Ask and You Shall Receive

Matthew 7:7-8: “Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.” Recently, this verse has been at the front of my mind. God laid it on my heart and I’ve been challenged to live it out boldly. I’ve been challenged to truly believe that it’s a promise for us and we can walk in faith that what we ask will be done. Our prayers do not go without answers.

We were doing evangelism and this verse was still laying heavily on my mind. For evangelism this time we were handing out packets with the Gospel along with a book of the Bible like John or Romans. Alyssa and I were told to go to apartment buildings and put the envelopes with the Gospel into everyone’s mailbox. The laws here are quite different regarding putting things in people’s mailboxes. I was honestly surprised that it was even legal. But we proceeded to try to put all these packages in people’s mailboxes, but there was a big problem. The doors to the apartments were always locked unless you had a key. The only option was to either telecom someone you knew inside or to find someone who was walking in and hope you can slide in before they close the door. We did a few apartments by slipping inside before the door fully shut. But we hit a stalemate. No one was walking into their apartments anymore it seemed, so we prayed something like this to God, “Lord allow us to get into these apartments to share your Gospel with these people.” Out of nowhere, a lady from the second floor opened her window and stared at us. We waved at her and she asked what we had in our arms. Or at least that’s what it looked like she said, we honestly didn’t know. We told her that it was a packet with the Gospel. She proceeded to respond in all Romanian, which we understood none of. But for some reason, she decided to give us a hand gesture inviting us inside. She sent people down to let us in to give the packages to all the people in the apartment. It made no sense why she would do that for us, besides by the Holy Spirit. It’s simply too obscure to be a coincidence. She saw two people holding cardboard boxes that didn’t speak her language and decided to invite them in. That’s God. We continued to get blessed with opportunities and got into a few more apartments by the grace of God. But then quickly we got into a complete stalemate all over again. No one was walking into apartments and very few people were even on the street at all. We kept checking doors just to make sure they were locked, and every single one was. We were stuck, and we had a whole box of packets left to give. We prayed, “God, would you open doors for us in Jesus’ name. Allow your Holy Word to be shared with these people.” After I prayed, the verse screamed in my mind, “Knock and the door will be opened to you.” I looked around and my eyes locked on the first apartment in front of us. Out of the blue, I had an insane amount of faith come over me. I said, “This door is open in Jesus’ name.” We walked to the door, pulled, and it swung wide open. We filled all the mailboxes with the Gospel and went to the next apartment. The door swung wide. Next apartment, doors swung open once again. Three apartment buildings in a row were completely open. Before this, we hadn’t been able to find even just one open door. The only ones we were able to get into were opened by the hands of people. These three apartments were opened by the hand of God.

Later in the day, we went to another community, this time it was the main city. We felt the Lord calling us to do the same thing we did earlier. To go to apartments and watch the Lord make a way to give the Word to everyone living that lives there. The same problems arose in the big city, but this time, they were multiplied. In the city they were a lot more cautious, if they didn’t know you, they most likely wouldn’t let you in. It only made sense, in the city there were always a lot more risks. But we still felt the Lord calling us to try. We had problems here even handing out packets to people on the street. They simply didn’t want anything to do with us. But after many attempts for about half an hour, we decided to refocus on the power of Jesus’ name. We walked and I saw an apartment across the street, I knew that it would swing wide open at the mere utterance of Jesus’ name. We prayed, “In Jesus’ name, this door will be open.” We walked across the street, pulled the handle, the latch clicked, and the door opened. We gave out all our packets and moved on to the next place. Every time we watched the Lord move, we couldn’t help but jump with excitement and speak praises thanking God for what He has done. We continued to a huge apartment building, the biggest we had been to yet. I felt the Lord very strongly telling me to press the 3rd intercom button. Fear was weighing heavy though, in this area of Romania, they don’t mess around. Who knew what would happen, we don’t even speak their language. But I felt Him still calling me to press the button. He showed me an image on the side of the entrance wall. It was a big triangle, He reminded me of the Holy Trinity. The THREE persons. Then I knew I had to. I pushed the button and waited, curious but scared of what the Lord was going to do. We waited almost 15 seconds, but then, we heard the lock click. The door was opened. We weren’t talked to over the intercom or anything, it just opened. We looked inside, and the first apartment we saw was number 3. At any minute we knew that if they opened the door to see who rang them, we would be standing right in front of them. However, the room remained silent. It was almost as if no one was in room three at all. As we finished the day one thing was clear, God was actively moving.

This is just one day of the Lord working here in Romania. This country has so much brokenness, the people are in dire need of Christ. These doors were opened for a reason, it wasn’t just because God wanted to have some fun. He is actively changing lives here in Craiova, Romania. One thing is for certain, He isn’t done yet.