...Israel Had the Better of the Fight

10-16-2022Weekly ReflectionFr. Manasseh Iorchir, VC

Ora et Labora, pray and work; this is the famous motto of St. Benedict, Patron Saint of our parish. This motto is providentially the theme of the Readings at the liturgy this weekend.

The First Reading presents to us Israel’s experience of the complementarity of prayer and action. On their way from Egypt, the land of slavery, to the Promised land Israel encountered many hostile nations who saw the travelling nation as an existential threat. One of such nations was Amalek, a nation of nomads that stood between Israel and Sinai, Sinai being the mountain where Israel had hoped to stop to meet with the God of their ancestors by whose power they were freed from Egypt. The Amalekites attacked Israel and so the redeemed people were forced to respond in order to guarantee passage to Sinai and the Promised Land, as well as to ensure their continuous existence as a nation. Joshua the son of Nun, commander of Israel’s hastily assembled forces led his fighting men in battle in the valley while Moses, Aaron and Hur went to the mountaintop to persistently beseech the Lord in prayer on Israel’s behalf. While Israel fought, her intercessors prayed, both actions were absolutely necessary for the same reason that faith and works operate together.

It is important to note that in the Old Testament there were no secular wars. Every battle was both a physical and spiritual conflict because the opposing armies always called on their respective gods. The conflict of nations was always the conflict of their divinities, thus the stronger divinities won. So here as well, there was a spiritual battle going on between the Lord, the God of Israel, and the gods of the Amalekites. The First Reading reports that as long as Moses had his hands raised towards Heaven in supplication, Israel gave the Amalekites a bloody nose, but the Amalekites seemed to recover whenever Moses’ hands went down. When Moses’ arms became weary, Aaron and Hur helped to hold his hands up in prayer. Even the intercessor needed help to have his hands to be held up in persistent prayer. We should hold each other’s hands up in prayer especially when faith and commitment wanes. Israel won because God won, the fighting army and the praying intercessors were God’s way of incorporating human participation in the fulfillment of His plans.

As a Church and as individual Christians, we often find ourselves in the position of the Israelites on their way to Sinai. We have been redeemed from Egypt (meaning our slavery from sin) by crossing through the Red Sea (meaning the Sacrament of Baptism). However, now that we are free people we are often in conflict with hostile nations that would like to stand between us and eternal life. We should hasten to apply the Israelite example of prayer and action, supplication and sincere effort, in order to successfully battle the hostility of sin in our lives. Prayer empowers the resolve and sincere effort to resist temptation and combat the lure of sin. A prayerless Christian is simply a powerless Christian who is not ready to resolutely declare the triumph of righteousness over evil in his life.

Every Christian is encouraged not only to pray, but to do so consistently and with dogged persistence. This is what Jesus emphasized in the Gospel passage at the Mass this weekend. Since persistence, as exhibited by the widow in Jesus’ parable, earned her justice even from a hesitant and reluctant authority, the Divine Redeemer argues that a loving Father and God will certainly grant what we ask if we pray persistently. St. Augustine is quoted to have asserted “pray as though everything depended on God, work as though everything depended on you”.

Let us ask the Lord to empower us with the Grace to be persistent in prayer, even as we battle sin. May we be persistent in our study of Sacred Scripture and the preaching of the Good News and so fulfill adequately our Christ bequeathed mandate to make disciples of all nations.

Please be kind and may God bless you.

Fr. Manasseh

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