Dec. 11, 2016 Afternoon Service Beatitudes Part 22 by Pastor Josh Sheldon

Matthew 7:7-11 and the Golden Staircase of Prayer

Now we're in chapter 7, 7 -11 as I said, and it seems that we have, if we follow the sequence in power, perhaps five messages after this one. And just so you know where we may be going, because in the afternoon we have been going with expositional lessons through a portion of the Bible, as we almost always do in our preaching generally.

I'm considering, and this is just for your knowledge so you know where we probably are going next, after we finish chapter 7 and finish the Sermon on the Mount, I'm very strongly considering going in the same style, expositionally, section by section through the book of Hosea for us.

So, just to put you on notice that we have a plan and that's most likely where we will go next after we finish this in a little bit more than a month, it would seem. Let me read to you the whole passage and then I will read it again as we bite off little chunks of this and go through this this afternoon.

The Lord Jesus Christ says, The one who asks, receives, and the one who seeks, finds. And to the one who knocks, it will be opened. Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone?

Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father, who is in heaven, give good things to those who ask him?

You know, Romans chapter 8, verses 29 to 30, Those whom he called, those whom he predestined he called, those whom he called he glorified, and so forth. That's often called the golden chain of salvation or redemption or a title in that same vein.

The golden something of something, however you look at it. I've heard it called the golden chain of salvation. Which I think is a good term, even if it's not found in the Bible. It's a good description of what the Apostle Paul is there saying.

And it kind of locks it in our mind and it gives us cause to memorize it. And something so we can talk to each other and say, Hey, you know that golden chain? Yes, it was very encouraging to me to remember the way God goes from calling to actually saving someone.

Well, this afternoon, I want us to see more gold in God's word. And there is for us in Matthew 7, verses 7 through 11, what this morning I'm calling a golden staircase. Now, if we can look at Paul's writing in Romans 8, 29, 30, he said that's the golden chain.

Well, since God didn't call it that, I think I have some license to name this something that might lock it in our minds. It might give us a memory for what Jesus says here. Matthew 7, 7 through 11, we have a golden staircase, which if we climb is going to lead us to good gifts showered down by a good God upon those who believe in his son Jesus.

So our Lord Jesus, he continues his sermon on the mount and he's now beckoning us to do something. He's now telling us that there is something that is worth all the effort. And make no mistake, following the precepts of the sermon on the mount requires effort.

We cannot do it except in the power of the Holy Spirit. We know this. And yet God works both ways. Even like this morning, we talked about the conception of these two men, John the Baptist and Jesus Christ.

A divine act of God miraculously overcoming the normal course of natural events, of nature, if you will. And yet, in that miraculous intervention, that suspension of the laws of nature, using human means to accomplish his will.

It's much like that as we look at this sermon on the mount. We need to think about this as we begin to close this. That it's a divine act that we're able to obey what Jesus says here. We need the power of the Holy Spirit to miraculously overcome our nature.

To set aside the law of nature, if you will, and make us by his divine power able and willing to obey this. And yet, understanding it to be a miracle of God's grace that we even want to understand this and do as Jesus says.

Keeping that in mind, it is still a responsibility to put great effort from our own personal spiritual strength into obeying what Jesus says here. And here Jesus does just that. He would have us climb what I'm calling this golden staircase to receive from God what we need in order to fulfill his will and lead lives that are well-pleasing to him.

For God to make us able to do it, but for us to do it, what God makes us able to do. Works both ways. This afternoon, the message will be in two fairly simple parts. First is Matthew 7, 7 -8, where we hear from Jesus the necessity to continually look to God to dispense to us what we need to obey him.

We look to God to continually give us all we need in order to follow what the Lord Jesus Christ would have us to do. And then in verses 9 -11, we're going to cement our resolve in the nature of the God whose help we plead for.

We're going to look at how we approach God, what it is we need to do in order to come to God, this continual act on our part. And then we're going to reinforce ourselves in this by looking at the God and the nature of the God who dispenses these good gifts and gives us what we need to meet our need here.

The text is Matthew 7, 7 -11, two parts. Verses 7 -9 is the golden staircase. Verses 9 -11, our motive to continue on it. And just before we unpack these verses, I think it behooves us to see where this fits into what just came prior in this Sermon on the Mount.

