Yes.
When Solomon asked God to answer the prayers of whoever prayed toward his temple, God agreed. Solomon’s temple doesn’t exist anymore, but now we have Jesus. And he says you can ask him for anything, and he will do what you ask. All you have to do is ask for something in Jesus’s name, and God will give you whatever you asked for. Because God is willing to satisfy the desires of everyone and everything alive.
It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’re like. God gives generously to everyone who asks, without finding fault. Ordinary human beings can control the weather, just by asking God. If you don’t have what you want, it’s only because you haven’t asked God for it.
And it’s not just God who will always give you what you ask for. Jesus says everyone who asks receives. So you could ask anyone for anything, even from someone evil, and you will definitely get what you want.
Maybe?
Elihu said you can pray and God will turn your life back around… at least if there happens to be an angel around and the angel decides to ask God to spare your life. That sounds like a pretty specific kind of situation, so it doesn’t seem like he’s saying this is how it will always be for everyone. And we don’t even know if Elihu is right, since God never clarified whether Elihu had spoken the truth about him or not.
When God agreed to Solomon’s requests about the temple, God said now he would be attentive to the prayers offered there. Is that unusual? Does he normally ignore the prayers offered in other places?
Jesus says even evil people know how to give good gifts to their children. So God will certainly give good gifts to those who ask him. But will he give bad gifts? What happens if you ask God for a bad gift? Jesus doesn’t say.
James states that if you ask anything of God according to his will, he’ll do it. That condition he’s added there pretty much negates the whole statement. Of course God is going to do what he wants, regardless of what you think he should do. But then when James attempts to restate the same thing, he forgets to include that condition, which means he’s saying something very different this time. Do these people even know what they’re saying?
No.
Obviously Jesus is wrong when he says everyone who asks receives. The Bible itself contains plenty of counter-examples.
Ask people, and you shall not receive
The king of Sodom asked Abraham to keep some of the spoils of war for himself, and Abraham refused. The men of Sodom asked Lot to send his guests out to them, and they didn’t get what they asked for either.
After Isaac blessed Jacob, Esau asked him to bless him too, but Isaac cursed him instead. When Shechem and his father asked for Jacob’s daughter for Shechem to marry, Jacob’s sons only pretended to agree. Then they killed Shechem and all the men in his city. Potiphar’s wife repeatedly asked Joseph to sleep with her, and he always refused.
God knows people don’t always get what they ask for. Otherwise his laws wouldn’t include instructions for what to do when someone refuses to give you what you ask for. God also has a law that says not to listen to any false prophets asking you to worship other gods. So it’s actually against the law for everyone who asks to receive.
Balak repeatedly asked Balaam to curse Israel, and Balaam blessed Israel instead, every time.1 Gideon asked the men of Sukkoth and Peniel for bread, and no one gave him any. After the Ephraimites got into a pointless fight with Jephthah, 42,000 Ephraimites who asked to be allowed to cross the ford to get back home were killed. They did not get what they asked for.
A man repeatedly asked his daughter’s Levite boyfriend to stay just a little longer, but eventually he was unwilling to stay another night. While the Levite was staying with a Benjamite, some local men asked the Benjamite to send the Levite out to them. But he refused, so the Levite sent his girlfriend out for them to rape and kill instead.
The Levite asked his girlfriend to get up and go the next morning, but she didn’t, because she was dead. And when the rest of Israel asked the tribe of Benjamin to hand those men over to be killed for their crimes, the Benjamites wouldn’t listen. They started a civil war instead.
Saul asked Samuel to forgive him and come back with him, but Samuel rejected him. Abner asked Asahel twice to stop chasing him, but Asahel kept going until Abner put a spear through him.
Abishai asked for permission to kill Saul and Shimei, but David wouldn’t allow it. Absalom asked David to join him, but David didn’t join him. He also asked Joab twice to come to him, and Joab refused.
Tamar asked her brother not to force her, but he did. Then she asked him not to send her away after he raped her, but he did that too. Adonijah asked his brother, King Solomon, to let him marry Abishag, and Solomon had him killed instead. Solomon says people won’t get what they ask for if they don’t give the poor what they ask for.
The Israelites asked Rehoboam not to force them to work so hard. But he said he would be even harder on them than his father Solomon had been. Jeroboam asked a prophet to stay for a meal with him, but the prophet said he wasn’t allowed to eat while he was in Bethel.2
Baal’s prophets passionately shouted for hours, asking him to light their sacrifice on fire. But Baal didn’t answer them, because Baal didn’t exist. Those prophets asked and did not receive. Two captains asked Elijah to come to the king. Instead, Elijah summoned fire from heaven to kill the captains and their men. Naaman asked Elisha to accept a gift, and Elisha was like, nah, man.
