Grace mercy and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.

        Out text today is the gospel lesson that we just heard a few moments ago.

        Dear friends in Christ, it is not often that God will invite us to make pests of ourselves, but today in the gospel reading He does precisely that. We are graciously invited to come before the Lord our God, the creator of all things, and to bring to Him every last one of our needs.

        Now please note, it says to bring before Him every last one of our needs, not necessarily every last one of our wants. There is a difference between needs and wants. I really want a candy-apple red Ferrari! But what I need is food, clothing and shelter. What I want is for the Bronco’s to win the superbowl this year (yes, I know, I’m a dreamer!), but I really need to hear God’s word every day, without exception.

        What’s more, our Lord not only tells us to keep on praying to Him, with persistence, but also, we should be praying with a strong confidence and belief that He will, first of all hear our prayers, and secondly, that He will indeed answer them. And not only that, but He will answer them through His divine wisdom and gracious will so that the answer He provides will be a reflection of that grace, and of that will, and of His omniscience, His all-knowing power. So that the answer we receive may not be the one we expect, but it will be the very best answer He could possibly render to us in response to our prayer.

        That He promises us.

        And what’s more, in this text, He names precisely the greatest thing we can possibly pray for. And that is for the Holy Spirit. And so I would caution you that you are about to listen in on a conversation and on a story that Jesus provides, that, if you listen carefully, will transform the way we live and it will transform our lives completely.

        I would suggest that, first of all, our Lord Jesus Christ tells us to pray in faith. I know, all you Lutherans are saying, "Well, duh!" But, let me tell you, there is a misconception out there that faith is not necessary for prayer. Indeed it is born of a misunderstanding that people who reject God may pray and be heard! But at the risk of being politically incorrect, I must tell you that it isn’t so!

        It is by the name of Christ that our prayers are heard. It is through the blood of Christ that God welcomes us to His chamber, to hear our prayers and to answer them.

        As a result then of God’s calling us to faith, we have this precious gift.

        Another thing about this passage which is oftentimes misused. Oftentimes it is said, in the part where it says that we should ask and knock and seek, and seek and ask and knock (I would suggest those are all the same actions, over and over again, that is what is entreated) that somehow unbelievers should look at this passage and say, "If I ask, if I seek, if I knock, then God will open the door." But this is not at all the case. Indeed, let it be known that this passage was spoken specifically by Christ to those who believed in Him, to His disciples. There is nothing within our old sinful Adam that wishes to ask, or wishes to knock, or wishes to seek. And so our old Adam will not go there.

        Rather, it is the grace of God, through Christ Jesus. It is His blood shed for us on the cross which enables us to be changed from unbeliever to believer. And then these words apply to us!

        That the people of God are entreated to come to their Father in Heaven, and to bring to Him their every need. This is a passage for us. Thanks be to God that it is.

        Our ability to access the Father is precisely due to the forgiveness of our sins granted to us through Christ. We, who had broken the law, needed someone who could keep it. And our Lord Jesus Christ did precisely and exactly that, to the very n^th degree! There was no law He did not keep. And He provides to us, as a gracious gift, apprehended through faith, that very righteousness which He alone has, but He shares with us!

        Through our Lord’s suffering and death, through the breathing of His last breath, through His blood shed on the cross, through His suffering through the agony, He pays the penalty for the sins we have committed, past, present, and future! And there is our hope! There is our salvation. There is the barrier, torn down, that separates us from God and ourselves, sinners. Our sins are washed away. And then the faith which He gives apprehends also the victory over sin, that resurrection of Jesus Christ, for in His resurrection we too are raised. And we too are God’s people now and forever. Assured of heaven. Assured of victory that the grave cannot and will not keep us.

        Faith is the portal to God’s gracious gifts, including the ability to pray with confidence, that He hears our prayers, that He responds to them rightly.

        Dear friends, let us pray in faith. But let us also pray with persistence! Jesus employs a story about a friend coming to another friend’s house at midnight, over the care of the stranger that this one who is in the bed doesn’t even know. None of us like midnight calls, whether they come over the phone or pounding at the door. I don’t know about you, but at our house, we figure that if the phone rings in the middle of the night, somebody probably died. So when that phone rings, it is not a pleasant experience.

        So, here we have that scenario. But instead of somebody dying, there’s a man at the door, a friend of his, who has a stranger who has come, and he has nothing to feed him. And the man, understandably, "Let me go back to sleep! Leave me alone! You can get it in the morning!" Or something like that! But the man doesn’t go away! He keep <knocking sound> knocking! "Hey, in there! Get up! I need some bread! I need some bread!" Finally, even though he would not normally get up, then indeed does this man get up out of bed. Not because he has great compassion for this stranger who has come, not even because this man at the door is his friend, but because he wants the noise to stop.