There's a lot of commentators I read who, a bit surprisingly to me, they see that there's no connection between these verses and any, much less all, that came before. They think Jesus has just made this abrupt shift and when he says, ask and it will be given to you, it has no relationship to do not give to dogs what is holy or judge not that you be not judged or therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you eat or what you wear, and backwards through the whole message.

I do not hold this view. I don't say that with any pomposity or arrogance at all. I don't have anything against the commentators who think Jesus is making an abrupt shift so that he can bring the Sermon to a close.

I just don't hold to the view that these verses are disconnected from what came before. This entire Sermon has been well-reasoned as though we'd expect any less from any biblical preacher, much less Jesus Christ, and it's been logically connected, the one section to the one that follows.

And what came before, everything that came before where we're at now has to drive us to God for who is sufficient for these things? Not me, not you. We need to ask, we need to seek, we need to knock, we need to continually go to God and find him to be the one who is sufficient and he and he alone the one who can make us able.

Jesus has just insisted that we divest ourselves of, for example, judgmental, sanctimonious spirits in our dealings with brothers and sisters in the Lord. It will not do that we have any motive towards one another other than the glory of God and the good of the one who now has our attention.

If we presume to point out anyone's sin without first recognizing and dealing with our own, we're disqualified. That's what we spoke about last week. If our spirit towards the other person is not one of gentleness, we have undone any hope of God's pleasure on our doings.

Yet with all that, the necessity of seeing each other's faults and doing something about them, we have before us a duty that Jesus allows no one in the church to shirk. So who is sufficient for this? Who is sufficient for these things?

None of us. Not in our own strength. So the great cry of the Reformation was, ad fontes, back to the sources, back to the scripture. Let us see what God says. Let us see what God has revealed to himself and what he supplies to us in order to do this.

Ask, Seek, Knock as the Golden Staircase

So first, the golden staircase. Ask, seek, knock. This three-step progression of coming to God. A golden staircase from this level that we're at to the throne of grace where we are assured to gain what we need.

He says, ask, seek, knock. Each given in the imperative voice, the voice of command, and then followed by success. Ask, he says, and you receive. Seek, and you find. Knock, and it is opened. And we'll look at what each of these activities entails.

Ask, he says, first one is ask. The first thing we observe is that asking is in and of itself the act of a supplicant. It's one who asks because what he requests is something he cannot himself achieve.

We ask God to give what we don't have in ourselves. It is the first descriptor used, really, this demeanor of asking and what it requires in us to be one who even feels the need to ask. It's the first descriptor of kingdom subjects.

Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. Blessed are those who see their need, who see their lack of resource, who see their inability, who see the poorness of their spirit before Almighty God for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

To ask is an implicit confession that I, the inferior, have approached a benefactor who is my superior. Asking is of itself requiring a humble attitude because asking says I need that which I do not have.

He says to seek. Seeking. Hendrickson says that seeking is acting plus, excuse me, it's asking plus acting. When we seek, it is the act, the asking, the request, plus acting upon it. And here the context is our proper approach to a brother or sister with that speck which we noticed and so we are duty bound to remove it.

That's the context. That's the immediate flow of Jesus' thought. So we ask God for what? Again, in the immediate thought process that we're going through in this sermon, we're asking God to qualify us for a holy task.

And then we seek. We seek by looking to God's word to find out who and what we must be before we move on. Before we move on, before we go and do this removal of this tiny little thing for their good. Seek.

Seek God's will. Seek from God that spirit within that then would make the whole transaction pleasing to God. Psalm 51 .10 among others. Psalm 51 .10 I think helps us. It's both a mirror and a prayer for us before we do this.

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a right spirit within me. Can we think of a better entrance into acknowledging and then removing our own log? As Jesus said just a moment before in this sermon, give me a clean heart.

I don't have this person in view anymore. Give me a clean heart. Give me a right spirit. Give me the demeanor and the inward attitude so that when I go to this person I will be believed. I will be trusted.

They will see in me the integrity of my heart before God and you, God, will receive all the glory. There's our prayer right there in Psalm 51. Create in me the clean heart that I need. O God, renew in me that right spirit which would then lead to success in the speck, in the log.

Success for God's name. Success for His glory so that only He receives the praise. And Jeremiah says famously those who seek God with all their heart will find them. You will seek me and you will find me when you seek me with all your heart.

Jesus attaches no less of a promise here. As Lord willing we will see. Asking is a confession of need and of our hearts desire to please God. Seeking is the earnest effort to mold ourselves into a cast modeled by God in His word.