Isaiah says it’s futile for Moabites to pray at their shrines. When people pray to gods that can’t save, their gods aren’t going to save them. Isaiah also says if the people of David’s city ask anyone to read his scroll to them, they won’t get what they asked for. (Even if they ask someone who knows how to read!) Jeremiah or whoever said children were begging for bread, and no one gave it to them.
Ahaziah asked for his men to be allowed to sail with Jehoshaphat’s men, but Jehoshaphat refused. Some officials of Judah asked the Assyrian commander to speak to them in Aramaic, so the commoners wouldn’t hear his threats. But the commander said his message was for them too.
Johanan asked Gedaliah to let him kill Ishmael so Ishmael wouldn’t kill Gedaliah. But Gedaliah refused, and then Ishmael killed him. Xerxes asked his wife to display herself to his guests at a banquet, and she refused. John the Baptist says people can receive only what is given them from heaven. So if you ask someone who isn’t in heaven for something, you’ll never get it.
Someone begged Jesus’s disciples to heal his demon-possessed son, but they couldn’t do it. In one of Jesus’s parables, someone in hell asked for a little relief, or at least for someone to go warn his family, and Abraham refused both of his requests. Why does Jesus tell stories about people not getting what they ask for, if he thinks everyone who asks receives?
Simon the Sorcerer asked the apostles to sell him the ability to give people the Spirit, but Peter said it didn’t work that way. Paul’s enemies asked Festus to send him to Jerusalem so they could ambush him, but instead he sent him to Caesar. They asked Festus not to let Paul live any longer, but Paul lived at least two more years.
…No matter how godly you might be
When God asked Pharaoh to let his people go, Pharaoh refused. God asked Moses to let him kill the rest of the Israelites, and instead Moses convinced him not to. God kept sending prophets for centuries to ask his people to turn back to him and obey him, but they didn’t listen. He told them to listen to a trumpet, and they wouldn’t listen to that either. Even God doesn’t always get what he asks for.
Job asked his servant to come to him, and his servant didn’t answer. Joseph pleaded with his brothers not to try to kill him, but they didn’t listen. And when Joseph asked his father to put his right hand on the firstborn when he was blessing Joseph’s sons, his father refused, and gave the firstborn an inferior blessing.
Moses asked twice for his people to be allowed to peacefully pass through Edom. Instead, the king of Edom sent out a huge army to scare them away. The king of Moab similarly refused them. And the king of Heshbon wouldn’t let them pass through his land either. God made sure of that.
David sent messengers to ask Nabal to give him… something, but Nabal gave him nothing. David asked to join the Philistines in fighting against Israel, but the Philistine king said he couldn’t. Araunah asked David to accept as a gift everything he needed to make a sacrifice. But David wouldn’t accept it for free, because then it wouldn’t be a real sacrifice.
Elisha asked to “inherit a double portion” of Elijah’s spirit. But whatever that means, it looks like it probably didn’t happen. Elijah said Elisha would only get what he asked for if he saw Elijah being taken away. Then horses with a chariot of fire appeared out of nowhere, just so they could get in between the two prophets so Elisha wouldn’t be able to see Elijah being taken to heaven.
Pharaoh Necho asked Josiah not to go to war with him for no reason. But Josiah went into battle in disguise and got himself killed. Jehoiakim’s officials asked him not to burn the prophet Jeremiah’s scroll, but Jehoiakim did it anyway. In one of Jesus’s parables, a king asked a lot of people to attend his banquet, but nobody was willing to come.
Ask God, and you still won’t receive
Even when people ask God for something, they don’t always receive it.
After the incognito God lost a wrestling match to Jacob, Jacob asked him to tell him his name, but he didn’t. Too embarrassing, I guess. Moses asked God to either forgive the latest sin of the Israelites, or blot Moses out of God’s book. God’s response made it pretty clear that he would do neither. Moses asked God to let him enter the promised land, but that just made God angry. There was one time when God did what Joshua asked, but that was a completely unique event. God had never listened to a human being before, and he never has since.
Samuel told the Israelites that since they weren’t satisfied with God and insisted on having a human king, God would not answer them when they cried out for him to save them from their king. On multiple occasions, the king, Saul, asked God for advice, but he didn’t receive an answer.
David’s enemies cried to God for help, but he didn’t answer them. David says God is near to all who call on him. But then he seems to correct himself, and he says God is near to all who call on him in truth. Since David felt the need to make his statement more specific like that, it sounds like God is actually far from some who call on him.
Asaph, for instance, cried out to God, who had apparently forgotten or rejected him forever. Asaph distracted himself by thinking of stories about God helping others in the past, but there’s no indication that God ever actually started helping him. Asaph said God’s people’s prayers just made God angry and brought more misfortune on them. The sons of Korah cried out to God day and night, and God not only rejected them, but actively overwhelmed them with his wrath and terrors and suffering.
The story of Solomon suggests that God will give you some things if you ask for them, but there are other things that he will only give you if you don’t ask for them. God gave Solomon wisdom because he asked for it, but he gave him wealth only because he didn’t ask for it. Jonah asked God to kill him, but God just tormented him.
