John 16: 23b-28
Jesus said to his discilples:
“Very truly, I tell you, if you ask anything of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete.
“I have said these things to you in figures of speech. The hour is coming when I will no longer speak to you in figures, but will tell you plainly of the Father. On that day you will ask in my name. I do not say to you that I will ask the Father on your behalf; for the Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from God. I came from the Father and have come into the world; again, I am leaving the world and am going to the Father.”
New Revised Standard Version, copyright 1989, by the National Council of the Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights reserved. USCCB approved.
A Direct Relationship
In today’s passage from John’s Gospel, Jesus tells his faithful disciples that “if you ask anything of the Father in my name, he will give it to you.” You might well ask what Jesus means by these words that could be interpreted as something of an incantation for a magic spell: ask the Father for something you want, say the magic words – “in the name of Jesus”, and PRESTO, the Father gives it to you! But that’s not what Jesus is saying here.
In this passage Jesus is telling his committed followers, a group that includes us, that he will no longer be the intermediary between his mature disciples and the Father; Jesus will no longer be explaining the Father to us and maybe too no longer explaining us to the Father. Jesus is telling us that as mature disciples we should ask the Father directly for what we want and need. Jesus is encouraging a direct relationship between us and the Father – as Father to adult child and adult child to Father.
Encouraging a direct relationship between us and the Father is also a primary goal of the Spiritual Exercises of St Ignatius. St. Ignatius insists that every time a seeker making the Exercises enters into prayer she should ask God for a grace. By the Fourth Week of the Exercises (8 months or so of daily prayer in everyday life), the process of asking God for a grace will have moved the seeker deeply into the life of the Spirit – life within a dynamic relationship of giving, receiving, and returning good gifts – as Father to daughter and daughter to Father in loving mutuality.
So when you enter into prayer today, ask the Father for what you truly want and need; tell the Father of your heart’s deepest desires, assured that your deepest desires have arisen in you in Jesus’ mighty name.
—Bill Lipscomb is a spiritual director with the Ignatian Spirituality Center and the Church of the Gesu in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Bill is a graduate of the Seminars in Ignatian Formation program of the Midwest Jesuits. Bill serves as a board member for the Ignatian Spirituality Project and as a spiritual reflector for the Ignatian Volunteer Corps.
Prayer
Loving Father, we come to you today as mature disciples in the humility of your Son and ask for the gift of loving union with you through the life of Jesus. Give us today and every day your love and your grace for these are enough for us. Amen.
—Bill Lipscomb