How many times has someone asked you to pray for them? How many times have you told someone you would pray for them? This is a common occurrence for most of us. However, how often do we remember to actually pray for those whom we said we would? Furthermore, how often do we only pray one time for a person’s intentions? The reading from the twenty-ninth Sunday in Ordinary Time instruct us to pray for one another always and be persistent in that payer. But how do we do that? We’ll get to the answer to that question in a bit.
The Amalekites Defeated
The Amalekites came and attacked the Israelites at Rephidim. Moses said to Joshua, “Choose some of our men and go out to fight the Amalekites. Tomorrow I will stand on top of the hill with the staff of God in my hands.” So Joshua fought the Amalekites as Moses had ordered, and Moses, Aaron and Hur went to the top of the hill. As long as Moses held up his hands, the Israelites were winning, but whenever he lowered his hands, the Amalekites were winning. When Moses’ hands grew tired, they took a stone and put it under him and he sat on it. Aaron and Hur held his hands up—one on one side, one on the other—so that his hands remained steady till sunset. So Joshua overcame the Amalekite army with the sword. Exoduse 17 : 8-13
The Parable of the Persistent Widow
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’ “For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!’” And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?” Luke 18 : 1-8
Scriptural Analysis – Old Testament
The reading from Exodus highlights the continued struggles the Israelites had during their sojourn in the desert. In addition to shortages of food and water, they had to deal with attacks from other groups over the rights to wells and pastures. One of those groups were the Amalekites, an ancient people that controlled the trade routes between Egypt and Arabia. They were spread all over the north of the Sinai peninsula. They would remain a persistent enemy of the Israelites until the time of Hezekiah. This particular attack shows that the same God who cared for the Israelite’s need for food and water, also will protect them from enemy attacks.
With his Rod in hand, Moses oversees the battle from a distance but his main assistance in the battle is through pray: through interceding for the people with God. As long as Moses held his hands up, the Israelites won the battle. As soon as he was unable to keep his hands raised, they began to loose the battle. In order to keep his hands raised, Aaron and Hur assisted Moses keeping his hands held high. The mention of Joshua leading the battle, and of Aaron and Hur assisting Moses points to the future where, after Moses, political-military authority will be split off from religious authority with the priests taking over the later.
The image of Moses with his hands help high has been understood to be as a type of Christ. The main difference is that Moses needed help in keeping his arms held high. Jesus, as St. John Chrysostom notes, “himself held his hands extended on the cross by his own power. Do you see how the type was given and the truth came?“
Scriptural Analysis – Gospel
Luke opens chapter eighteen of his Gospel with Jesus telling his disciples that is is necessary that they pray always without becoming weary. There is a comparison here to Moses in the Exodus reading who got weary in prayer. When Jesus originally taught the disciples how to pray he told them a parable. (11:5-8) He takes the same approach with this instruction as well. Of note, this particular parable is found only in the Gospel of Luke.
The parable centers around a judge with questionable character. Rather than fear God and keep his commandments, he has no fear of God nor does he have regard for people. The parable also features a widow who would come to the judge repeatedly asking for a just decision in her case. In ancient Israel, widows were very vulnerable thus we see numerous instructions to defend them and not oppress them. A God fearing jurist would immediately feel obliged by Torah to take care of the widow, “Cursed be he who perverts the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless, and the widow.” (Deuteronomy 27:19) Yet this judge feels no such obligation.
This situation continues for a long time as the judge was unwilling to relent. However, the widow keeps pestering the judge similar to the persistent person who kept bugging his friend at midnight for some bread, ignoring his friend’s request to, “Not bother me.” (Luke 11:5-7) Just as in this earlier parable where the friend eventually relented, we see here also the judge eventually relenting and giving the widow what she wanted. The judge was not motivated by a sense of justice but rather his own self-interest, namely getting this widow to stop bugging him.
Jesus then explain the parable. Just as in the parable of the peristant gentlemen, Jesus again uses a how much more argument. If a dishonest judge grants justice to a widow who repeatedly demands it, how much more will God secure the rights of those who follow him. They will ultimately be vindicated even if their current situation appears hopeless. The key is the persistence. Remain persistent in the faith even if that means the request is finally answered at the end of time.
Daily Application
When the Israelites went to battle with the Amalekites, Moses prayer for the success of the campaign. As long as he remained in prayer, the Israelites did well. The moment he was no longer able to remain in prayer with his arms raised high, the Israelites began to loose the battle. Moses needed help. He needed others to rally around him and give him the strength he needed to remain persistent in prayer.
The Lord is calling us to be persistent in prayer as well. That is the message of the Gospel: ask the Lord and continue to ask the Lord over and over and over again. Your prayer will be answered but you have to continue to ask. To state it differently, you have to keep the faith. That can be hard to do. It can be hard to be consistent in prayer, to continue to bring our needs to the Lord over and over again especially when it feels like our prayer is not and never will be answered. It is easy for discouragement to set in. This Gospel tells us to do the opposite. To continue to turn to the Lord in prayer. How do we do that? How do we do that when we are tired and the discouragement sets in?
The solution is the follow the lead of Moses and get help: to share your needs with those around you and invite them to pray with you and for you. That requires two things. First, on the part of the petitioner it requires humility and vulnerability. You have to be humble to let others know that you need help. You have to be vulnerable enough to share with them your specific intention: an intention that is often very personal in nature.
On the part of the one being invited to pray, they are called to respond with patient love. They have to recognize the importance and the personal nature of the prayer request being made. They also have to have the commitment and the endurance to pray for the intention being shared with them: to remain persistent in that prayer. This is a huge responsibility and one not to be taken lightly. Don’t casually say you will pray for someone without the firm commitment to do so. If you need help to keep that commitment then ask for it.
Fortunately, we have an entire army of such intercessors that we can call on. These intercessors will respond with love, hold our request in confidence, and pray to God unceasingly for us. This army is the Communion of Saints: specifically the Church Triumphant, the Saints in heaven. We can call upon them to help us and pray for us. We can call upon them to pray for others: for those who asked us to pray for them. More importantly, we SHOULD call upon them on a regular basis. They are in heaven waiting and wanting to assist us. They will pray for us always, we just need to ask.
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