“Ye Know Not What Ye Ask”                             

Matthew 20:22

            We often ask God to do things for us or give things to us, without considering what weighty things might be involved in God’s compliance with our requests. Such was the case with the mother of Zebedee’s children. She desired a place of special honor for her sons, not knowing the glory she sought for them (wrong as it was for her to seek it), could not be attained without great sorrow. Only by drinking the cup of God’s wrath and being baptized in the torments of his fury for us could the Lord Jesus Christ attain the glory of heaven as our Mediator. How much like this woman we are! We ask God to save our children. But are we willing for him to humble and break them? We cannot have one without the other. We ask the Lord to teach us patience. But are we willing to endure tribulation? There is no other way to learn patience. We ask that Christ be made precious to us. But are we willing to have every rival to our Savior taken from us? We ask for grace to truly trust our God. But are we willing to be cast upon him alone? We pray that God will make us holy. But are we willing to be refined in the fire? “Be not rash with thy mouth, and let not thine heart be hasty to utter anything before God: for God is in heaven, and thou upon earth: therefore let thy words be few” (Eccles. 5:2).

 

Don Fortner