“If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.”-John 15:7
While strolling through a local park here in Albany, Georgia I paused to notice a beautiful magnolia tree. Magnolias are marked by their bright green leaves, long low lying branches, and pearly white flowers. One of the branches had bloomed and then the branch broke off the tree. Seeing this, I picked a bloomed flower off the broken branch to take home, because it was going to die anyway. It would die because it was cut off from the root and without the nourishment of the rootstock the branch has nothing to live off. It was created to continually call back to the rootstock for substance to grow and live, and the rootstock answers with all the goodness that has been gathered from the soil to do so. However, once cut off, even though it is calling back to the root it will find no answer.
In this broken magnolia tree, the scripture came to me: “If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” We have a powerful promise in this text. Ask what ye will. The text is so powerful that carnal men have sought to pervert it and use it to influence ignorant souls to treat this as a blank check for every lust of the flesh. However, recall that the command “ask what ye will” is preceded by the command “abide in me.” Abide in me, stay connected to the root. Connected to the power source. When the two are one, the branch will not ask for anything from the root that is not good for it, and the root will not supply anything that the branch doesn’t need to grow. If we abide in Christ and ask, we are in the most blessed place a Christian can be, because we have access to all the power of God. The Holy Ghost connects us to Christ (the root) and sanctifies us. When we are sanctified and serving God, we are constantly calling back to the rootstock for our needs. God is constantly sending us what we need. We must take care to stay connected, because without that connection we will wither and die. We stay connected by reading his Word. The Bible helps us know how to abide. The Word will guide us, shape us, prune us, and teach us. The Word of God is the person of Christ, and to know Him better is to know His Word better. We must pray. Pray and always pray. Our prayers attune us to fellowship with God and with His Son. It reveals to us the will of God, and where we stand with God. It’s our primary communication source with God. We abide through worship, fellowship with God’s people, witnessing to others, obedience to the will of God, and sacrifice of our own will. We must take great care not to obstruct this relationship of abiding and asking, because without it we lack nourishment and strength. The devil is always trying to obstruct it. He wants us to sustain ourselves on, and in, the things of this world. He wants our thoughts to be on the world, and our lives to be invested in this world. Our hearts to be married to this world. He is the prince of this world, and anything that we gain from the world and try to use against Satan he can defeat. However, when we abide and ask, what we get is from God, and when we use that against Satan, he cannot defeat it.
When we abide and ask, we can ask and ask big, because God is on the other end of the line. What is too big for God? What is too hard for God? Is there anyone too lost? Any mountain too high? Take care to abide in God, remove anything that would hinder this abiding, and ask of God. Ask and ask big.
