Today we will consider two scriptural reasons for prayer to help us understand why God has lovingly instructed us to pray.

First, we must come before the Lord in prayer is because the Lord has decreed it. In His wise counsel,God has decreed that it is His pleasure that we should come before Him as a little child.

It is God's good pleasure that we should ask to receive, that we should seek to find, and that we should knock before He opens. This is demonstrating an obedient posture of the heart before God; He wants to see that seeking heart. He wants to look upon a heart that is humbly asking and knocking at His door.

The greatest blessings are promised if we ask to receive, seek to find, and knock for the door to be opened. MAT 18:19 says, "Again I say unto you, That if two of you shall agree on earth as touching any thing that they shall ask, it shall be done for them of my Father which is in heaven."

The Lord has decreed we must ask. He knows what we stand in need of; He could provide it without our asking, but in His decree He has commanded us, saying in His Word, "Ask, and ye shall receive,"JOH 16:24. The negative implication is that if we don't ask, we won't receive.

The Lord is directing us by giving us a command that we must ask. We may not allow Satan to come in our heart and tell us that the Lord knows what we need; therefore, don't bother, don't do these things. Satan wants overreaction; he either wants us to come with a repetition of words that has no end, or he wants us to be mum. Look how Satan will trap us to keep us from asking. It is so important to understand that God commands with a promise, "Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you," MAT 7:7.

The second reason for prayer is that through asking we excercise our faith, which pleases the Father. We must come to Him believing that He will provide, that He will answer and grant. The command for us to ask is a command to exercise our faith to come before Him. We read in HEB 11:6, "But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him."

When we come to lay our petition before the Lord, we demonstrate that we believe that He is. We are demonstrating our faith to believe there is a God to whom we are directing our petition. We must believe that He is, that He is also a "...rewarder of them that diligently seek Him." This asking, this coming before the Lord, demonstrates faith.

So often we ask ourselves, "But do I have faith?" Jesus said, "If ye have faith as a grain of mustard seed, ye shall say unto this mountain, Remove hence to yonder place; and it shall remove; and nothing shall be impossible unto you," MAT 17:20b.

Now when we come before the Lord to ask, and when we come in a posture of heart that is acceptable before the Lord, we are exercising faith because we are demonstrating that we do believe that He is. We are coming to Him believing He "is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Therefore, one of the reasons God has decreed that we must ask is to show that we are demonstrating faith.

JAM 1:6-7 says, "But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed. For let not that man think that he shall receive any thing of the Lord." It is important that we come believing He will grant. Otherwise we become unstable. We must ask in faith, because if we are not asking in faith, we will not receive anything of the Lord. MAT 21:22 says, "And all things, whatsoever ye shall ask in prayer, believing, ye shall receive."

Asking is an exercise in faith. The Lord wants us to lay out our needs before Him from a heart of simplicity. He tells us to ask for those things when our heart is exercising faith before Him.