Matthew 7:7-12 | I Corinthians 12:24b-27
Well we’ve made it a whole month into this year. Congrats!
There are a number of considerations in this passage from Jesus: prayer, asking things of God, being faithful in giving, receiving God’s love, the Golden Rule, and the law and prophets. Take your pick/verse and dwell on it for a bit.
Sometimes it seems like people receive the commandments of God as tests - that God randomly chose arbitrary rules to see how we’d do with obeying. But this is quite far from the truth. Other times we might think the Law exists because God just doesn’t like particular things for some reason (pigs, mixed textiles, etc.). But in the end, Jesus says that the law (and the prophets!) exist, again…for relationship. We saw this earlier in the sermon on the mountain, and we will continue to see it in Jesus’ ministry as we read through Matthew.
Matthew 7:7-12
“Ask, and you will receive. Search, and you will find. Knock, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Whoever seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door is opened. Who among you will give your children a stone when they ask for bread? Or give them a snake when they ask for fish? If you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good things to those who ask him. Therefore, you should treat people in the same way that you want people to treat you; this is the Law and the Prophets.”
I Corinthians 12:24b-27
…But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the part with less honor so that there won’t be division in the body and so the parts might have mutual concern for each other. If one part suffers, all the parts suffer with it; if one part gets the glory, all the parts celebrate with it. You are the body of Christ and parts of each other.
Prayer
O Lord, you have called me to open my hand, that you might fill it:
but I would not open it; I held the world fast,
and kept my hand shut, and would not let it go.
But you alone can open it for me;
not my hand only, but my mouth;
not my mouth, but my heart also.
Grant that I may know nothing but you,
account all things a loss compared with you,
and endeavor to be transformed to be like you.1