Br. Christopher addresses a concern: “Friends, in a previous blog I shared on the Miraculous Power of Intercessory Prayer, and made the bold statement that God intervenes EVERY SINGLE TIME WE PRAY. But I can hear some of you say, “But Br. Christopher, I have asked for plenty of things in prayer that I never got. How can you say that God answers every prayer?” It is a great question! The biggest obstacle to believing this is seemingly unanswered prayers. We all have the experience of asking for something in prayer that never materializes, even when we are praying for what appears to us as obviously good and necessary. So we wonder, how can we take seriously Our Lord’s Promise that “Whatever you ask for in prayer, you will receive it”?
I’d like to share a story that has been helpful to me. There was a little girl who heard that her beloved kindergarten teacher was very sick with a high fever. She knelt down on her little knees, clasped her hands, looked up to heaven and prayed very fervently, “Oh God, make teacher’s temperature zero, make teacher’s temperature ZERO!”
How should God answer such an earnest prayer?
Obviously, the little girl is not asking God to KILL her teacher, which is what would happen if God answered her prayer literally and lowered her teacher’s body temperature to the freezing point. God sees and responds to the true intention of our hearts, in this case, the little girl’s sincere desire for her teacher’s good. In our human ignorance and littleness we often don’t know what the best good really is, but from His Infinite Heavenly Perspective and Divine Wisdom, God does, as incomprehensible as it might be to us. We remember that God brought about the best good the world has ever known through the Cross of Jesus Christ.
And so I continue to stand on the above point, but add to it: that God intervenes every time we pray IN THE BEST WAY POSSIBLE, either giving us what we pray for in the manner we ask, or in a way far better than we would even know how to ask. Those are the only two options.
For us, our task is to keep praying.”
God bless you,
Your brothers of New Clairvaux
#prayer #intercession #NewClairvaux #monks #trappists
