Sermon 6/28

Persistent Prayer

Scripture

 ¹ Then He spoke a parable to them, that men always ought to pray and not lose heart, ² saying: "There was in a certain city a judge who did not fear God nor regard man. ³ Now there was a widow in that city; and she came to him, saying, 'Get justice for me from my adversary.' ⁴ And he would not for a while; but afterward he said within himself, 'Though I do not fear God nor regard man, ⁵ yet because this widow troubles me I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.'"
⁶ Then the Lord said, "Hear what the unjust judge said. ⁷ And shall God not avenge His own elect who cry out day and night to Him, though He bears long with them? ⁸ I tell you that He will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?"

 

Sermon

The story starts with a woman and a judge. The woman was a widow. We all know what a widow is. A woman whose husband had died. Yet it is hard to understand what it meant to be a widow in ancient times because our culture now affords women a lot more opportunities than the women had in the time of Jesus. There were no death benefits. Women had a hard time inheriting any property that their husband might have had. If your husband died in the time of Jesus you were almost guaranteed to be poverty stricken, and even more you may be in danger of starvation.

 

However, there were laws and traditions in place where family members of the husband would help take care of the wife of their dead family member. There were traditions where people should help those widows and orphans that are in desperate need.

 

Yet this woman was knocking at a judge's door. She was knocking at a judge's door asking for justice. Somebody owed this poor widow something and she was going to get the help that she needed to support her family one way or another. So, first thing in the morning she waited outside the judge's front door and asked for the judge to take her case and rule in her favor. She followed him to work. She shouted outside his courtroom. She followed him on his way home, begging for the judge to do her justice.

 

The woman was doing the only thing that she had in her power. You see one of the interesting loopholes in the middle-eastern male-dominated power structure is the chivalry that is generally shown toward middle-eastern women. You see, because of the powerlessness of women otherwise, women often are given the right of free movement and protest in middle eastern societies. If a man would have stalked the judge like this, he would have been told to go away, beaten, and possibly jailed. But a woman…..well it would not be right for this judge to jail a woman for wanting justice and help. This is even true in the middle east today. In the most hostile war torn places, women are allowed to move freely and get groceries and do things. But about any man who does the same risks death. This is why the martyrdom of the woman in Iran dying on YOUTUBE is so powerful. The flipside of having to wear a burka is that a woman should never be treated like she was, even if she was at a protest.

 

Perhaps all of this was lost on the judge at first. Now the judge was perhaps the worst kind of judge that you could imagine. He was most likely a political ladder-climber. He said this about himself. "I neither fear God or regard man". This is very significant. In a Jewish mind a judge's job is the fear God enough to bring about his justice on earth. And secondarily a judges job is to care enough about his friends and neighbors to make sure they were treated fairly according to the law. He denies relationship as a priority for a judge. In a Jewish mind, judging was all about preserving the covenants between God and people, and the covenants people made before God with one another. This judge did not care about either of this. Like I said, I think he was a mover and a shaker seeking political advancement and possibly wealth. He did not care about justice. Especially about justice for this insignificant widow.

 

Yet, this widow kept coming to him. He looked out the window, she was on the front curb. He went out to eat, and she stared at him from outside the restaurant. He walked out of his office, she was sitting in the hallway. Holding up a sign that said, "Give me justice". Screaming into his window for the judge to rule in her favor. Begging on her knees for the judge to hear her plea.

 

It got to the point where every time he dreamt, the dreams would end with him coming to her for justice. Every time he went anywhere, he felt like he always had a shadow. This judge got toe point where he could not take it anymore, and he granted the woman's request. Not because he thought she was right. He did not care about right or wrong. Not because he cared. He didn't care about anyone but himself. He granted the woman's request simply because her persistence wore him down. It got to the point where he knew he would never have a moment's peace, a day of peace and quiet, a night out on the town with friends, until this woman stopped bothering him

 

So he went into his office one morning. He went into court. He called the woman's case, and he ruled on the woman's behalf. It was the only way he could get away from this annoying difficult woman that drove him crazy. So he ruled in her favor.

 

This is the parable that Jesus told. A parable that Jesus told because he wanted us to "keep praying and not lose heart." Jesus wants us to pray for our desires and needs. To pray, and keep praying, and to pray some more.

 

We find a similar passage in the Sermon on the Mount. In the passage that we skipped over last week. The passage on prayer in Matthew 7 says this. Ask and it shall be given. Seek and you shall find. Knock and the door shall be opened to you. And when we read Matthew 7 in the English language, the depth of the meaning does not come to us. Because Matthew 7:7 describes a continuous action from the present into the future. It would be better translated…start and continue asking and it shall be given….seek and continue seeking and you shall find….knock and continue knocking and it shall be given.

 

Prayer is about persistence. It requires persistence and boldness. Most of us live our lives trying to be self-sufficient and polite. If we are going to pray the way God wants us to pray we have to put that pride aside. And we need to come to God and ask him for help, and ask him for justice, and ask him to rescue us, and ask him to come to our side and support us in our time of need. God wants us to pray shamelessly and emptying ourselves of pride like that each and every day. Just like the widow did with that judge we talked about earlier.

 

However, the Scripture is clear. God is nothing like that wretched judge. The judge did not care anything about that poor, poverty-stricken, powerless widow. God loves us and cares for each of us because we are his children. The widow's cause had nothing to do with what the judge cared about. If we are disciples of Jesus, we are walking with him, standing up for him, living our lives to serve him. God is intimately involved and affected by our case. The judge did not fear God or really value people. God places infinite value on people like you and I. In otherwords, Jesus contrasts the justice making and justice keeping of the judge with the widow, with the righteous, loving and holy justice making and justice keeping of our Father in heaven.

