This week we practiced Lectio Divina on the Liturgy with the Prayer Over the Offering for the 16th Sunday in Ordinary Time.
O God, who in the one perfect sacrifice brought to completion the varied offerings of the law, accept, we pray, this sacrifice from your faithful servants and make it holy, as you blessed the gifts of Abel, so that what each has offered to the honor of your majesty may benefit the salvation of all. Through Christ our Lord.
While studying the twelve periods of the history of salvation in my summer class Praying Sacred Scripture, I had a vivid experience during the period when the exiled Israelites returned to Jerusalem. It was as if I saw generations flash before my eyes: people who had gone into slavery, come to know God, become free, and then became exiles again—until they finally saw God’s promise fulfilled as they returned to the Promised Land.
At the end of that flashback, I saw how all the Old Testament years—the generations of wandering, the sacrifices, and the slavery—were brought to completion in the one perfect sacrifice of Jesus. When you study the Old Testament through the lens of the New Testament, you see how God always provided for His people, even through their lessons and failures, and yet He still gave His own Son to win us back.
In this prayer, the sacrifice we offer to the Father is not only from us—it should be us. Just as we offer bread and wine, we ask Him to accept the sacrifice of our very selves and make it holy.
What caught my attention most, however, was the word for “servants.” In the Latin, it is famulis (from famulus), which does not simply mean an employee. It refers to an apprentice—someone learning a trade or skill under the mentorship of a master.
Seeing myself as an apprentice rather than just a servant changed the prayer for me. Jesus is inviting me to offer myself as a sacrifice to the Father, just as He did. I ask Him to accept the offering that is me, to make me holy, so that what I have offered may honor His majesty by contributing to the salvation of all.
I was also struck by the reference to Abel. In Genesis 4:4, “The LORD looked with favor on Abel and his offering.” God blessed Abel’s gifts because he gave a true sacrifice—from the best of what he had. Jesus gave the perfect sacrifice. Our own self-offering, though imperfect, can still be genuine. When we ask the Father to accept it and make it holy, we can trust that He will.
Holiness is not usually something we simply “catch.” A person may experience a change of life through reading Scripture, but God often calls certain people to be sources of holiness for others.
How many times have you thought, “I’d like to have a holy family,” or prayed that your parish or the whole Church would be holier? The path forward is clear: we ourselves must become holy first. Apprentices learn from their Master, and the One teaching us will never lead us astray.