnt offering is never a sin offering or a Christmas offering. The burnt offering is the offering God gives. Remember that shows him as the perfect man who does the perfect will of God and perfectly glorifies God.

And there's no question of sin and bloodshed. And Calvary and anything in that offering at all. This one the meat and dust doesn't even have blood in it. Thank the Lord. But I'm glad because everything in the atonement has centered on these two offerings.

Usually this one everything in the atoning work of Christ has just settled on one thing. He took my sins away. And I'm happy today. Well if you've got a Calvary that is limited to just that you certainly have never had a vision of Calvary.

It is too horribly limited even in our churches. You limit it down to to that which touches your little life in its circumference. How many of you know out on the periphery of that circumference are vast and marvelous and wonderful things in the atoning work of Christ that we don't catch at all because we don't know anything about them.

That's the burnt offering God's word that God sees. We see the offering here. It's a sin offering in our approach to God. We approach God through this. God comes to us through that. So you see truth's all one anyway.

You see it sticking out in the offering. Then it's up in the wilderness. Then by and by it's in one of his messages. Then you see it in the psalm. You know it's all. It's all one great glorious beautiful package.

Now when he answers it he says man because he becomes the federal head of this new order. And he is playing the part of the perfect man to please and satisfy the heart of God. Before Jesus ever gets to Calvary he has to have this marvelous life to display the first original desire of God which was to see the man.

And so he has to be the lamb without spot and blemish. Therefore when he stands in that place of testing and proving you don't tempt God. You don't. You can't tempt God. Well Jesus Christ is the son of God.

He's God the son. Wait a minute. How do you know who Jesus is? How do you know he's the man Christ Jesus? Yes he has the perfect concept of the man. And the enemy is not tempting God the son. What is he doing?

He is tempting the man Christ Jesus. That's who he's tempting. You can't tempt God. But how do you know you can tempt the man? How do you know humanity can be tested? How do you know sinless perfect beautiful humanity of Adam was tested and tempted?

Sure it was. Well Jesus Christ has to have that long before he comes to Calvary. He has to have the display of that perfected Adam so that he can be called the last Adam. Remember being one like him. It was the first one he failed.

But the last one brings to it full all these lights that God wanted in him. So when he answers him he doesn't say I am the son of God he is. But he didn't say that he said. In this role I'm playing the part of man to show before God to please him and to show to all humanity what God's desire has always been and wanted to be in a man.

Therefore he says the man that God created the ideal concept that God had in creation that was not to live under the power of the material side of life debasing all these lovely potential gifts of man upon this lower order.

Man was not to live by bread alone. Oh somebody says then he should have cake. Oh then I want to faint away. Now people are just as stupid as that. You say Candy. I wish you could hear some of the questions people have asked me that.

I wonder where under heaven they've come from. And they're just as serious. I'd rather poetic man was not to live by bread alone. You see God has provided pie and cake for it too. But now don't smile.

There are people as dumb as that. I've had them to come and talk to me about what I would call spiritual things. And they would be just as dumb as that I say. Well where's your spiritual perception. Have you no opening in God.

Or are you still living in this misconception. For flesh he said man. And he was speaking for the ideal arrangement that God had for man. In the beginning he said when God made man and I'm representing that man was not to live under the power of the material concept in which he was thrust.

But he was to live how united to God with the power of the spirit and live by the light. The truth the revelation which proceeds from him drops down into the man concept and demonstrates perfectly. Do you get it now.

Now you get it. So when he said that that's what he was talking about. Man was never made to live like this in Jesus when he was under. I mean though he kept his concept continually in God. He kept his concept there.

Well wasn't he a man. He ate fish and everything. That's not the question he says. That's the way man is to live. That was the first design. Not by this. This is not by this. He's telling you here one thing of our design.

I have had them reduced that I will make my aim in life. That's my. That's the drive in me has become channeled correctly. And all that I do. Paul says all that you do all that you say whether it be eating or drinking or coming or going whatsoever becomes the little arrangement for your pattern of living.

Let it all be done in order to get to heaven. No you're saved. You're going to heaven now. Let that alone. Let it be done so to redeem the world. No. God's got the world going. Stop getting into his business.

Let it all be done to the glory of God. How do you catch it now. You get that. Well that's that's the objective whatsoever you do. If your little life is cast in the mode of selling neckties sell them.