Try to examine how you pray. Which one describes your prayer: prayer with expectant faith, prayer with insistent faith, or prayer with resignation? - Daily Reflections June 26,2015

JESUS CANNOT RESIST OUR SUBMISSION

 

There were so many people who were sick and were in need when Jesus was walking through Palestine during His public ministry. God though He was, He did not cure all. He did not hold a huge healing crusade and He did not go from north to south on a healing tour. Had He done so, He would have converted the whole of Palestine, the whole of the Roman Empire and the world.

       First, our Lord Jesus wanted to emphasize that this earth is not our utopia. The fulfillment of the Kingdom of God is not here, but in another life. Likewise, Jesus wanted to show that God’s power did not work in an automatic way, disregarding human choice and freedom. God does not supplant our humanity. Out of love, God initiates but we have to welcome Him and open up to His invitation.

       The poor leper in today’s Gospel could have attracted Jesus’ attention by His unique way of coming up to Jesus. He said: “Lord, if You will, You can make me clean.” This is humility. The Book of Sirach (25:2) states that not all people who are sick or poor or needy are automatically humble. There is “a beggar who is proud.” But the words of the leper reveal not only a humble beggar. They reveal a person fully submitted to God’s will. Again, the leper said to Jesus: “Lord, if You will, You can make me clean.” He had a disposition that was very much like Jesus who says before the Father: “Not My will, but Your will be done.” No wonder, the leper’s prayer was irresistible for Jesus. Fr. Domie Guzman, SSP

 

REFLECTION QUESTIONS: Try to examine how you pray. Which one describes your prayer: prayer with expectant faith, prayer with insistent faith, or prayer with resignation? Which kinds of situations make you struggle with accepting?

 

Help me to trust You so much, Lord, that I will always seek that Your will be done.