Don’t forget to ask God for what you need today. 

Have you ever wondered why some people seem to have all they need and others can never get what they want? Jealousy can easily set in and disputes soon follow.

Where do wars and fights come from among you? Do they not come from your desires for pleasure that war in your members? 2 You lust and do not have. You murder and covet and cannot obtain. You fight and war. Yet you do not have because you do not ask. 3 You ask and do not receive, because you ask amiss, that you may spend it on your pleasures. – James 4:1-3

James asks some straight forward questions here, which are very poignant at times when we see people fighting and finding disagreements with each other. James asks if the root of the matter is your desire. Disputes begin when one person has what another person wants.

He also says there are two main reasons why we don’t have what we would like and it’s all about asking. The first reason is that you want something, but don’t feel you can ask. But if you are a child of God then He will not withhold any good thing from you.

For the Lord God is a sun and shield; The Lord will give grace and glory; No good thing will He withhold from those who walk uprightly. – Psalm 84:11

God is a good father who does not hold back what His children need. Jesus puts it this way in the gospel of Luke:

“So I say to you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks receives, and he who seeks finds, and to him who knocks it will be opened. 11 If a son asks for bread from any father among you, will he give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will he give him a serpent instead of a fish? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13 If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him!” – Luke 11:9-13.

What a wonderful picture of us asking our Heavenly Father for something as simple as a piece of bread, fish or an egg. If we ask for something to sustain us and give life, He will not give us the opposite. We may not get what we ask for if those things are detrimental to us or take us away from God’s will for our life.

The problem comes with the second reason James gives for not receiving. It’s because we ask for the wrong things. Those things we ask for to service our pleasures, can lead to envy, wars and fighting. God knows what you really need and does not hold back when you ask.

So never be afraid to ask our Heavenly Father for those things we need. Ask in humility and in line with His will and He will not hold back. Don’t be those who don’t get because they don’t ask, or those who ask for the wrong things. Our Heavenly Father wants to give you all you need today, just ask.

And my God shall supply all your need according to His riches in glory by Christ Jesus. – Philippians 4:19