The Good Shepherd, carrying His own.

Devotional Thought for our broken days:

15 “If your brother sins against you, go and rebuke him in private. If he listens to you, you have won your brother. 16 But if he won’t listen, take one or two more with you, so that by the testimony of two or three witnesses every fact may be established. 7 If he pays no attention to them, tell the church. But if he doesn’t pay attention even to the church, let him be like an unbeliever and a tax collector to you. 18 I assure you: Whatever you bind on earth is already bound h in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth is already loosed in heaven. 19 Again, I assure you: If two of you on earth agree about any matter that you pray for, it will be done for you by My Father in heaven. 20 For where two or three are gathered together in My name, I am there among them.”  Matthew 18:15-20  HCSB

228      Be filled with faith and rest assured! The Lord tells us this through the prophet Jeremiah: orabitis me, et ego exaudiam vos—whenever you call upon me, whenever you pray!, I will listen to you.

Over many years, I’ve heard people claim the verses in italics as their own guarantee of what they pray for, what they thought they really needed. 

I’ve also known people who have been promised that God will do what they ask, whose faith has been crushed because they do not see their prayer answered,  The extreme case of that would be my friend Jean, whose daughter was told by her pastor that if she had enough faith, she would be healed of her cancer, without any medical care.

As I read it this morning, in my morning devotions, I realized something.  This well-known passage is connected to another well-known passage, the passage about reconciling those who have sinned against us.  It is followed by another passage, where Peter asks how many times he has to forgive Andrew, and is told not 7, but 7 times 70.

So this passage about prayer has a specific context, the impossible task of reconciliation and restoration, the return of the prodigal son, the erring brother, the one we’ve been tempted to give up on seeing in God’s presence. 

What a comfort this is, for no one is beyond God’s reach, and no one that lives is beyond being called back, even those who have hurt us deeply.  (For if we didn’t love them, how could their betrayal us?)

What peace this brings, knowing that God loves and cares for them, and wants to heal and restore them to us.  This is the amazing thing about finding ourselves bath in God’s grace, this glorious love, and peace, that He draws us into at the cross.

He is with us, He is listening,!  So let us give Him those who we struggle with, forgiving, counting on Him to draw them back and reconcile us into one body, His.  AMEN!

Escriva, Josemaria. The Forge (Kindle Locations 980-983). Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.