 

When I first discovered that this was a contrast instead of a comparison it rocked my world. Because when I first read this I tried to put God in the place of that judge. I believed that what this taught was that if I nagged and pleaded with God loud enough for long enough he might just care enough about little old me to bend down his ear and hear my request. So my job, in my mistaken view, was to beg and plead until God relented.

 

This false interpretation led me to think of prayer as something like the strategy that some of us used to get what we want from our parents when we were children. You know how it is, you know your parents are going to say no to giving you what you want at first, but if you keep begging, and if you keep manipulating, your parents might give in just to get you to shut up.

 

 

 

The truth is though, God in his infinite love is not annoyed with our constant asking, seeking, knocking and begging. As a matter of fact, this is the kind of prayer that Jesus wants us to pray. He is not annoyed by us. He suffers with us. Reaches out to help us. And while we may wonder where his helping hand is, he is active working to bring things together for my benefit, and your benefit, and our benefit and the benefit of his kingdom. And he encourages us, like a parent nurturing their wounded child to just let it out as God listens to our prayers, and pats our backs, and continues to love us and love us even more than we could even think or imagine.

 

God wants us to be tenacious prayers. Persistent prayers. Stubborn prayers.

 

I wish I was as persistent in prayer as I am in the rest of my life. I am the type of person that has been accused at times of being….how should I put it…..stubborn. Most of my accomplishments in life have been accomplished not through skill or talent or ability, but through persistence. And we all know that stubbornness and persistence are pretty much the same thing. Stubborness is just persistence that seems less useful or annoys us more. Persistence or sticktoitiveness is just stubbornness we admire. Anyway…. I am the type of person that believes that if I fail at first, it simply means I have to try harder, work harder, and push harder and eventually I can push hard enough to come out on top or at least break even. My wife will tell you that if I can find no other solution immediately available to solve a problem, I usually believe that I should just apply more force and effort and it will fix about anything.

 

Most of us have a stubborn streak about something. Maybe it is in our marriage. Maybe it is about an unwillingness to change despite all the signs in front of us that encourage us that we should. Maybe it is in our work. Maybe it is in our unwillingness to forgive our neighbor.

 

Imagine what would happen if we put that persistence to work in prayer. Think about what could happen. When I was pastoring in Montana in the 1990s we had a challenge in our church where the preacher encouraged us to get into groups of three and pray for one another weekly. Some of us took him up on the offer. My prayer partners were Joey and Doug. Doug and Joey and I prayed for those in our lives we wanted to come to faith in Jesus. We prayed for other needs. And Joey and Doug made it a matter of prayer that God would send me a wife to share my life with.

 

 

 

 

 

Even after I left Joey and Doug kept praying for this. They prayed for this for 5 years. Other people, without me knowing, also made this a matter of prayer. And then just at the right time, in the right place, Jennifer walked in my life. Because there were friends and family who were making this a matter of prayer. Persistent prayer. And even when I gave up at times. They kept praying. God honors persistent prayer. God blesses stubborn, tenacious, not growing weary or giving up prayer. As a matter of fact, persistent prayer is really what prayer is all about.

 

One of my favorite preachers is a teacher and pastor in the Deep South. At one point there was an issue of racial injustice in his community. He went to the meeting of believers to become informed about the what was going on, and what he could do to help others in need in Jesus' name. At one point, it came time for an old African-American preacher to stand up and speak. He read the parable we are looking at this morning and then commented "Until you have stood for years knocking at a locked door, you knuckles bleeding, you really do not know what prayer is." (Craddock, Luke, p. 210). This is a good one word summary of what Jesus is teaching here.

 

My friends, I long to be a part of a church full of prayer warriors. People who pray for their friends, their family, their church, and themselves with persistence and vigor. People who start praying, and never give up praying for those things that they need to pray about. People who pray day and night for God to intervene in unexpected, and miraculous ways.

 

This morning, as we talk about persistent prayer, I have some challenges for you.

 

First, I want to challenge you to find 2 prayer partners you can pray with as prayer triplets on a weekly basis. Preferably people of the same gender, although that is not completely necessary. Get together with these people, even if you do not know them that well, find times to get together, and then the three of you gather together once a week or at whatever interval you choose to pray with one another. You will have to be bold enough to ask others to join you. Have the courage to do it anyway. And as you pray together, keep a journal, and keep track of what you have prayed about and how God has answered your prayers.

 

As you pray, I have three items I want you to pray about on a consistent basis.

 

First, pray for those in your circle of families and friends that do not have a relationship with Christ. Pray that the Holy Spirit would draw them unto himself. Pray that God would give you opportunities to share your faith with them. Don't give up when you are praying about this. Be persistent.

 

 

Second, pray for your church. Pray for its pastor especially. I need lots of prayer. Pray for the church leadership. Pray that we as a church truly seek God and do his will. Pray for your friends in the church. Especially pray for the church's health. It's unity. It's spiritual growth and its numerical growth. It's financial health. Pray persistently for this church, and its witness in this community.

 

Finally, pray for yourself. Many of you have health concerns. Of course pray for those. But also pray for wisdom. Pray that God would continue to change your heart. To renew your soul. Pray that God would give you love for those you ignore. Pray that God would help you know him better and serve him more. Pray that God would help you love him more, and trust him more.

 

Pray for your church. Pray for your friends and family. Pray for yourself.

 

Pray. Pray. And keep praying. Don't give up praying. Don't give up hoping. Don't give up waiting upon the Lord. His hope, his deliverance, his answer, his direction is just around the corner. Just over the horizon. If you will just be stubborn enough to keep praying, if you will just trust enough to not give up, there is a blessing waiting for you. For me. For us.