Thursday in the 27th Week of Ordinary Time, October 8, 2020

Luke 11:5-13

Jesus said to his disciples: “Suppose one of you has a friend to whom he goes at midnight and says, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, for a friend of mine has arrived at my house from a journey and I have nothing to offer him,’ and he says in reply from within, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been locked and my children and I are already in bed. I cannot get up to give you anything.’ I tell you, if he does not get up to give him the loaves because of their friendship, he will get up to give him whatever he needs because of his persistence.  And I tell you, ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives; and the one who seeks, finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened. What father among you would hand his son a snake when he asks for a fish? Or hand him a scorpion when he asks for an egg? If you then, who are wicked, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”

The Evangelists portray the Lord Jesus as all-powerful, and they also show him earnestly entreating the Apostles to pray to his Father in heaven, asking in his name for what they need.  Far from being miserly with his power, the Lord Jesus describes his Father as more willing to grant answers to prayers than anyone is to pray to him.  Indeed, Jesus shows the Father’s generosity through his own: if the Son is generous, curing all who desire to be cured, casting out demons, raising the dead, feeding crowds, how much more so his Father must be.  And by teaching us to call Almighty God our “Father”, the Son further encourages us to ask for gifts, for fathers bestow gifts on their children.  

In today’s Gospel reading, the Lord tells a parable in order to teach his followers how they are to ask for gifts in prayer.  He speaks of a man who has a midnight visitor.  This situation would have arisen now and then in that time and place.  A traveler in those days would most likely have made short journeys from one town to another on foot, and would have slept by the side of the road most of the time, since lodgings existed only in and near the cities.  Jesus alludes to this practice when he says that, “Foxes have dens and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man has nowhere to lay his head” (Luke 9, 58).  For some reason, this visitor decides to come to his friend’s door at a late hour rather than wait for morning.  But when the visitor arrived, long-held custom dictated that his beast, if he had one, be watered, and that he himself be fed.  Since the visitor catches the householder without even bread ready, he goes to his neighbor, rouses him, and asks him to get out of bed and give him some.  Naturally, the neighbor is irritated.  It is midnight, he was in bed, and could not his importunate neighbor have used some foresight to keep some loaves overnight in case he did have a late visitor?

The man does not give up: he must provide the customary hospitality for his visitor.  People of the Ancient Near East took this responsibility very much to heart.  The neighbor therefore knows that the man would not give up calling to him, and so he relents.  Luke quotes Jesus as saying, “Because of their friendship, he will get up to give him whatever he needs because of his persistence.”  The friendship enables the man to go to his neighbor for help, and his persistence wins him the bread.  Now, the Greek word is actually much stronger here: it is not so much “persistence” as “shamelessness”, or “shameless persistence”.  The man with the unexpected guest throws self-respect to the wind and begs and pleads for the bread.  The rest of the neighborhood can probably hear him making a fool of himself, but nothing matters except procuring bread.  He does not hold back even knowing he will have to face these people in the morning.  Propriety means nothing to him.

Jesus urges us to act in the same way with the Father: to beg, plead, entreat shamelessly and endlessly.  It is not that the Father is tight with his gifts, but that we must deeply acknowledge our utter dependence on him for them.  Many gifts he gives us and we are hardly aware of it, but for some gifts we must make this acknowledgment, and learn as thoroughly as we can that all that we have comes only from his liberality.  But not only is our God generous to us, but he is surpassingly wise and knows that some of the things we ask for are not good for us.  We ask for “snakes” and “scorpions” that would end up harming us.  So many dangerous things are wrapped up in bright packages.  So instead of giving us the snake that we unwittingly ask for, he gives us the fish that will really do us good.  This too is part of his generosity.  

“How much more will the Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?”  The Holy Spirit grants the gift of faith and the other virtues and also the graces we need in order to use the virtues, in order to do good, in order to be saved.  How much the Father wants us to come to him in heaven!  He does everything for us.  All we have to do is to ask for his spiritual gifts and receive them when they come.  The Son himself is the way for us, and he has unbolted the gates of heaven for us with his Cross acting as their key.  We see the generosity of the Father in the Son’s abundant miracles and in his sending his Son to die for us.  Let us be generous in our turn with what we receive so that in the end we may be received into heaven.