Luke 18:1-8
Persistent Prayer
George Mueller prayed for a man for 63 years to come to Christ, and finally the man did so. When Mueller died, he had documented 50,000 answers to prayer! 5,000 of those were answered on the day he prayed for them, which means that about 90% of the time he had to keep praying and waiting! Sound familiar? Mueller once said “Don’t let yesterday’s seemingly unanswered prayers stop you from praying in faith today.”
Today’s parable is about prayer, and it’s unusual because the primary point of the parable is spelled out right up front. Luke 18:1 says, “Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.” Jesus gives two lessons: pray always, and never give up. And then he’ll add a third one later. Let’s think about each of these lessons.
When it comes to prayer, Jesus says,
1. Pray always
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray... (v. 1a)
Prayer is vital to our life. Prayer indicates a relationship with God. Imagine if you had a marriage where no one ever uttered a word. Some of you are thinking, “That would be heaven!” No, it wouldn’t! Relationships count on communication. And our relationship with God counts on prayer. Pray always!
To illustrate his point, Jesus uses a classic rabbi “lesser to greater” argument: “If this lesser thing is true, then certainly this greater thing would be true.” He describes this mean-spirited judge who fears neither God nor man. The judge only does the right thing because he’s so sick and tired of this woman continuing to pester him, and afraid she might escalate to a bodily attack! Jesus then contrasts the judge with God, who will certainly do the right thing for us. If the mean-spirited judge comes through (that’s the lesser argument), then how much more will God come through for you (that’s the greater argument). So Jesus says to always pray.
Scripture often encourages us to pray. The Apostle Paul urges the believers in Ephesus to “pray always” (Ephesians 6:18), and the believers in Thessalonica to “pray continually” (1 Thessalonians 5:17). How do you pray continually? Imagine that the prayer line with God is always open.
In 2005 Randy Travis brought back a spiritual famous in the 60s called, “Jesus on the Mainline.” The song echoes today’s teaching: Jesus on the mainline, tell him what you want.” One of the verses reminds us that “his line is never busy.” You can talk to Jesus anytime, anyplace. Talk to him on your walks. Talk to him when you swim. (My former boss has her most vibrant prayer times while she swims laps in the pool every morning.) Talk to him when you’re shopping. (You can even talk out loud, because most people will just assume you are on some kind of a Bluetooth device!) Talk to him while you’re driving; people will think you’re singing with the radio. Talk to him in the shower. Talk to him before you get up and when you lie down at night. Talk to Jesus. Talk to God. You don’t have to use any fancy words. In fact, next week we’ll look at how “fancy” can sometimes get you in trouble. Just talk to him.
And listen. Find time to listen to God. Find time to listen to Jesus. Listen to the quiet voice of the Holy Spirit. The scripture says, “Be still and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10). As you read scripture, listen. Listen for what God might say to your soul. As you walk, listen. As you talk, listen. As you contemplate a difficult decision, listen. One-way communication is never good in a relationship. You need both talking and listening time with God.
Pray always, and #2,
2. Never give up
...and not give up (v. 1b)
In the story, we have a mean old judge, and then we have a widow. She had no family to support her. There was no social security in those days, no pension, no Air Force Village Widows’ Fund. It would have been easy to give up her righteous pursuit of justice. Yet, she reached down deep and matched the judge’s hard-heartedness with a fierce hard-headedness of her own that never gave up.
Winston Churchill gave a speech once to a graduating class that has been summarized into the words, “Never give up.” Listen to his actual words and imagine how they apply to the spiritual warfare behind your prayers. He said to the class that day, “Never give in. Never give in. Never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in, except to convictions of honour and good sense. Never yield to force. Never yield to the apparently overwhelming might of the enemy.”
His context, of course, was the Nazi threat. Our context in prayer is Satan. When you stay faithful in your prayer life, you give no license to the Evil One. You guard against temptation. You guard against apathy. You guard against depression. You guard against hopelessness and fatalism. You stay tuned to what God may choose to do in and around and through you, as he answers your prayers. Martin Luther once said, “Pray hardest when it is hardest to pray.”
The context for today’s parable is right after Jesus has been talking about the last days (Luke 17). He’s been describing how sudden his return will be, as he plucks one person to heaven and leaves another person here. So maybe Jesus’ primary focus in persevering is to keep on praying until he comes again. For some of you, you can’t wait! It seems to be taking forever! When is he ever going to return? But Jesus has one last point for us at the end of his story. #3,
3. Keep the faith
After Jesus has made the point that God will respond to our persistent prayers so much faster than the unjust judge, he says in the second half of verse 8,
“However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”
It’s a rhetorical question. It sounds kind of negative, kind of sad, like Jesus is not expecting too many to stay true to him. And it’s a challenge for us: Will we keep the faith in rainy days as well as sunny days? Will we trust God and keep on praying when we don’t yet sense an answer? Will we trust God with the outcome no matter what? Will we be able to say with Job, “The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away; blessed be the name of the Lord!” (Job 1:21).
God WILL answer your prayer, yet God’s timetable is not always our timetable. One of my favorite scriptures on this subject is 2 Peter 3:8-9, which says, “But do not forget this one thing, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. Instead he is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.” God seems slower than we would like at times because he is working his master plan, behind the scenes. As someone once said, “God doesn’t settle all his accounts in 30 days.” He will bring justice. He will bring honor to his own. Trust in his perfect timing!
Pray always, never give up, and keep the faith. Let’s pray it in right now: Father, you know that often the Spirit is willing but the flesh is weak. We want to pray more, but so often we don’t. Help us to sense your presence throughout the week this week, to know you are with us when we’re here, but also when we’re scattered to the four winds. Help us keep the prayer line open, to know that you are but a whisper away. Help us keep the faith. In Jesus we ask this, amen.
Luke 18:1-8
18 Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.2 He said: ”In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought.3 And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’
4 ”For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, 5 yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!’”
6 And the Lord said, ”Listen to what the unjust judge says. 7 And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? 8 I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?”
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Welcome time:
A man was speaking to God and he asked him, “God is it true that to you a thousand years is a minute?” “That's true,” God replied. “And is it true that to you $1,000,000 is like a penny?” “That's true,” God said. “Well, you see I'm a poor man and I was wondering if you could give me a penny,” asked the man. “Sure,” said God, “just a minute.”
