THY WILL BE DONE
INTRODUCTION
The title of my
homily is, “Thy Will Be Done.”
The idea of the
Will of God appears in today’s first reading, today’s Psalm Response and
today’s gospel.
We say that
prayer – “Thy will be done” in the Our Father - sometimes with little thought – sometimes with deep depth.
The air traffic
controller and the greatest theologians in the history of our world have tossed
around what they think that phrase means.
I don’t know
about you – but I hesitate to say I know for sure what “God’s will be done”
means – but of course like everyone – I think I know what’s best for everyone
else in the family and in the world.
Oooops! I take
some of that back, because I assume God’s will is that we forgive one another,
love another and respect and honor and are generous to each other. Okay: timing
is everything
I don’t think God
has a check list of people who are to die today. I don’t believe that God zaps
people. I believe that God cries when babies die and are with loved ones is
with their loved ones as loved ones die.
I don’t think God
wants some football team to win the Superbowl and some team to lose the
Superbowl.
Just before a
high school basketball game, I was standing there with our team. We were praying to win. I just happen to look at
the faces of the other team. They were also praying. At
that moment the insight hit me and this is not the way God works. So I
say to God – “I don’t think you determine who’s going to win a certain
basketball game nor do you have favorites and all that.” Yet the fans of some teams think that’s what
happens with their team every year.
TODAY’S READINGS
I noticed in the Letter to the Hebrews that we’re dealing
with folks who have struggles with the
Law. The main message seems to be – that we struggle to say “Amen” – especially
the Great Amen - to what God seems to
want and what God does each day.
I know that when
I say to God, “Thy will be done, I am saying, ‘God I have no clue at times how
all this works. Help me to let go of my trying to be you and control the
universe – as well as other people’s lives – and God “God, what does it mean
that you control the universe?”
I also say many times each day – the words
Jesus said from the cross, “Father forgive them for they don’t know what they
are doing.”
I say that one a
lot. You don’t have to live with the priests I live with.
But most of all -
that prayer in the Our Father and in today’s 3 readings about God’s will be
done on earth as it is in heaven triggers for me the best funny prayer of all
time: “My will be done.”
That’s the prayer
I’m thinking lots of times. It’s underneath all my complaints about others and
life and how things go. I wish so and so wouldn’t say that – or drive like that
– or get jam in the peanut butter.
It takes a
lifetime to laugh at oneself about how I want the world to go round. If I was the engineer I want God to be, uh
oh. I find it difficult to move backwards with the car in Reverse in a parking
lot.
I’m sure whoever came
up with the line, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”
I would think it
would make a very funny movie if everything people wanted on the spot happened.
Some one says, “I wish it wasn’t so cold – and the temperature shoots from 29
to 92 – and then someone says, “It’s too hot. Dang it. It’s always too hot
around here and the temperature shoots down to 43.” Then some kid says, “I wish
it was just a little bit coldler – and it snowed – so we didn’t have to go to
school.”
Chaos would reign
as rain switches to snow.
CONCLUSION
In fact a good
time to pray and say and laugh the, “Thy will be done!” prayer is when we’re
actually saying, “I want it my way.” Or when we’re thinking and praying, “My
will be done.”