The church I attend has been teaching a Sunday school class on the Puritan look at the act of biblical meditation. With their relatively distraction-free life, they still desired to live a life that actively meditated on God’s Word. (Major conviction on us highly distracted 21-century types!)
Not just reading a passage quickly, then moving on … the goal being to finish a book, or chapter, “In record time.” Their intent was to chew on the Word… to let it satisfy them… that’s my goal today in these short verses.
But let him ask in faith…
This is convicting on a couple levels.
First - how often do we ask God something like He is a proverbial “divine gum-ball machine?” Our prayers are selfish… not supplicatory. They are us-centered, not God-centered. They ask for what we want, not what we need. They are a “gimme,” not a “You’ve got me.” These distinctions make a huge difference.
When we ask in faith, we ask relying not on our own strength… but also we ask relying on His (God’s) wisdom. His wisdom that is infinitely better than our own.
Second - this reminder is hugely important because it tells us that our prayers (even for wisdom from the LORD) need to be done in faith. Ok… yes… I just repeated myself… no, I am not committing circular logic! What I mean is that our prayer is not based in a hope that He will hear us. It is not based on a selfish desire for X-Y-Z “thing.” Instead, this reminder from Paul is to lift our prayers in faith. Let our prayers be founded on a firm belief that the LORD wishes to bless His people - even when that blessing is radically different from what we, ourselves, may think we need.
But why? Well, Paul, expecting that question, tells us! When we ask in a way that is not grounded in faith… we do so in only one other way… in doubt. When we don’t go to God in prayer, resting on His Own faithfulness to hear us… we go to Him in a haze of doubt. And not only a haze, but the uneven ground of doubt.
Paul is explicit here - to doubt the faithfulness of the LORD is to be thrown about like waves by the wind. This, then, draws my mind to another story concerning wind and waves … and doubt. Could it be that Paul was also alluding to the time Peter doubted when walking on the water? Could it be that this experience of forgetting to rest in God’s faithfulness had been passed around the early Church as a concrete (pun intended) example of trusting the LORD in difficult times?
As we seek to meditate on these verses, and rest in God’s Wisdom as our one and only source, we need to remember this warning at the end. When we go to the LORD with doubt in our heart… doubt that He is good… doubt that He will listen or supply… doubt that His promises are sure… everything else in our life begins to rock uncontrollably.
When we go before the Creator-Sustainer of all things… ask Him for wisdom knowing that He lavishes upon His people! Do not ask for wisdom assuming you will be met with a “no.” He desires our hearts to be pure! He desires for our minds to be full of His Truth - not the world’s violence! He desires us to be a more pure reflection of His Son day-by-day. And He promises to do that by growing us in His Wisdom!
So…
If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask God… who gives to all generously, and without reproach. But let him ask in faith, with no doubting, for the one who doubts is like a wave of the sea, driven and tossed by the wind.
Amen? Amen!