For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them. (Mt. 18:20)
Why does Jesus tell His disciples that He needs a minimum of “two or three” people to “agree” on a petition in order for Him to grant it? Does this mean that if I pray alone for a particular need, my individual prayer is less effective? Or worse—ignored altogether?
Furthermore, what if two or three people are praying for a sunny day at the beach, but a neighbor down the street has gathered his own “two or three” to pray for rain to fall upon his vegetable garden? Which two or three will the Father listen to and favor with an answered prayer?
Of course, we know that Jesus is not speaking in frivolity here. It is not that He doesn’t care about things like our vacations or our gardens; indeed, He wants us to invite Him into every aspect of our lives!
But here, Jesus is specifically referring to what it means to be a Church community. Jesus is saying that it does not take a congregation full of people for Him to be present—even as few as two or three is enough to be considered “Church.”
Why is this important to know? Because in an age in which church attendance has declined and a contingent of once-active members are often disgruntled, angry, and “disgusted with this wretched food” (Num. 21:5), all it takes is the “two or three” who are left to “agree” about that “which they are to pray” (such as welcoming back those who have strayed), and that is enough for it to be “granted to them by [the] heavenly Father” (Mt. 18:19).
Scarcely is there a more consoling thought than this! However, we must be careful here because we might read this passage from Matthew and interpret it with our own added word:
Again, amen, I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my Heavenly Father—instantaneously.
Instantaneous miracles are always welcome by those of us who struggle with patience and trust and are prone to worry and anxiety. Who likes to wait in the throes of uncertainty? But this is precisely the reason that God sometimes takes His time to answer our prayers. It is in the wait that we learn to grow. We grow in things like patience and trust, exercising our virtue muscles until the day the Lord grants us His special grace, without which we “can do nothing” (Jn. 15:5).
On that day, waiting for prayers to be answered is no big deal anymore, because we no longer simply “hope” for a favorable answer, we know beyond the shadow of a doubt, that regardless of the outcome, “all things work for good for those who love God and are called according to his purpose” (Rom. 8:28). That is to say, all things turn out well (even if the path from here to there is not a particularly pleasant one).
That is why we often go to really holy people for intercessory prayer; it can seem to us as though they indeed receive instantaneous, miraculous answers to their every petition. But this is only because they have practiced a lifetime of learning to increase their patience and trust, by being made to wait for answers at a time in their lives in which their virtue muscles needed their own exercising.
Again, amen, I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything for which they are to pray, it shall be granted to them by my heavenly Father.
Jesus says the two praying must “agree” for the request to be granted. Furthermore, this agreement is one that takes place “on earth.” So how does this explain how God decides whether to answer the prayer of the two people who agree to pray for a sunny day, as opposed to the prayer of the two people next door who agree to pray for rain?
To solve the answer to this riddle, we must first understand who it is exactly that must be in agreement. It seems that when Jesus is advising the two to agree “on earth,” He is not just referring to their agreement with each other. More importantly, He is referring to their agreement with the “heavenly Father.” That is to say, their agreement must be with God’s will. The Church is where heaven and earth meet! This is why Jesus tells us that when we pray for God’s will—even if it is with just one other person—this is the moment we are Church. And Jesus is always in His Church.
Which brings us to one final puzzle. How do we know if we are praying for God’s will? We all have received countless specific requests from others: “Pray that my son goes back to confession”…“Pray that my mom’s surgery is successful”…“Pray that my child gets into this college.” We ourselves have offered endless prayers such as these for our own cares! Which of these are in “agreement” with heaven?
The short answer is: we don’t know. But that is okay. For one thing, Jesus gave us the only prayer we ever need to be completely sure that we are praying in agreement with heaven, and that is the Our Father. It is short and simple and gets straight to the point:
Thy will be done. (Mt. 6:10)
For another thing, even though we have no way of knowing whether the vast majority of our petitions are in accordance with God’s will, we do know with certainty the agreement of just one: prayer for the salvation of souls. And in the end, do we really need certainty about anything more than this?
Once the dust settles and our earthly lives are no more, things like surgeries, college educations, sunny days at the beach—as important as they might be to us here on earth—will not matter to us anymore in heaven. The only thing we will look back upon are the souls whom we loved and prayed for—and for whom we participated in the plan of their salvation, in agreement with God’s holy and perfect will.
We can never be certain that all our prayers will be answered according to our expectation, for we do not know if what we ask is conformable to God’s will; but when it is a question of apostolic prayer which asks for grace and the salvation of souls, it is a very different matter. In fact, when we pray for the aims of the apostolate, we are fitting into the plan prearranged by God Himself from all eternity, that plan for the salvation of all men which God desires to put into action infinitely more than we do; therefore, we cannot doubt the efficacy of our prayer. – Fr. Gabriel of St. Mary Magdalen, Divine Intimacy
Author’s Note: This article was adapted from a chapter in 26 Steps with the Eucharistic Lord: A Guide to Deeper Communion in Prayer.
Photo by Tony Lomas on Unsplash
