Luther and Lewis

Thus he always mingles blood with baptism, in order that the red and innocent blood of Christ may be seen in it.—Martin Luther, Sermon from 1540

The New Testament contains embarrassing promises that what we pray for with faith we shall receive. Mark 11:24 is the most staggering. Whatever we ask for, believing that we’ll get it, we’ll get... How is this astonishing promise to be reconciled (a) With the observed facts? And (b) With the prayer in Gethsemane, and (as a result of that prayer) the universally accepted view that we should ask everything with a reservation (‘If it be Thy will’)?—C. S. Lewis, Business of Heaven, p. 189.