Grace and Space

Lk 11:5-13
Ask, seek, knock: In the Lord’s Prayer, Luke teaches his Christian community how to pray. He now teaches why it should pray.
The first reason is the example of Jesus, who was praying before he taught his disciples how to pray.
The second reason is found in the unique Lucan parable about a man who goes to a neighbor at midnight and pesters him with his knocking until the friend within gets up and gives him the three loaves of bread he needs. This type of unrelenting insistence will move God to respond to the requests of Christians. God is eager to answer prayers. Christians should pray because God wants to answer their prayers.
The third reason Luke gives for Christian prayer is that it is effective. God does answer prayer. Jesus declares, “Everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened” (v 10).
The fourth reason given for prayer centers on the good gifts that God gives to his children. Even sinful people give only good gifts to their children. God, who is not sinful, will give greater gifts to his children. The greatest of these gifts is himself—the Holy Spirit. In the gift of the Spirit, who has been given to the Church, the kingdom of God has come. It is the Father’s desire to give the kingdom to his children and, through them, to bring it to its fullness.