Always Pray And Never Give Up

Luke 18:1-8 (NLT)

1 One day Jesus told his disciples a story to show that they should always pray and never give up.

2 “There was a judge in a certain city,” he said, “who neither feared God nor cared about people.

3 A widow of that city came to him repeatedly, saying, ‘Give me justice in this dispute with my enemy.’

4 The judge ignored her for a while, but finally he said to himself, ‘I don’t fear God or care about people,

5 but this woman is driving me crazy. I’m going to see that she gets justice, because she is wearing me out with her constant requests!’ ”

6 Then the Lord said, “Learn a lesson from this unjust judge.

7 Even he rendered a just decision in the end. So don’t you think God will surely give justice to his chosen people who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off?

8 I tell you, he will grant justice to them quickly! But when the Son of Man returns, how many will he find on the earth who have faith?”

PRAYER

For 3 weeks in October 2002 fear gripped the hearts of those who lived near Washington DC. Up and Down I-95 a pair of snipers were working together, systematically killing unsuspecting people who were just going about their daily routines.

The first shooting took place on the evening of October 2 where one victim was killed. The next morning it got worse.

• At 7:41 am, James L. Buchanan, a 39-year-old landscaper known as "Sonny," was shot while mowing the grass at the Fitzgerald Auto Mall.

• At 8:12 am, 54-year-old part-time taxi driver Premkumar Walekar was killed while pumping gasoline into his taxi at a Mobil station.

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• Sarah Ramos, a 34-year-old babysitter and housekeeper, was killed at 8:37 am at the Leisure World Shopping Center in Aspen Hill. She had gotten off a bus, and was seated on a bench, reading a book.[3]

• At 9:58 am, 25-year-old Lori Ann Lewis-Rivera was killed while vacuuming her Dodge Caravan at a Shell station.

• 9:15 pm, Pascal Charlot, a 72-year-old retired carpenter, while he was walking on Georgia Avenue at Kalmia Road, in Washington, D.C. Charlot died less than an hour later.

On October 7, at 8:09 am, Iran Brown, a 13-year-old boy, was wounded as he arrived to the Benjamin Tasker Middle School in Bowie, Maryland, in Prince George’s County.

Fear quickly spread throughout the community, upon hearing about the shootings. Many parents went to pick up their children at school early, not allowing them to take a school bus or walk home alone. Montgomery County Public Schools and private schools went into a lockdown, with no recess or outdoor gym classes. Other school districts in the area also took precautionary measures, keeping students indoors.

Two days later, on October 9 at 8:18 pm, 53-year-old Dean Harold Meyers was shot dead while pumping gasoline.

Again, two days later, on the morning of October 11 at 9:30 am, 53-year-old Kenneth Bridges died while pumping fuel at an Exxon station off Interstate 95.

On October 14, at 9:15 pm, 47-year-old Linda Franklin, an FBI intelligence analyst was shot dead after she finished shopping at a Home Depot.

After a five day wait, 37-year-old Jeffrey Hopper was shot on October 19 at 8:00 pm in a parking lot near the Ponderosa steakhouse.

On that same day, 50 Christian truckers got together to pray to pray that somehow the sniper terrorizing the Washington, DC area would be caught. Ron Lantz would be retiring as a driver in a few days and didn’t even live in the area, but he felt sure that God would answer their prayers. In fact, he told the others there that God was going to use him to catch the sniper. Ron Lantz was a man of faith.

A few days later, on October 22 he was listening to the radio as he was driving again through the region and felt compelled to pull off the highway to a rest stop. It was just a couple of miles from where the prayer meeting had taken place. As he pulled in, he was shocked to see a car similar to what was being described on the radio right there before his eyes.

Carefully trying to read the license plate, a chill went up his back as the numbers matched. He quickly called 911 and remained there for what he said were the longest 15 minutes of his life until the police arrived. The authorities advised him to block the exit and so he and another trucker parked their rigs across the only way out.

The Police arrived to find the 2 suspected murders sleeping in their blue 1990 Chevrolet Caprice, the two men were arrested, tried and found guilty.