Becoming God’s Friend in Order to become an Intercessor
Genesis 18:20-32; Colossians 2:12-14; Luke 11:1-13
Characteristics of friendship include the ability to talk to each other frankly, support each other mutually and have a relatively good understanding of each other, at least, each other’s likes and dislikes. One is lucky to find a friend, these days, that satisfies these criteria because of the overwhelming presence of mutually exclusive and antagonistic interests or conflict of interests in people. Most people prefer to act solo, so as to cover their tracks, and so pass themselves as holier-than-thou. In fact, the eleventh commandment – thou shall not be caught – is gradually becoming a cherished virtue, even though a vice can never become a virtue, at least, for Christians! But why harp on friendship today?
Well, our readings, the gospel and the first reading, provide us with the characteristics of friendship as a way of dealing with God. In a parabolic form, our gospel tells us about what one who has a friend does for her/his friend – she/he helps prevent her/his friend from falling into disgrace and saves her/him from embarrassments. The example and context of our gospel present two realities that are still very much with us today: 1) poverty, and 2) migration as hindrances to friendship. A traveler is a migrant, albeit, for a short duration. And a migrant really needs hospitality and help. Some people would very much like to help a migrant or be hospitable, but economic and financial poverty make that difficult, so they count on friendship to bail them out. Most of us are either guests/migrants or hosts in this kind of situations. Globally, migrants are in need of hosts, be they governments, charities or individuals, to take them in.
Our gospel presents a man who welcomes a guest, but due to poverty lacks the wherewithal to be hospitable to his guest. So, he takes the initiative to seek the assistance of a friend of his to rescue him from an imminent disgrace. Poverty plays a double role here, the wayfarer lacks the means for his sustenance, but goes to reside with a friend. This friend of his too needs help to take care of his guest/migrant friend; hence, he too goes to a friend of his for aid. We have before us a need-web which requires friendship to disentangle. And Jesus’ suggestion is that human needs will be addressed to the degree to which friendship is valued and its codes respected, the code of intercession – a friend who seeks to provide for the needs of his friend-guest!
Just like the parable of the gospel, although Abraham isn’t in trouble, his cousin Lot and the people of Sodom and Gomorrah are. The dialogue of Abraham with God provides the parameters for evaluating what friends do for each other. The idea of a God who doesn’t dialogue, who is brutal and authoritarian is far from the picture we read from our first reading. On the contrary, we see a patient and reasonable God because he allows Abraham to “lobby” for those in need, when those needs are not Abraham’s. Should one ask the question of why God visits Abraham on his way to Sodom and Gomorrah, instead of going there directly, one can’t but conclude that God seeks for intercessors or negotiators as a pretext to show mercy. Moreover, God needs friends, he wants your friendship and mine.
As the adage goes, “the home of a friend is never far”. It is the power of friendship with Abraham that makes God visit with him on his way to Sodom and Gomorrah; after all, God took Abraham out of his native home of Ur of the Chaldeans as a sign of friendship. Abraham’s friendship provides him with the audacity to intercede for others besides himself. And, giving our standards today, Abraham is a good negotiator to have scaled down from 50 to 10, as precondition for the salvation of Sodom and Gomorrah. Imagine what our world would be like, should we have so many intercessors/negotiators!
In every friendship NOT partnership, there is always the element of divine providence – God makes the paths of friends to cross. For example, God takes the initiative to call Abraham from his home to become a friend. The story is the same in the gospel and our second reading. It is the initiative of God that leads to the Incarnation, God becoming a human being for the salvation of the world. In fact, our gospel reading begins with the sign of friendship between Jesus and God in the context of prayer. And Jesus introduces us, human beings, in a double capacity, into friendship with God. First, the gospel reading tells us that we are God’s children, so Jesus says we should call God “Our Father”, when we pray. Second, our second reading makes baptism and the death of Jesus for human salvation the ritual of our initiation into friendship with God.
If Abraham intercedes today for the needs of the residents of Sodom and Gomorrah because of his friendship with God, what do you and I do with the leverage which our baptism and salvation in Christ provide us with? It is true that poverty is palpable today than ever, but how do we treat the visitors, migrants, family and friends who come to us for aid? Since the waters of baptism and the universal/globalized salvation in Christ makes us children and friends of God, how do we repay God through our behaviors and conducts? The teaching in the “Lord’s Prayer” wishes us to extend friendship to other persons, not just our individual friendships with God, but inter-human friendship. This is evident from the requirement of “forgiveness”: “forgive us our sins for we ourselves forgive everyone in debt to us”.
Universal forgiveness of sins in Christ Jesus is the basis for universal friendship. Every human being is a debtor to God for his or her sins. Better still, all of us are creditors because of God’s grace and forgiveness. Therefore, every human being must be an investor in forgiveness and an intercessor for forgiveness and clemency like Abraham and Jesus exemplify in our readings today. Yes, “everyone who asks receives,” but we must offer forgiveness to others as a precondition; we need to forgive and accept the friendship of the other first and foremost. Indeed, “everyone who knocks gets the door open,” but we must knock at the right door, the door of a friend’s home! No doubt, “he who seeks finds”; but we must seek God’s will exclusively: “thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven”.
The treachery of sin or disobedience is what kills friendship. The inability to forgive closes the door on inter-human friendship. The failure to avert a looming disaster that might affect others denatures the image of God that you and I should be; and, an excessive preoccupation with our personal needs is suicidal for our corporate existence. There will be no more doors to knock at, when we are all friends because we will anticipate one another’s needs. There will be nothing else to seek, when God’s will is done; and, there will be nothing to ask for, when the kingdom of God dwells among us.
Assignment for the Week:
Prove yourself a friend to someone this week or negotiate an end to a conflict you know exists between/among conflictual parties.