So we have ask, we have seek, we have knocking. Knocking is the other two activities as we climb this staircase but here is demanded a more intense determination. Knocking implies of course a door. That's fairly simple.

Knocking implies a door. And if we must knock then it's clear that we cannot from where we stand open the door ourselves. It needs to be open for us. Perhaps we can't reach the handle. Perhaps we don't have the key.

However you want to picture it in your mind is fine and it works perfectly with Jesus' metaphor here as long as you have to knock on that door and accept the one on the other side of the door by grace opens the door.

The door cannot open. So picture it however you will. As long as you're incapable of opening the door and only by grace shall it be opened to you. All continue. Ask, seek, knock. All continue. All commanded.

One piled on top of the other. None left as our sole means of grace. All three intensively employed in a spirit of humble dependence upon God. Might ask, have you received from the Lord's hand the promises of His word?

Do you yourself personally know that God keeps His word to you? He keeps His word to nations. He keeps His word to churches. Invisible, invisible. The whole body of God's word. He keeps it all. Do you know personally from God to you the individual that God keeps His word?

I expand this beyond the borders of specks in the eye. What promise has God made of which you have had or now have great need of and yet you have been left devoid of fulfillment up to now? What promise can you see in God's word that applies to you this moment?

Something you've been praying for for a day a week, a month, a year, a decade and yet have not yet seen God bless you with a fulfillment a provision of that need. Have been bereft of strength. Unable to exhibit that spirit that receives an audience and is allowed to come near enough to remove a speck, whatever the case is.

Before we lay the fault at God's door we need to examine ourselves. So we'd say brother, sister have you even asked? Are you on the first step of what I'm calling this golden staircase? Have you even asked God in a spirit of dependent humility have you bent the knee and sought out the Lord?

I mean and if you have how long have those prayers gone on? I myself am guilty of praying a few times here and there remembering it and soon it wanes and I forget and then I try to find my own solutions to things I give up on the praying so quickly.

Maybe I only pray a few dozen times maybe three or four, maybe once wake up the next morning say okay I guess it's time for me to act terribly wrong headed I mean how would I how would you compare with John Knox's cry?

Do you remember this? Praying to God we could see him on his knees with his hands clenched trembling with intensity and he said give me Scotland or I die. I can't imagine but he said over and over again and it came from his spirit wanting his country, his fellow countrymen to be saved.

I mean do we do this? Do we seek the Lord? He promises to be found but there's a qualifier he's found by whom? Those who seek him those who seek him we know elsewhere that God's word says as Paul quotes Isaiah I have been found by those who did not seek me.

I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me but the context here are different. Paul and Isaiah were speaking of God's sovereignty and his design of salvation. Jesus here in the Sermon on the Mount he's speaking directly to the church to the redeemed of the Lord he speaks to we who with no seeking on our part were found out by the Lord we are the ones who he tells now to seek God sought us out even as Jesus says in the parables where he leaves the 99 and seeks out the one who's wandered off God sought us out and now we are told seek God not for salvation that's assumed here.

Seek God for help now, this day, this moment next year, next decade do not stop asking and seeking and knocking to God so ask and seek and then what do we do? We come to this door picture your inability to open the door any way you want as long as you can't open the door what do we do?

We pound on the door are we knocking? No, we're pounding on it. We're clenching our fist we're hammering that door. We think of Solomon's throne made of ivory and covered with gold. It must have been a magnificent sight but you know it led to a place less gorgeous than the three steps I'm describing this morning.

Jesus gives us this golden staircase that comes to this door and we've prayed to God, we've sought out his will and we say now give me what I ask give me Scotland or die, give me my husband, give me my wife give me my son or I die give me the strength to go to this person in a spirit of humility and help them with that speck.

Give me Father what I need. I insist, I demand and this door is going to shake with my pounding until it opens. It's the importunate window in Luke 18. I will not leave unsatisfied it is God's glory I want to magnify by doing good for one of his blood bought children open or be ready for my persistence to tire you until if justice silence me this door will swing open.

Do you see how it intensifies as we ascend and get to this point verse 8 virtually repeats the previous verse. For everyone who asks receives. Everyone who knocks everyone who seeks finds and to the one who knocks it will be opened it was Jesus saying nothing except that the answer, the provision is commensurate with the request or the need if we ask in humble faith we receive if we seek with diligence we find our desire if we knock the door to heaven will surely open and then from that we know that God in that provides to us whatever we need.

