James 4:2
You do not have, because you do not ask God...

On a recent jaunt to preach in a good friend's church in Columbia, SC, we stopped off at a bookstore and my children each got to pick a book off the sale rack. Sydney got a puzzle book, Parker got a magic trick book, and Will got a paper airplane book. We stuck them (the books, not the kids!) in the suitcase and drove home. Sometime after lunch, Will decided he wanted to work on some airplanes and he asked me where the book was. Being the dad I am, I told him it was in the suitcase. Being the seven year-old he is, he forgot.

It wasn't until a few hours later that I realized this. He had gotten distracted doing other things and then realized that he had never practiced with the paper airplane book. Suddenly he came in the room and told me that the book wasn't on the bed like I said it was. I told him that I never said it was on the bed and he said, in typical 7 year-old fashion, "Yes you did!" Then he went outside and told Parker what he thought I had said that and eventually Parker came inside and told me that it wasn't on the bed like I said it was. That, my friends, is when Will went to his room.

See, it's one thing to forget what I said. It's a whole other deal to tell someone else that I said something I didn't. We had a discussion about that and when we were done, I asked him what he thought he should do about the still "unfound" book. He said he could look for it. I asked if there was anything else he could do (yes, I was fishing for "I could ask you, Daddy") and he said he could look for it - hard. So I told him to do that.

Now, let me say that I'm not sure I wasn't being cruel. Of course, that wasn't my intention. My plan was to teach him that he could ask me where it was and I would tell him, but he would actually need to ask. Instead, he was stubborn enough to want to look for it himself and so I let him. After 10 minutes of him sighing and looking, I asked if he had thought of anything else that he could do to find the book. He looked at me and said, "Ask for help?" "Yes!" I said. "Now, who would you ask?" "You," he replied. And the next words out of his mouth were, "Will you lead me to it?" YES!!! And off we went to get the book.

Don't miss the point. I'm not saying that if you ask God for things, you'll always get them (believe me, my children do NOT get everything they ask for). What I am saying, though, is that if you don't ask, the best you can hope for is that you somehow, after years of sighing and looking, stumble on what you wanted. If you're too stubborn to ask God for help, I guarantee you that you will not receive it. So take a chance and ask. Who knows?

You may receive.