        The argument goes like this. It goes, from the lesser to the greater. He lets us remember that we, who are mere human beings, who are sinful, evil beings by nature, will give our friends some food, how much more then will our Father in heaven, who sent His son to live and to die and to rise again from the dead for us, will He not give us all good things?

        Now that may not include my candy-apple-red Ferrari. It may not even include a superbowl victory for the Broncos (although I think He’s somewhat obligated there... maybe not!) But He does give us that which is truly truly precious.

        Sometimes He waits before He answers our prayer. The answers to prayer are three, as I have often said (forgive me if I repeat myself), the answers to prayer are "yes", "no", or "wait". We generally only like "yes". And we really hate "wait". At least I do, not being a very patient man. I’m one of those guys who will try to beat you to the checkout stand if we’re both headed there at the same time with grocery carts.

        Let me tell you that my patience isn’t that great! But sometimes I’m convinced that God waits to answer prayer, my prayer, precisely because I am impatient. He’s teaching me. "Settle down, Dick. It’s coming!" And He does. And it does.

        By the way, this asking, knocking, seeking is not a phased in approach, that first we ask, and then we knock, and then we seek. But rather, it is precisely that which is described in the story. The man does all three things at the same time! He is asking, he is knocking, and he is seeking, and he is pestering. And he continues to pester until he gets the answer! And strangely enough, God desires that from us! He wants us to come to Him again and again and again. And I think I know part of the reason why, although certainly not all of it. You see, if God doesn’t answer us right away, in the way in which we expect, it requires faith to keep asking.

        And so we keep asking. And God may be up there saying, "Let’s see a little more." And so we ask, and we ask, and we ask, and we ask in faith. And maybe, finally, we may realize in our asking, as I have done from time to time, that finally you just have to say, "God, you know, whatever timing you think is right, you do it." And then it usually happens. After we have given up trying to control the situation.

        So let us pray persistently. But I would suggest, my friends, that most of all we pray for what the Holy Spirit so graciously brings. That’s the way the text ends. That the most important thing we could possibly ask for is the Holy Spirit. Now, I’m not talking about asking for any supernatural manifestation or divine gift here. But rather, to ask for what the Holy Spirit always gives and always promises to gives, and that is this. That He gives us what He always gives, which is the forgiveness of sins and the grace to serve Him with a god-pleasing life.

        Let us remember our baptism. Let us remember as we watched Lea baptized this morning, that indeed, our baptism daily speaks to the power of the Holy Spirit in our lives. We are assured by that baptism that God has called us His own and made us His child, now and forever.

        Martin Luther in his Small Catechism, one of our Lutheran Confessions, reminds us at the beginning of each day and at the end of each day to make the sign of the cross upon us in remembrance of our baptism, and then to utter our prayers. Let us remember that God brings to mind the Holy Spirit in us, working through that water, and through the word.

        Let us pray for the promise of the Holy Spirit when He works through His mighty word also, through these holy scriptures which we read and from which we proclaim this sermon to you! To teach us more deeply about the faith which He has so graciously provided. And let us pray for an increase of the hunger that is within us for that consumption of that word, for the study of His word, for the imbibing of the ever-growing body of knowledge that He continually unfolds to us, as we grow in His wisdom and grace, through the revelation of His word.

        And let us pray, for the encouragement to overcome the ever-frequent temptation to skip that worship of God where the word is proclaimed and the sacraments are provided. And let us pray that we will skip the ever-present temptation to think that, unfortunately, we have learned everything we need to know about God, and therefore we need not study Him any further. But rather, drink deeply of the spring and well of His wisdom without ceasing.

        Dear God, create that hunger in us, maintain it, establish it!

        Then I would suggest too that we would pray for the work of the Holy Spirit, as we weekly receive it in the body and blood of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, whom we receive at this very altar, kneeling side by side in common confession of faith, as one body of Christ, receiving there the very body and blood of Christ, in, with, and under the bread and the wine.

        And know that God has promised to strengthen our faith through this. That He will forgive our sin through this also, and that He will give us the grace to serve Him in a God-pleasing way.

        And then, perhaps, you should pray for your Pastor. After all, God sent him to you to preach that word to you, and to study that word. Pray always that he will be faithful to the scriptures and never teach anything contrary for them. For these temptations come to us all. Pray that temptation will not turn him away from the truth, but ever hold fast to it, and proclaim it with all the power that God, through His gracious spirit, gives to it.

        Friends, our Lord does indeed graciously invite us to make absolute pests of ourselves before His throne of grace through prayer. He invites us to ask, He invites us to seek, He invites us to knock. And then through that He promises us the gift of His spirit to strengthen our faith. There is no downside to prayer! It is only and always the upside.

        So God grant us faith in which to pray, the persistence to continually pray, and the willingness to receive, and to wait patiently for the good gifts He brings us, in Jesus’ name. Amen.