GOSPEL COMMENTARY LK 11:1-13
Are you spiritually healthy? Prudent people take great pains to
care for their physical well-being, and turn to a medical doctor at the first
sign of illness. But how many people recognize that there is such a thing as
spiritual health? When I am spiritually healthy, external circumstances and the
vicissitudes of life are powerless to disrupt the peace of my soul. Traffic
cannot upset me. The fall of the stock market does not cause me worry. My
favorite sports team can lose the big game. My flight can be canceled. Despite
life’s changing circumstances, my soul remains at peace.
When I am not spiritually healthy, the only way I can stay
cheerful is if everything goes my way. Think about your best days. What were
they like? Were they days in which everything had to go your way? If so, then
you are a spiritual prisoner — a prisoner of circumstances and of self-seeking.
God wants to set you free, but you must cooperate. The quality of our
cooperation with God is determined in great measure by the quality of our
prayer.
In the Gospel this week, a disciple approaches Jesus and asks,
“Lord, teach us to pray just as John taught his disciples.” First-century
rabbis typically gave instruction in prayer to their disciples, so this request
is not surprising. What is surprising is Jesus’ answer. Jesus does not teach a
technique, but rather teaches a prayer, which we all know as the Our Father.
This week we hear Luke’s version of the Our Father, which is shorter than the
one we are accustomed to from the Gospel of Matthew. It contains five petitions
instead of seven. Why is Luke’s Our Father shorter? In all likelihood, Luke
recounts one of many times Jesus taught the Lord’s Prayer. Every good teacher
knows the most important lessons deserve to be repeated, and knows which points
to highlight when doing so.
Take a moment to consider the Our Father not just as words to
recite, but as an instruction in how to pray. Notice how the Our Father begins.
Our first word to God is not a request or a demand, but a deeply personal
greeting: “Father.” Prayer is a relationship, and we don’t approach God as
though he were an employee, or a boss, or a vending machine that delivers goods
on demand. God is not an abstract power, or an impersonal creator, or a
spirit-force. God is your Father, and we should speak to him with deepest love.
Jesus’ next words are replete with joy and praise. “Hallowed be your name. Your
kingdom come” (Lk 11:2). Once again, our relationship with God, joyful to the
core, comes before a single petition to God is addressed. The Our Father
teaches us that the praise and love of God should be our first instinct.
Of the three things Jesus teaches us to ask for in prayer, notice
which comes first — our daily bread. What does Jesus mean by daily bread? When
a first-century Jewish audience heard these words, they would have thought
immediately of the manna in the desert. The Book of Exodus describes manna as a
fine, flaking, frost-like bread that appeared each morning like the dewfall.
The Israelite people could gather only one day’s worth of manna. Anyone who
tried to hoard up too much manna would soon discover that it went bad.
Literally, “It bred worms, and stank” (Exod 16:20). Then just as now, God wants
you to abandon yourself to trust in his goodness each day, and to recognize
that God really does provide what you need.
Since the Our Father is a prayer taught by Christ himself, its
capacity for teaching us about prayer is literally infinite. This week, try to
hear the Our Father as Jesus’ instruction in how to become spiritually healthy.
Place first things first — love, praise and trustful surrender. This path,
taught by Christ and proven by generations of saints, is how children of the
heavenly Father discover the unassailable peace that is their birthright.
Fr. Hudgins is pastor of St. Jude Church in
Fredericksburg.