Don’t be afraid to beg …Every time I read or listen to the Old Testament narrative of Abraham standing before God and literally with him, as a merchant, he bargains for the number of the righteous for whom he will preserve sinful Sodom; again and again two facts appeal to me – on the one hand, the accessibility, generosity and mercy of God, who patiently listens to Abraham’s bargaining and what’s more, approaches them; and at the same time, openness, and from our point of view, perhaps even audacity, Abraham, who, although with respect, but very persistently, soothes the well-deserved wrath of God, over the sinners of Sodom. (Only below the line, in that big city, with hundreds, perhaps thousands, of inhabitants, there were not even ten righteous –that’s a warning. How would we turn out? Would there be at least a few righteous among us, that is, those who live with God and with men according to law, or, if you will, according to God’s law?) The Old Testament story, which teaches that God can be asked at any time for anything, is followed by today’s gospel in terms of content. It begins with prayer, a prayer we all know well. Lord’s Prayer. But still. It sounded somewhat different from what we are used to. We pray (and hopefully more than once a day) the Lord’s Prayer as recorded by the Evangelist Matthew. Does this mean that the evangelist Luke, from whose pen we heard today, was mistaken? Of course not, it is not a mistake, a wrong interpretation, an incorrect transcription of Jesus’ prayer. The gospels are not a stenographic record of Christ’s words, nor are they a historical study, let alone a report from the life of Christ.
Twice in the Gospels, we hear the Lord’s Prayer, and each time it is recited a little differently, but these are not two different prayers. It remains the same prayer with the duplicate content. At Matthew, we find the Lord’s Prayer composed of seven petitions; at Luke, two are missing. Nevertheless, St. Lukáš did not lose anything. Now let’s not compare the linguistic differences between evangelists, but let’s look at the content of this “prayer”. (Tertullian says that the Lord’s Prayer is a kind of summary of the entire gospel.) Luke’s Lord’s Prayer is a kind of compendium of Jesus’ lessons, scattered throughout all the Gospels. It is a model of everything essential that is supposed to characterize Christian prayer. It begins with SALUTATION – and that is already a sign of the universality of this prayer. It includes all who believe in God (not only Christians, but also Jews, Muslims, Anglicans, and separated Protestant brethren, and generally all people who believe in any way). For us, for everyone, God is our Father; no one can just appropriate that – we say Father OUR, not Father mine, or Father of Christians. Even when we pray as individuals, we pray on behalf of the whole human family to God the Father. That is the universal dimension, and at the same time, the salutation and the entire prayer in general also have a very personal dimension. For we should not overlook the beautiful fact that Jesus does not use the word “our FATHER” (which sounds rather mechanical and impersonal), but that Jesus’ ABBA, with which he addresses his and our Father, sounds translated as our “Papa”!
I will not go into the interpretation of this prayer of all prayers (countless theological and spiritual treatises have been written about it), but only the composition of this prayer. Five petitions follow the invocation of the Father, the order of which is certainly not random. First, we ask that the name of the living God be sanctified – the name of God will and must always remain HOLY! In the next petition, “Thy kingdom come”, we ask that God’s reign on this earth be manifested through peace, justice, and reconciliation.
At the same time, we ask for the coming of this kingdom – the kingdom towards which we are all moving, more or less consciously. The kingdom of God is the goal of our life’s direction; it would make no sense to long for any other goal and fulfillment in our lives. What follows is a request for what we need for our lives here and now, on an earth where, through our sin, we are creating a place of chaos, tension and unjust misery, whether material or spiritual, instead of God’s order and harmony. Therefore, we ask for daily bread (which is the fruit of God’s blessing on our labor) and for forgiveness of our guilt (which requires that we forgive others). And finally, we ask God that we do not succumb to the onslaught of evil in our – unfortunately, so numerous – temptations.
Jesus, after giving the disciples this treasure of the Lord’s Prayer, adds a parable about a person harassing his friend in the middle of the night. The interpretation of this example of Christ is twofold. The first, which picks up the insistence of the supplicant; the second, which emphasizes the unwilling, but still the help of the desired. The first interpretation is older, most vol. Fathers and ascetic interpreters of Scripture use it as proof of the necessity of persistent prayer. (If you are persistent in prayer, if you are equally persistent, God will surely hear you.) In Christ’s parable, however, it is not primarily about the perseverance of prayer, but about the certainty of being heard by the Father. The main person is not a supplicant at a closed door, but a friend who complies with the night’s request. (To understand this interpretation, you need to know Jewish customs and rules. For it was unthinkable that the Israelite of that time should deny his fellow-tribe hospitality, even if it were under the most challenging circumstances. However, it is easy to imagine that he complied reluctantly, without the noble motivation of friendship, just for his intrusiveness and insistence.)
So the main idea of this evangelical example is this: „When a person who is disturbed in his sleep and has certain difficulties in complying hears a neighbor’s request, how much more surely the almighty and benevolent God, whose supplications can never lead us into difficulty, and who even ENCOURAGES us, will hear EVERY request and prayer of ours! For constant prayer. Has not that exceedingly comforting and encouraging word come out of the mouth of Christ: „Beg and you will receive; seek, and you will find; beat, and it will open to you. For everyone who pleads receives, and whoever seeks finds, and whoever knocks, to him will open up…!“ My dears, these words do not need further comment; they only need our faith and prayer. Let’s not be afraid to beg, let’s not hesitate to beat, let’s keep looking. The words of Christ’s promise never cease to apply; it is up to us to take them seriously and not be shy to beg as insistently as Abraham, or as that nameless friend, at God’s door. After all, Christ called us friends and God accepted us as his children in baptism. Is it conceivable that God would not fulfill the wishes of his children, mainly if he addresses them with such an intimate address? „daddy
