'Asking' in the Bible

So the LORD God called out to the man, asking him, "Where are you?"

Abraham continued to speak to him, asking, "What if 40 are found there?" The LORD replied, "I won't do it for the sake of those 40."

Because she had been asking, "May God give me another son," she named him Joseph.

"Please," Jacob inquired, "Tell me your name." But he asked, "Why are you asking about my name?" And he blessed Jacob there.

"I'll send you a young goat from the flock," he responded. But she pressed him, asking, "What security will you put up until you've sent it?"

The angel of the LORD answered him, "Why are you asking this about my name? It's "Wonderful.'"

As they approached Micah's home, they recognized the voice of the young male descendant of Levi. They turned aside from there and spoke to him, asking him, "Who brought you here? What work are you doing here? And what's your business here?"

Samuel reported everything the LORD told him to the people who were asking him for a king.

When you leave me today, you will find two men by Rachel's tomb in the territory of Benjamin at Zelzah. They'll tell you, "The donkeys you went to look for have been found. Now your father has stopped worrying about the donkeys and he's anxious about you. He's asking, "What will I do about my son?'

Is it not the wheat harvest today? I'll call upon the LORD, and he will send thunder and rain. Then you will know and understand that you have done a great evil in the sight of the LORD by asking for a king for yourselves."

Then all the people told Samuel, "Pray to the LORD your God for your servants, so that we don't die, because we made all our sins worse by asking for a king for ourselves."

In reply, the king asked the woman, "Please don't conceal anything about which I'm going to be asking you now." So the woman replied, "Please, your majesty, let the king speak."

"We're not looking for mere silver or gold to be paid by Saul or his household to us," the Gibeonites responded to him. "And it's not for us to execute anyone in Israel." In reply, David asked, "So what are you asking me to do for you?"

Later, David's conscience bothered him after he had numbered the army, so David told the LORD, "I have sinned greatly by what I did. But now I am asking you, please remove the guilt of your servant, since I have acted very foolishly."

His father had never challenged him at any time during his life by asking him, "Why are you acting like this?" Adonijah was very handsome and had been born after Absalom.

While he was still asking that question, Jonathan, the son of Abiathar the priest arrived, so Adonijah told him, "Come on in, since you're a worthy man and are bringing us good news!"

So now I'm asking one thing from you. Don't refuse me." "Talk," she told him.

But King Solomon replied to his mother, "Why are you asking Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah? Why not ask me to give up the kingdom for him, since he's my older brother, and why not ask for Abiathar the priest, and for Zeruiah's son Joab?"

Then Elisha prayed, asking the LORD, "Please make him able to really see!" And so when the LORD enabled the young man to see, he looked, and there was the mountain, filled with horses and fiery chariots surrounding Elisha!

When the army approached him, Elisha spoke to the LORD, asking him, "LORD, I'm asking you please to afflict this group of people with blindness!" So he afflicted them with blindness, just as Elisha had asked.

Later on, Jabez called on the God of Israel, asking him, ""whether you would bless me again and again, enlarge my territory, keep your power with me, keep me from evil, and keep me from harm!" And God granted what he had requested.

David responded to God, "I sinned greatly by behaving this way. But now I am asking you, please remove the guilt of your servant, since I have acted very foolishly."

"When you're thinking about asking yourselves, "How will we pursue him, since the root of the problem is with him?'

No, I haven't allowed my mouth to sin by asking for his life with a curse.

Many are asking, "Who will help us to see better days?" LORD, may the light of your favor shine upon us.

My tears have been my food day and night, while people keep asking me all day long, "Where is your God?"

They spoke against God by asking, "Is God able to prepare a feast in the desert?

My eyes grow weary with respect to what you have promised I keep asking, "When will you comfort me?"

I rejoiced when they kept on asking me, "Let us go to the LORD's Temple."

Since a king's command is powerful, who is able to challenge him, asking, "What are you doing?"

"How do your voluminous sacrifices benefit me?" the LORD is asking. "I've had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of well-fed beasts. I don't enjoy the blood of bulls, lambs, or goats.

Then I heard the voice of the LORD as he was asking, "Whom will I send? Who will go for us?" "Here I am!" I replied. "Send me."

They set out to go down to Egypt, without asking my advice; taking refuge in Pharaoh's protection, and seeking shelter in Egypt's shadow.

This message from the LORD came to me, asking, "What do you see, Jeremiah?" I replied, "I see an almond branch."

King Zedekiah sent Shelemiah's son Jehucal and Maaseiah's son Zephaniah the priest to Jeremiah the prophet, asking him, "Please pray to the LORD our God for us."

Now, please listen, your majesty, and pay attention to what I'm asking you. Don't make me go back to the house of Jonathan the scribe, so I don't die there."

