If any of you lacks wisdom, let him ask of God… – James 1:5

No man will ask wisdom till he knows that he is ignorant. Come, dear hearer, confess your ignorance into the ear of God, who is as present here as you are; say unto Him, “Lord, I have discovered now that I am not so wise as I thought I was; I am foolish and vain. Lord, teach Thou me.” Make a full confession, and this shall be a good beginning for prayer.

Asking has also in it the fact the God is believed in. We cannot ask of a person of whose existence we have any doubt, and we will not ask of a person of whose hearing us we have serious suspicions. Who would stand in the desert of Sahara and cry aloud, where there is no living ear to hear? Now, my dear hearer, thou believest that there is a God. Ask, then!

There is in this method of approaching God by asking a clear sight that salvation is by grace. It does not say, “Let him buy of God, let him demand of God, let him earn from God.” Oh! no-“let him ask of God.” It is the beggar’s word. The beggar asks alms. You are to ask as the beggar asks of you in the street, and God will give to you far more liberally than ye to the poor. You must confess that you have no merit of your own. If you will not acknowledge that, neither will God hear your prayers; but come now with the acknowledgment of ignorance, with the confession of sin, and believing that God is the rewarder of them that diligently seek Him, and He will even now give you the wisdom which saves the soul. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0735.cfm