{"id":1210,"date":"2013-10-20T07:26:40","date_gmt":"2013-10-20T11:26:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/?p=1210"},"modified":"2013-10-20T07:26:40","modified_gmt":"2013-10-20T11:26:40","slug":"homily-29th-sunday-in-ordinary-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/homily-29th-sunday-in-ordinary-time\/","title":{"rendered":"Homily – 29th Sunday in Ordinary Time"},"content":{"rendered":"

29th<\/sup> Sunday in Ordinary Time<\/a>
\nExodus 17:8-13
\n2 Timothy 3:14-4:2
\nLuke 18:1-8
\nOctober 20, 2013<\/p>\n

Jesus speaks today about the necessity<\/i> to pray always.<\/i><\/p>\n

Pray always<\/i>?<\/p>\n

Doesn\u2019t that mean praying 24\/7?\u00a0 How can we do that?\u00a0 We need to work, sleep, and eat.\u00a0 We can\u2019t possibly pray always.<\/p>\n

Look at the story of Moses.\u00a0 While Joshua led the Israelites in battle it was Moses\u2019 role to stand atop the mountain with his arms outstretched.\u00a0 This is a posture of prayer.\u00a0 It\u2019s how I hold my arms during specific prayers at Mass.\u00a0 It is a gesture of praising God and opening our arms (lives), inviting God into our lives.<\/p>\n

What happened to Moses when his arms got tired?\u00a0 He got so tired that Aaron and Hur had to hold up his arms for him.<\/p>\n

Now, we don\u2019t hold up our arms in prayer for arms to grow physically tired in our prayer but we can tire in our prayer.\u00a0 We can tire from our prayers that we feel go unanswered.\u00a0 We can tire when we struggle to feel God\u2019s presence in our prayer.\u00a0 Prayer can be hard.\u00a0 To pray always can make it seem impossible.<\/p>\n

To help us understand what He means by \u201cpraying always\u201d Jesus offers a parable.\u00a0 The woman is awaiting a court decision.\u00a0 The judge has a reputation for not rendering decisions immediately.\u00a0 He doesn\u2019t care what people think or what God thinks.<\/p>\n

Knowing this, the woman keeps going back to the judge to ask him to render a \u201cjust<\/i> decision\u201d.\u00a0 I want to emphasis that she is asking for a \u201cjust\u201d decision rather than a decision in her favor (although we can imagine that she thinks a just decision would be in her favor).<\/p>\n

Finally, the judge renders his decision to get the woman off his back.\u00a0 Her persistence pays off.<\/p>\n

So, does this mean that if we keep \u201cnagging\u201d God He will give us what we what?\u00a0 Would that imply that we can change the mind of God?<\/p>\n

We cannot change God\u2019s mind nor should we want to.\u00a0 God is the one who knows what is best.\u00a0 We shouldn\u2019t want to change God\u2019s mind.<\/p>\n

So what is the lesson to be learned from the parable?<\/p>\n

We see that the woman don\u2019t ask the judge for a decision 24\/7 but she did keep going back to the judge.\u00a0 We need to keep going back to God in our prayers but why bother?\u00a0 If we can\u2019t get God to do what we want, what\u2019s the point?<\/p>\n

I think persistence in our prayers can have an effect on us.\u00a0 First, when we keep praying for the same thing with an open heart, we see how important it is.\u00a0 If we just pray for something once, we realize it isn\u2019t that important.<\/p>\n

Praying with an open heart (and I emphasis an \u201copen heart\u201d) over and over, can help us to understand where God is leading us.\u00a0 Maybe God wants to reveal to us part of why things are as they are.<\/p>\n

When we pray persistently with an open heart, we can also learn from God what we need to ourselves for God\u2019s will to be done.<\/p>\n

So, the persistence in prayer is not meant to change God\u2019s mind but it can change our mind to conform to God\u2019s Will.<\/p>\n

Even knowing this, prayer can still be hard.\u00a0 Sometimes, we never understand why our prayers don\u2019t get answered.\u00a0 That\u2019s why reading the Bible is important for us to persist and not grow weary.<\/p>\n

Reading the Bible with a prayerful open heart helps us to know God\u2019s Will.\u00a0 The Bible is written by human beings but it is inspired by God as a way to reveal His truth to us.<\/p>\n

Reading stories in the Bible we hear stories of others whose prayers weren\u2019t always answered and\/or not answered when they wanted.\u00a0 In the reading the Bible we can see how God has been present to his people throughout the ages even when their prayers weren\u2019t answered.\u00a0 Readings these Bible stories helps us to know that God will also be there for us.<\/p>\n

May we preserve in prayer not to change God\u2019s mind but the God\u2019s will be done.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

29th Sunday in Ordinary Time Exodus 17:8-13 2 Timothy 3:14-4:2 Luke 18:1-8 October 20, 2013 Jesus speaks today about the necessity to pray always. Pray always? Doesn\u2019t that mean praying 24\/7?\u00a0 How can we do that?\u00a0 We need to work, sleep, and eat.\u00a0 We can\u2019t possibly pray always. Look at the story of Moses.\u00a0 While …<\/p>\n

Continue reading ‘Homily – 29th Sunday in Ordinary Time’ »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[82],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMTPk-jw","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1210"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1210"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1211,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1210\/revisions\/1211"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.renewaloffaith.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}