11 May 2013
Saturday of the Sixth Week of Easter
There are plenty of obstacles to good communication with others. Our own stubbornness need not be one of them.
Prayer is an ever-deepening relationship with God, based on good, regular communication. One obstacle to prayer is that we presume that since God is all-knowing, we need not ask for what we need. We expect that God should just know what we need, and wave His magic wand to grant our wishes. When we don’t hear anything, God feels distant or absent.
But this is to misconstrue Christian prayer. We articulate our needs and desires in prayer not to let God know them – but to make ourselves more aware of our own needs and desires. And when we honestly ask ourselves the question, “What do I need today?” we can sort out the needs from the wants more easily.
Consider today’s gospel reading from John:
Jesus said to his disciples:
“Amen, amen, I say to you,
whatever you ask the Father in my name he will give you.
Until now you have not asked anything in my name;
ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete.
When we seek God with a sincere heart, and lay our desires at His feet, we are vulnerable and risk feeling rejected. But, as a wise older friend likes to say, “God always grants us our holy desires – unless He has a better plan in store for us.”