Can you think of the times when our prayers don't seem to get answered? I can think of several.
Not necessarily the prayers for someone's detriment (although to be honest there are times when our prayers are not quite charitable) but sometimes even the prayers for someone's good. Like when we pray for healing for someone but healing doesn't come. Like when we pray for someone to be blessed but somehow they are still struggling for a long time after that.
Yes, we may pray that God will remove those who are evil from positions of authority, we pray that our adversaries would be removed from us. Or like Paul, we pray for God to take away some thorn in the flesh. Somehow the wicked seems to prosper even more and goes unpunished. The righteous continue to suffer instead despite our fervent prayers. And by the way, the thorn will still be there when we wake up each morning.
Could it be that at these times our prayers may just have come face to face with the sovereignty of God? Job's cries for understanding also comes to a head when he stares at the sovereignty of God. God is just too big to be understood. Sometimes God's sovereignty is like that. We can just never understand it no matter how hard we try. We just have to come to a place of acceptance.
Acceptance is always painful when in the sovereignty of God, the outcome of our prayers is not to our desires or expectations. We are left disappointed, a bit angry at times. We realise that God's answer to our cries can take many forms. Not all to our liking some times. Somehow, we come to learn and accept that His thoughts are not our thoughts, neither His ways our ways because the heavens will always be higher than the earth and so His thoughts and ways higher than ours. It still hurts nonetheless.
It is then we realise that our prayers are not about pushing God in a corner or forcing His hand. It is about the surrender of our will and our heart to His infinite wisdom and plans. Abraham's altar still speaks to us today about that. So do the stories of some of the heroes of faith in Hebrews 11.
26 October 2010
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God alone initiates salvation. He always turns toward man first and seeks him, as when God walked in the Garden (Genesis 3:8). Man does not seek God or turn to him without God first calling man to Himself (John. 6:37, 44; 1 John. 4:10,19).
ReplyDeleteSecond, God’s initiative does not exclude man’s free response, but demands it (Catechism of the Catholic Church [Catechism], nos. 154, 155, 2002; Philippians 2:12, 13). In other words, God wills that man be free to choose His grace or reject it.
Third, salvation is extended to each and every human person, not limited to just some, and one can fall away from grace (Hebrews 2:1-4; 6:4; 2 Peter 1:10; 3:9; 1 John 5:16, 17).
Furthermore, it is imperative that once one is touched by grace, he perseveres in charity lest he forfeit the free gift of salvation (Lumen Gentium [LG], no. 14). Within the confines of these principles, Catholics have sought to understand the mystery of predestination.
Though opinions and formulations have varied among Catholic theologians, with these principles left intact, there is room for legitimate speculation.
The only proper framework to understand predestination must be rooted in the notion of a communion of persons in love. Why? The nature of God as Trinity is this very kind of communion and God created man to share in that “blessed life” (cf. Catechism, no. 1).