"Yet you keep asking, "Why wouldn't the son bear the punishment of his father's sin?' Because the son has done what was lawful and right, and has kept all my statutes and obeyed them, he's certainly going to live.

"Meanwhile, Babylon's king is standing at the fork of the road, where he can head in either of two directions, and that's where he is practicing divination. Shaking his arrows, he's asking questions of his teraphim while he examines livers.

Furthermore, what the king is asking is so difficult that no one can reveal it except the gods and they don't live with human beings."

And the LORD was asking me, "What do you see, Amos?" I replied, "A plumb line." So the Lord said, "Look, I have set a plumb line in the midst of my people Israel. I will no longer spare them.

And he was asking, "What do you see, Amos?" I answered, "A basket of summer fruit." Then the LORD told me, "The end approaches for my people Israel. I will no longer spare them.

"Speak to Shealtiel's son Zerubbabel, governor of Judah, to Jehozadak's son Joshua, the high priest, and to the rest of the people, asking,

The angel who had been speaking with me answered by asking, "You don't know what these mean, do you?" So I responded, "No, sir."

and to speak to the priests assigned to the Temple of the LORD of the Heavenly Armies along with the prophets, asking, "Am I to go about mourning, denying myself throughout the fifth month, as I have these many years?"

"Keep asking, and it will be given to you. Keep searching, and you will find. Keep knocking, and the door will be opened for you.

Because everyone who keeps asking will receive, and the person who keeps searching will find, and the person who keeps knocking will have the door opened.

So if you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who keep on asking him!

Someone told him, "Look! Your mother and your brothers are standing outside, asking to speak to you."

Jesus replied, "You don't realize what you're asking. Can you drink from the cup that I'm going to drink from?" They told him, "We can."

When he came into Jerusalem, the whole city was trembling with excitement. The people were asking, "Who is this?"

One of them, an expert in the Law, tested him by asking,

A crowd was sitting around him. They told him, "Look! Your mother and your brothers are outside asking for you."

When he had left the crowd and gone home, his disciples began asking him about the parable.

Now the woman happened to be a Greek, born in Phoenicia in Syria. She kept asking him to drive the demon out of her daughter.

Then Jesus and his disciples set out for the villages around Caesarea Philippi. On the way he was asking his disciples, "Who do people say I am?"

But Jesus told them, "You don't realize what you're asking. Can you drink from the cup that I'm going to drink from or be baptized with the baptism with which I'm going to be baptized?"

As Jesus was sitting on the Mount of Olives facing the Temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew were asking him privately,

The crowds kept asking him, "What, then, should we do?"

Even some soldiers were asking him, "And what should we do?" He told them, "Never extort money from anyone by threats or blackmail, and be satisfied with your pay."

So I say to you: Keep asking, and it will be given you. Keep searching, and you will find. Keep knocking, and the door will be opened for you,

because everyone who keeps asking will receive, and the person who keeps searching will find, and the person who keeps knocking will have the door opened.

So if you who are evil know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who keep asking him!"

Others, wanting to test Jesus, kept asking him for a sign from heaven.

Every single one of them began asking to be excused. The first told him, "I bought a field, and I need to go out and inspect it. Please excuse me.'

Then the Jewish leaders debated angrily with each other, asking, "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?"

The Jewish leaders kept looking for him at the festival, asking, "Where is that man?"

So the Jewish leaders were asking, "He isn't going to kill himself, is he? Is that why he said, "You cannot come where I'm going'?"

So far you haven't asked for anything in my name. Keep asking and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete."

"I am asking on their behalf. I am not asking on behalf of the world, but on behalf of those you gave me, because they are yours.

I'm not asking you to take them out of the world but to protect them from the evil one.

Jesus replied, "Are you asking this on your own initiative, or did others tell you about me?"

All of them continued to be stunned and puzzled, and they kept asking one another, "What can this mean?"

They made Peter and John stand in front of them and began asking, "By what power or by what name did you do this?"

and asking Festus to have Paul brought to Jerusalem as a favor. They were laying an ambush to kill him on the road.

"All of us fell to the ground, and I heard a voice asking me in the Hebrew language, "Saul! Saul! Why are you persecuting me? It is hurting you to keep on kicking against the cattle prods.'

in my prayers at all times, asking that somehow by God's will I may at last succeed in coming to you.

And Isaiah boldly says, "I was found by those who were not looking for me; I was revealed to those who were not asking for me."

For this reason, since the day we heard about this, we have not stopped praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the full knowledge of God's will with respect to all spiritual wisdom and understanding,

With this in mind, we always pray for you, asking that our God might make you worthy of his calling and that through his power he might help you accomplish every good desire and faithful action.

Baptism, which is symbolized by that water, now saves you also, not by removing dirt from the body, but by asking God for a clear conscience based on the resurrection of Jesus, the Messiah,