God told his people that no matter how much they prayed, he would hide from them and refuse to listen, because their sins separated them from him. His people weren’t fasting properly, so they couldn’t expect God to hear them. They hadn’t listened to him, so he wouldn’t listen to them. They could shout in his ears, and he wouldn’t listen. He wouldn’t even let anyone ask him questions. Not even prophets.
God had decided to destroy his people, and he wouldn’t listen to them or anyone who prayed for them. They wouldn’t get an answer from him any more than they would get an answer from their other gods. The king of Judah asked God to save them, but instead God said he would fight against Judah himself, joining their enemies to kill everyone in Jerusalem.
The Pharisees asked Jesus for a sign from heaven, but he said they wouldn’t get a sign. A man Jesus had healed begged to be allowed to go with him, but Jesus didn’t let him. After Jesus was arrested, people asked him a lot of questions and didn’t receive answers. Jesus didn’t even answer when they asked him if he was not going to answer.
Paul pleaded with God to take away his weakness, but God thought that wasn’t necessary. Philemon prayed for Paul to be restored to him, but that probably didn’t happen. Paul was already imprisoned in Rome, where he would be executed about two years later.
God pays no attention when people cry out for help. Why? God said every inclination of the human heart is evil. He tried to fix that, but it didn’t work. There is still not even one person who does good. So clearly a good God would never do anything a human asked him to do, because it would always be something evil. Everyone is a sinner, and God doesn’t listen to sinners.
…No matter how godly you might be
Job asked God to kill him, and instead God gave him 140 more years of life. Regardless of whether that was a good thing or not, Job decidedly did not receive what he asked for, so Jesus is wrong. Job also asked God to tell him what he had done wrong, which God never did, because Job hadn’t done anything wrong.
Eliphaz said if Job would just stop being wicked and start praying, God would hear him and make everything better for him and everyone else. But God said Eliphaz had not spoken the truth about him.
David pleaded with God for a week not to kill his innocent baby for what David had done, but God did it anyway. David cried out to God day and night, but God was far from saving him. And when David prayed for his enemies, his prayers returned unanswered. He wore himself out calling for help from God and not getting it.
David asked God to let him stay on the throne forever, or at least to increase his years to span many generations. But David died while his son was still young, without having lived an unusually long time. He asked God to give Solomon wholehearted devotion to keep God’s commands, but Solomon ended up worshiping other gods. God doesn’t even give people what they ask for when it’s what God wants too.
Elijah asked God to kill him, but God strengthened and encouraged him instead. Elijah did not receive what he asked for. Jeremiah or whoever called out for help, and God shut out his prayer. He covered himself with a prayer-proof cloud. Habakkuk asked why God didn’t listen when he asked to be saved from violence, and God’s only “answer” was that he was planning to send more violence.
People asked for a chance to say goodbye before they abandoned their families to follow Jesus, but that was not acceptable to Jesus.3 James and John asked Jesus to let them sit next to him in his kingdom, but Jesus didn’t have the authority to grant that, because he wasn’t God.
Not everyone who asks will get to live in the kingdom of heaven. You have to do more than just ask. Jesus told a parable where some women asked to be let into a wedding banquet, but the bridegroom claimed he didn’t know them, and he wouldn’t open the door. That’s how Jesus intends to treat people who ask to be let into the kingdom of heaven.
Jesus prayed not to have to be crucified. If Jesus is God, that means this was God asking God for something… and he still somehow didn’t get what he asked for!
God’s willingness to answer prayers is conditional
Jesus said if you believe, you will receive whatever you ask for in prayer. This suggests that people who don’t believe may not get what they ask for. He said you’ll get whatever you ask for in prayer… but only if you believe that you’ve received it, which is a completely absurd requirement. If you thought you already had it, you wouldn’t be asking for it.
Jesus said if you have even the tiniest amount of faith, you can even ask a mountain to move, and you will get what you asked for. But he said that in the context of explaining why his disciples had failed to get what they wanted. Because they didn’t even have that much faith. Everything is possible for one who believes, but apparently not for people who don’t believe… people like Jesus’s closest disciples. People who doubt can’t expect to receive anything they ask God for.
Jesus said God would do what his followers asked for, but only if two of them agreed on it. So if only one person wants something, that person isn’t going to get it. He also says God will do for you whatever you ask “if you remain in me and my words remain in you“. He’s adding an awful lot of conditions to this promise that at other times he had made unconditionally.
James says some people don’t receive what they ask for because they ask with the wrong motives. He says it’s the prayer of a righteous person that’s powerful and effective. Peter says bad behavior can hinder your prayers. And John says you’ll receive anything you ask of God if you have a clear conscience and do what God wants. Why do they have to specify these conditions, if God gives generously to all without finding fault?