The first reading for mass today and the responsorial psalm are about prayer. It is easy to overlook these two readings because the gospel is such a famous story in the bible. But, Saint Paul urges us “that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone.” At the end of the first reading Paul says ” I desire, then, that in every place the men should pray, lifting up holy hands without anger or argument.”
The responsorial psalm goes on with the same theme of prayer:
“Hear the voice of my supplication,
as I cry to you for help,
as I lift up my hands
toward your most holy sanctuary.”
God answers prayer, He really does. Even in seemingly hopeless situations, God answers prayer. Time and time again in the bible, we hear from people throughout the ages of the need to pray. Their words are a personal testimony to us, that God really does hear and answer our prayers. Believing this is hard to do sometimes though, especially when our prayers go unanswered for long periods of time. But, God does not answer prayers on our time table, but His. God answers our prayers through His own means, in His own way, and in His own good time. We should never give up praying. Jesus himself exhorts us to be persistent and never give up asking God for something that is important to us, in our prayers. The parable of the persistent widow, or the man whose family was already asleep for the night and his friend asked him to get up and let him borrow some bread, are examples of persistence in prayer.
The next lines of scripture in the psalm today verbalize our total dependence on God and our joy when He hears and answers our prayers:
“The Lord is my strength and my shield;
in him my heart trusts;
so I am helped, and my heart exults,
and with my song I give thanks to him.”
As we move on into today’s famous gospel reading, we should try and keep in mind this theme of prayer. The centurion was a man of prayer. He loved the Jewish people and even built a synagogue for them, so he must have been a man whose life was deeply rooted in prayer. There is no doubt that he was praying for his slave who was sick and lay near death. What is truly astounding about this man though, is that he was not just a man of prayer, he was also a man of action. He prayed, but then he followed up his prayers with a concrete action. Like building the synagogue, or sending his servants to Jesus. He didn’t sit around and wishfully hope for things to get better after he prayed to God about it. He had the faith to act on what the Holy Spirit led him to do. This small detail would be easy to overlook in the grand scope of things in this story, but it is important to note this. Prayer alone doesn’t change things. Life isn’t one dimensional. Prayer, action and living out God’s will in our lives is how our faith is dynamically and authentically lived. The centurion had this down pat. And, actually the centurion didn’t have to say a word to Jesus on his own behalf, because his actions preceded him.
Jesus was amazed at the centurion’s faith and said “I tell you, not even in Israel have I found such faith.”
These two men never met. That is also something that is worth noting. Jesus never physically met him. He didn’t need to. They were connected in the Spirit. The centurion trusted that Jesus was the son of God so much, that he believed that just a word from him would heal his slave. His humility and his absolute trust in Jesus was reflected in his words and still ring true throughout the generations. We say his words at every mass now:
“Lord, I am not worthy that you should enter under my roof, but only say the word and my soul shall be healed.”
However, the centurion’s exact words were, “but only speak the word, and let my servant be healed.” Today, would be an excellent day to pray for those we love, and their loved ones as well. Our faith isn’t just about our own healing, but other people’s healing too. Jesus loves to hear our prayers for the people we love and by his gracious will, answer them. In fact, prayers for other people seem to be answered more often than the requests we ask of the Lord for ourselves. Christ loves unselfishness. Let us storm the gates of heaven today, on behalf of those we love.
