Midnight is a rather late hour for a guest to arrive, especially if the guest was not expected. However, it was common for people to travel at night in Palestine because it was cooler. It was considered unwise to journey long in the heat of the midday sun. Unfortunately, when this unexpected guest arrived, his friend had no food in the house. This was not only distressing but also embarrassing for the host. In the Middle East, hospitality is regarded as a sacred duty.
On the other hand, getting up from bed in the middle of the night is such an annoyance. Getting up from one’s spot in a one-room house and walking over everybody else to unbolt the door is an even worse bother for everyone in the house. Being pestered by a neighbor who lacked foresight and now demands groceries just when you ought to be sleeping can be annoying, for knocking at the door is another intensification of the idea of asking and seeking.
Who would want to be disturbed when common sense dictates that no one ought to be doing that? Hmmm … Welcome to the world of impatient human beings like me. Well, today’s reflection is not about you and me, thank God! We are an impatient lot. But we can thank God even more because today’s Gospel passage is not about the prayer but the one we should be praying to. With faith, yes! With persistence, yes! Unceasingly, yes!
Jurgen Moltmann says, “Prayer is not a servant’s desperate begging, nor is it the insistence of a demanding child; prayer in Christ’s name is the language of friendship”. If that is true of the one who asks in prayer, it is all the more accurate of the one who answers prayer.
In 1850, American novelist Nathaniel Hawthorne published a story entitled, “The Great Stone Face.” It is about a gigantic and noble face that nature had carved on the side of a mountain overlooking a village. An old legend said that one day, one of the villagers would come to resemble that majestic and saintly Stone Face. A young lad longed for such a man to show up one day. Meanwhile, he passed all his leisure hours contemplating the Stone Face. Time passed. The lad became an older man. One day, the villagers realized with shock that his luminously holy face had become the exact resemblance of the Great Stone Face.
In the Gospel of Luke, Jesus tells us: “Ask, and it will be given to you, knock, and the door will be opened to you.” There is a mystery here for many of us; because we ask for many things which we never receive. We wait long and our faith is shaken. But Jesus does not say that we will necessarily receive what we ask for, only that something will be given to us. It always is, if not what we asked for, then something better. Perhaps something better is the slow transformation that takes place in ourselves if we look at God long enough. Don’t be afraid to knock ... for it will transform us.
Father Boby John, C.S.C., ordained a priest in the Congregation of Holy Cross in 2008, worked as a pastor and as an educator with tribal populations in Northeast India for thirteen years. Originally from Kerala, India, Father Boby grew up with three siblings. He is a dedicated and detailed educationist with experience in educational leadership. He is currently working as an executive assistant at the world headquarters of Holy Cross Family Ministries, North Easton, Massachusetts.