It's a golden staircase that leads to the riches of God's grace and his help in our time of need. So do we have a motive? Do we have a foundation? How do we keep ourselves continuing on this? Not just asking once but asking over and over and over until we can get to the next level and seek God's when we keep seeking and knocking over and again a continual activity.

How do we keep ourselves going? That's what Jesus exactly what Jesus does next in the next three verses 9 through 11. Not any reliance on our efforts. We expend effort but the basis for our perseverance the hope that we have is not in the strength of our pounding or the amount of noise that we make or anything like that but in the nature of the God whose help we need.

Our reliance is not in us but in God and his goodness and who and what he is. So Jesus' argument here is really very simple going from the lesser to the greater. The lesser which is us to the greater who is of course God and in a nutshell he's saying if you being evil though he doesn't mean evil in the condemnatory sense he means compared to God our motive, our subsequent actions are always tinted and there is necessarily simply by our nature some admixture of dross in all that we do none of which is present in God.

That's what he means when he says you're evil. If even we would not turn away our children empty or with things harmful substituted for things needful. If even we would do this how much more would God give good gifts to his children?

And in Luke, Jesus even adds Luke adds to Jesus' statement how much more will God give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him and I think the two here work together very well because what do we need? Who do we need?

In order to fulfill what Jesus is saying in the Sermon on the Mount up to this point. Nothing less than the Holy Spirit of God to strengthen us every step of the way. And we think of this door pounding on it and it put me in mind of the Wizard of Oz.

Do you remember when Dorothy and the Tin Man and the Lion and the Scarecrow and they finally get to the Emerald City and the door opens and there's a guard there and he doesn't want to open the door and I can't remember the whole senior quota for you but remember they finally after much cajoling and finally said do you know who she is and look at these red slippers and all these things they finally open the door and then after getting all cleaned up and her hair done and the stuffing stuffed back into the Scarecrow and they're all presentable they go to the door that leads to the hallway that leads to the room where the Wizard is but the Wizard is busy and that guard will not open the door until of course he sees Dorothy crying.

Our persistence I think is often no better than Dorothy's who assumed the door wouldn't open. She sat down on the steps weeping. We ask, we see no immediate result. We sit down with her and just cry over our poor fortune.

Maybe we'll go one more step we seek but we don't immediately find a scripture that gives us comfort or hope or strength and we fall down and we bewail our poor fortune and give up and then we say knock.

Knocking this third step in this staircase we can't even speak of pounding down the door of heaven if we can't ascend those first two steps. But Jesus didn't give us this portion of scripture to depress us or to make us despair of ever having from God our needed benefit.

I only digress for a moment to encourage us to take Christ at his word. We serve a good God. A good God who more than any of us could ever begin to do gives good gifts to those who ask them. He's not the stern guard at the Emerald City.

He's not the too busy Wizard. And once Dorothy saw the Wizard you may recall when they saw him for the first time he scared the wits out of them and that intentionally. Of course we come to the Lord in the name of our Savior Jesus Christ and because we come to him in Jesus name in faith in him we know that we're accepted in the beloved because of the beloved.

So my analogy to the Wizard of Oz and those doors falls apart pretty quickly. There's barely just a picture to put us in mind that we need to persevere at this. So where are we? I leave us with this. I leave us with the analogy of faith where scripture interprets scripture or reinforces scripture as we need.

Hebrews 4 .16 I think is a corresponding text is one of our favorites. Let us then with confidence draw near to the throne of grace that we may receive mercy and find grace to help in time of need. We draw near with confidence which corresponds to what he says a few chapters later without faith it is impossible to please him for whoever would draw near to God must believe that he exists and that he rewards those who seek him.

What leads us there? What leads us to that door? It's this golden staircase. Ask and it will be given. Seek and you will find. Knock and it will be open to you. And within those doors what do we find?

We find a king on his throne ready to dispense what we need because we approach him in humble acknowledgement of our need having turned to the scripture and asking God to create that spirit within us that does things the way he would have us to do.

And still needing his help we fall down before that throne which we approach with confidence. We boldly approach this throne and there find help in time of need which I think is exactly what Jesus is telling us here.

Ready to give us because he's a good God. He's a good father and he wishes to be glorified and he wishes to see us do those things which bring more glory to his name. Amen?