For the past two Sundays; fifteenth and sixteenth Sundays, Jesus has been answering questions on his road to Jerusalem. The first was the scribe who asked Jesus who is neighbour was and the reply was the story of the Good Samaritan which mirrors and depicts the love we owe to all irrespective of their race, religion and creed. The other was the dispute between Martha and Mary her sister at Bethany when they played host to Jesus.
Martha was anxious about serving while Mary sat at the Lord’s feet to listen to him. The end was the remark by Jesus that Mary had chosen the better part and it will not be taken away from her. (Frankly, I hope Jesus did not return to that home a second time because if I were to be Martha, he’d have to come with his own meal else …) Today dearest friends, Jesus still on that journey to Jerusalem stole a quiet time to pray and his disciples met him to teach them to pray. Desiring to learn to pray like the disciples of John, Christ obliges their request and teaches them.
Every teacher teaches what he knows but for Christ, knowledge incites action, as such he not only teaches what he knows but what he practices; a prayer that is sincere and earnest, no less persistent. The Lord’s prayer has a chief attribute- it lacks the first person pronoun. It speaks of ‘our’ and ‘us’ and not for any individual, a prayer that is said for the sake of all and the community. In a unique way it depicts the life of Christ from the incarnation to the passion, a life lived for the sake and salvation of others. Let us learn as Christians more so as Catholics to pray for and with others.
Like Christ we are called to prove neighbor to them by praying for them. If we cannot speak to people about God, let us learn to speak to God about them. Many will be saved by the latter. This clearly underscores the action of Abraham in the first reading of today, Gen. 18. Abraham was not speaking for himself but interceding for others, he was not speaking to them about God but rather speaking to God about them. The action of Abraham today was no mere bargaining, it was intercession, one that was hinged not on the fate of the just who are to be confused with sinners as such accounted as equally doomed, far be it from you to do such a thing. (Gen. 18:25).
It was rather a question of the weight of the just man. Can the just man tip the scale in the balance of judgment, can their justice move God to pardon? Abraham thinks yes and on this belief he begs and makes intercession. The intercession of Abraham is not simply for Sodom and Gomorrah alone but for the human city so perverted by sin that it cannot escape the wrath of God. The intercession of Abraham teaches us today the weight of the just man and the friendly communion of prayer with God. With the guise of simplicity and familiarity; prayer will not hesitate to be insistent and constant, to take charge in all situations even the most difficult- this is the example that the prayer of Jesus and Abraham leaves us in our liturgy today. The genius of the Lord’s prayer is in its simplicity and persistence.
Christ concludes the periscope of the Gospel today by illustrating the importunity of the friend who will obtain what he entreats from his friend. Our prayer therefore ought to follow this pattern- simple and persistent. God our father knows our needs he simply wants us to ask and thus by praying we build a relationship with him. Some kids these days do not want to pray and it is not the work of the devil, they are not possessed, it is simply because prayer is suddenly difficult. It is not a communion with God, it is a barrage of words. It loses fragrance when it is a means to pull down enemies, our entreaty becomes warfare. We should teach them to pray and understand that it is a relationship with God ‘Our Father’. A mother sent her fifth-grade boy up to bed.
In a few minutes she went to make sure that he was getting in bed. When she stuck her head into his room, she saw that he was kneeling beside his bed in prayer. Pausing to listen to his prayers, she heard her son praying over and over again. “Let it be Tokyo! Please dear God, let it be Tokyo!” When he finished his prayers, she asked him, “What did you mean, ‘Let it be Tokyo’?” “Oh,” the boy said with embarrassment, “we had our geography exam today and I was praying that God would make Tokyo the capital of France. He prayed hard but the time will not come when the capital of France would be Tokyo.
Sheldon was asked to help Georgie his elder brother study for a test whose failure would mean that he would not be in the football team. At table the night of the test his father asked how he-Georgie performed and he sounded unsure and so was Sheldon and everyone else. However, his mother consoled him that she would ask God to help him get a good grade in the test. Sheldon was surprised and so he asked his mother- “shouldn’t you have asked him before he took the test?” the mother replied- the man rose from the dead, I think he can fix a test after the fact.
Most times we act like Sheldon’s mother, and believe God to be the fixer who acts at our beck and call. For such people prayer is a magic wand that is waved and we name it and claim it. As much as nothing is impossible with God, he desires something more from us, a sincere relationship in prayer. If a friend only calls you up when they are in need, you would be weary of such a friend in the least. Prayer obtains all things by bending our wills to God’s will. St. Teresa of Calcuta once said- I used to believe that prayer changes things but now I know that prayer changes us and we change things. It is better in prayer to have a heart without words than to have words without a heart.
The former better disposes us to a loving relationship with God Our Father. God will indeed never refuse his Spirit to those who ask it from him. Let us pray that the Spirit will intercede for us with sighs too deep for words and too strong for tears, for in this matter of prayer much is obtained by sighs than by speech. The more loyal our faith, the stronger our hope and the more ardent our desire, so much more shall we receive. Let us pray: O Lord, fill us with your Spirit and grant us the grace to pray and the grace to hear you. Amen.
• Rev. Fr. Benjamin Mkpahu, Ass. Priest. St. Peter Claver Catholic Church Ajao, Lagos.
