The Nag Series

The Nag (Luke 18:1-8)

Several years ago, David Willis, from Texas, was browsing through some books at the Waterstones bookshop in London’s Trafalgar Square. Willis said he had been upstairs in the shop for 15 minutes and when he came down all the lights were out and the doors locked. He found himself trapped inside.

After posting on Twitter and asking for help, he received hundreds of replies, with many people asking him if he was taking the opportunity to read some books. Others said they would love to be locked in a bookshop, and more than one suggested he should build a fort out of books. Then he tweeted Waterstones and said, “Hi @Waterstones I've been locked inside your Trafalgar Square bookstore for 2 hours now. Please let me out.” Someone from the bookstore came and let him out shortly thereafter (Staff, “Tourist locked inside Waterstones bookshop uses Twitter to be freed,” BBC, 10-17-14; www.PreachingToday.com).

Sometimes, you feel trapped and in the dark, especially in these last days before Jesus comes.

Jesus Himself describes the darkness of those days. He says, “I tell you, in that night there will be two in one bed. One will be taken and the other left. There will be two women grinding together. One will be taken and the other left.” And they said to him, “Where, Lord?” He said to them, “Where the corpse is, there the vultures will gather” (Luke 17:34-37).

In the days surrounding the rapture of the church, Jesus describes our society like a rotting corpse. So, what can you do, as a follower of Christ, in these dark, stinky days before Jesus comes? When you feel trapped and in the dark, what do you do? Well, if you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Luke 18, Luke 18, where Jesus addresses His followers in the context of the dark days before His coming.

Luke 18:1 And he told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart (ESV).

To keep from losing heart in the dark, to keep from giving up is despair, to keep from debilitating discouragement…

PRAY!

Call on the Lord. Ask God for help. It’s a lot better than going on social media!

Warren Wiersbe says, “If society is like a rotting corpse, then the “atmosphere” in which we live is being slowly polluted, and this is bound to affect our spiritual lives. But when we pray, we draw on the “pure air” of heaven, and this keeps us from fainting (Wiersbe, The Bible Exposition Commentary, Victor Books, 1996). Prayer keeps us from losing heart!

That’s how the International Justice Mission (IJM) keeps from giving up as they work to combat human trafficking around the world. Every staff member spends the first 30 minutes of the workday in silence—for prayer, meditation, and spiritual reflection. IJM also gathers staff for 30 minutes of daily corporate prayer, in addition to hosting quarterly offsite spiritual retreats and providing employees with an annual day for private spiritual retreat.

IJM CEO Gary Haugen believes “prayerless striving” leads only to exhaustion. He says, “I have learned just how crucial it is to settle my soul in the presence of Jesus every morning.” This is what Haugen concluded after working for two decades to combat human trafficking and other forms of violence against the poor. He goes on to say, “Even though it is tempting to hurry into our work, we intentionally still ourselves and connect with our maker: the God who delights in restoring and encouraging his children” (Jedd Medefind, “The Fight for Social Justice Starts Within,” Christianity Today, 6-21-17; www.PreachingToday.com).

Are you discouraged in the work God has called you to do? Then take a few moments to still yourself before your Maker, and let Him restore and encourage your exhausted heart. In these dark days before Jesus comes, pray! Then…

PERSIST IN PRAYER.

Don’t just pray once. Keep on praying. Or as Paul put it in 1 Thessalonians 5:17, “pray without ceasing.” That is, make prayer a regular habit, in which you constantly ask God to bring justice in an unjust world. That’s what Jesus encourages His followers to do, especially when life gets hard, and people treat them unfairly.

Luke 18:2-5 He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor respected man. And there was a widow in that city who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Give me justice against my adversary.’ For a while he refused, but afterward he said to himself, ‘Though I neither fear God nor respect man, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice, so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming’” (ESV).

Literally, so she will not give me a black eye by her continual coming. The judge was afraid he might suffer shame or damage his reputation if he refused the constant nagging of this widow. It’s the only thing she had going for her, because women (and especially widows) had no legal rights in Jesus’ day.