We Won't Go Until We Get Some

He also said to them, “Imagine that one of you has a friend and you go to that friend in the middle of the night. Imagine saying, ‘Friend, loan me three loaves of bread  because a friend of mine on a journey has arrived and I have nothing to set before him.’  Imagine further that he answers from within the house, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already locked, and my children and I are in bed. I can’t get up to give you anything.’  I assure you, even if he wouldn’t get up and help because of his friendship, he will get up and give his friend whatever he needs because of his friend’s brashness.  And I tell you: Ask and you will receive. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to you.  Everyone who asks, receives. Whoever seeks, finds. To everyone who knocks, the door is opened.
-Luke 11:5-10

But Jacob stayed apart by himself, and a man wrestled with him until dawn broke.  When the man saw that he couldn’t defeat Jacob, he grabbed Jacob’s thigh and tore a muscle in Jacob’s thigh as he wrestled with him.  The man said, “Let me go because the dawn is breaking.”  But Jacob said, “I won’t let you go until you bless me.” He said to Jacob, “What’s your name?” and he said, “Jacob.”  Then he said, “Your name won’t be Jacob any longer, but Israel, because you struggled with God and with men and won.”  Jacob also asked and said, “Tell me your name.”  But he said, “Why do you ask for my name?” and he blessed Jacob there.
-Genesis 32:24-9

The fawning etiquette of unctuous prayer is utterly foreign to the Bible. Biblical prayer is impertinent, persistent, shameless, indecorous. It is more like haggling in an oriental bazaar than the polite monologues of the churches.  -Walter Wink (1)

Prayer in its highest form and grandest success assumes the attitude of a wrestler with God.  -E.M. Bounds (2)

We won't go until we get some;
We won't go until we get some;
We won't go until we get some, so bring some out here

We wish you a Merry Christmas;
We wish you a Merry Christmas;
We wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

All our prayers can be answered.  Jesus said that all things are possible through God, for the person that believes.(3)  

What if the truth is that God is waiting on us, rather than we're waiting on God?  
What if the truth is that how close we are to God is regulated by our own choices?  

Imagine an airplane or vehicle called, "salvation through Christ", that is headed to heaven.  There are an unlimited amount of first class seats, but only a few people take them.

Did you know that the opposite of love is not hate, but passivity?  When we are passive towards God, it's not a sign of our love for him.  Lovers are passionate.  Lovers get jealous and angry with their beloved.  Lovers pursue.  Lovers seek reconciliation when there is a rift.  

Children of God who are upset with God and tell God are people who care, who love, who want something from God.  They are honest to God, telling him their disappointments.  Do you care about God enough to be angry with him?  Are you seeking to trade your sorrows?  Are you turning your lament into worship?  Are you seeking an upgrade for your outdated operating system?

When we want to get something from from God, we have to persist.  In the story of the man seeking bread from his friend in the middle of the night, the key to why the one gives the other what he needs and asks for is not the friendship.  It is not the friendship that gets him what he wants.  The friendship leads him to that particular door.

God is the person we go to with prayers, with needs, with requests.  We get that.  But Just knowing that is not enough, according to Jesus.  We get our answers, our stuff; through shameless, audacious, persistence.

We have to be brash, as it says in Luke 11 in the story of the friend knocking on the door.  Another word is audacious.  Another word is boldness.  Did you know that God likes it when we are brash, audacious, and bold?  

God likes risk takers.  Passionate, God seeking people, pursuers, who boldly go forward, make mistakes and fail.  But, God is alright with that.  God has made provision for our failures.  These are "holy failures".  I am not talking about sin failures.

Jesus said,"ask of me", and "all things are possible"; so we say, "you said, Lord"; and keep at it.  Seeking God is like playing hide and seek with your child.  You, as the parent, watch your child from your hiding place, and you want to be found.  

We can make a demand on God.  This does not mean we boss God or order God.  It's just taking God's word in the Bible, that we have, and speaking it to God and asking for it.  There are things God wants to give us that don't come automatically.  We have to ask for them and pursue them.  We have to pursue God for them. 

Every thing we want is in God.  So, as a child of God, engage with God, until you get what you want.  There may be things we want that we don't need and God will sort that out for us in the process.

You need something and there's God, who has what you need.  You know he is there.  There is Jesus who has what you need and there is the Holy Spirit who can solve all your problems.  There they are and there you are with your lack, your need, your unfulfilled destiny.  Will you wrestle with God for what you want?  We you wrestle before God?  Are you willing to not give up until God blesses you?

Can you say, "I won't go, until I get some?"  The "some" is the divine antidote to all your longings.  In God, in God's presence, everything is clarified.  When God comes or when God takes you into Himself, it is in Christ.  In Christ we have all our needs and wants.  Our destinies get fulfilled, our callings are commissioned and empowered.  On earth as it is in heaven means Christlikeness for us.  That's the goal.  That's what we get when we get more of God.  That's what we need.


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Artwork credits:
Sir John Everett Millais, Bt (1829‑1896),  The Importunate Friend
Gerard Hoet (1648-1733), and others, Figures of The Bible (1728) 

Footnotes:
1. Walter Wink, Prayer and The Powers, Sojourners, Oct. 1990. p. 13
2. E.M. Bounds, the Classic Collection on Prayer, 2002, p. 519
3. Matthew 19:26, Mark 9:23