Readings: Gal 2:1-2.7-14, Ps. 117, Luke 11:1-4
Rev. Fr. Emmanuel Emenike Onyia.
HOW TO PRAY THE RIGHT WAY ACCORDING TO THE LORD JESUS
As human beings, communication is part and parcel of our lives, and prayer is one of the important means of communicating between God and humanity. It is a close link by which we reach God who dwells in our hearts. It is through prayer that we discern the will of God for us.
Hence, if we have not been able to discern the will of God for our lives or have not had any personal relationship with God in prayer, then perhaps we should consider examining our prayer life to know if we have been praying the right way. Thus we can learn the proper way to pray from the prayer Jesus taught his disciples as a pattern for all prayers, as we have in our Gospel passage today.
In this prayer, we have four traditional dimensions of prayer, which include: glorification of God, submission, justice and protection. Jesus begins by saying: “Father, hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come”, thereby teaching us that we begin any of our prayers by glorifying God. Following this is our total submission to God’s providence when we say: give us each day our daily bread.
Then, we acknowledge the justice and mercy of God when we say: forgive us our sins as we forgive those we have sinned against us. And finally, we ask for God’s guidance and protection when we say: lead us not into temptation but deliver us from all evil.
This is important because it is the means by which we communicate with our God. But oftentimes
we treat prayer wrongly when we consider prayer as a means to only achieve what we desire without considering what God desires for us. Some of us end up spending lots of time reciting the prayers, and yet we do not mean what we say.
This is because we have a wrong disposition born from an unforgiving heart, which must be redirected before we can get a positive response from God. This is what St. Paul was emphasising in our first reading today when he reminded the Galatians how he stood firm in defence of the Gentiles before Peter and the Jews.
This is what the memorial of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary we are celebrating today represents. An event where we recall the famous victory of the Christian faithful against the enemies of the Church in the Battle of Lepanto, where through the prayers and intercessions of Our Blessed Mother Mary the Church became victorious when the situation of the Christian faith was in extreme danger and was bitterly divided by the various heresies and splinter groups appearing at the time due to the Reformation movement.
Then, Pope Pius V called all of Christendom to pray the rosary fervently, seeking the intercession of Mary, the Mother of God, that her Son Jesus should be with the faithful fighting for the survival of the Christian faith, which was under persecution and trials. And through the power of their love and dedication to praying the Rosary, God granted victory to his faithful people, and this is the root of our October devotion.
Dear friends, as we know, there are times when we asked, and we received; sought and found; knocked, and the door was opened to us. But there were also times when we asked but did not receive, sought but did not find, knocked but the door remained shut. In such moments, persistence and perseverance in prayer are what we are called to embrace. For they will help us to understand how to trust God knowing that he does not need to be informed of our needs, thereby encouraging us never to lose heart.
This is certainly one of the biggest challenges of our faith today. People are not just patient with God. We want to have everything right now as it is hot. Patience, persistence, and perseverance are very difficult virtues for most people today.
Therefore, it is time for us to change our perspective and wrong disposition towards prayer. It is time for us to spend more quality moments in prayer and be connected with God. We must let our prayers also be meaningful and be genuine from our hearts. It is time for us to improve the quality of our prayer life by imitating Jesus, who always prayed to his heavenly Father at every possible opportunity.
LET US PRAY: Lord God, oftentimes we are not patient with you in our prayers, because we don't know how to dialogue with you in prayer. Through the intercession of Our Lady of the Holy Rosary, give us the grace to learn how to dialogue with you and to persevere and be persistent in our prayer life and in every other thing we do in life, especially in our relationship with others. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen. Have a fruitful day.
No comments:
Post a Comment