Days of Our Lives
Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart. Luke 18:1
Not To Lose Heart – When do you give up praying? That’s the question that Jesus answers with this parable. You know the story. There is a judge who is implacably immoral. He doesn’t care about real justice. He cares about what’s in it for him. So, the widow who has no bribe money cannot get an audience with the judge. But she keeps on pestering him until he relents, not because she has anything to offer but because he can’t stand the annoyance. The story about the unjust judge is a story about our times, when justice is not served, when the wicked escape because they are rich and the poor suffer because they have no advocate. Just ask Gary Haugen from The International Justice Mission. Or travel with me to Honduras, China or Appalachia. The world is full of injustice – and I don’t mean just the kind that you experience when a contractor takes your money but doesn’t finish the job. It’s enough to make you cry out to God, “How long, O Lord, how long?”
That is exactly Jesus’ point. God is not an implacable judge. Injustice swells on the tide of sin. This world stinks of it. But God will not allow injustice to win. Therefore, there is never a time to stop praying about it. In fact, says Jesus, if you do give up praying, you do more than lose heart. You become a coward. That’s the nuance in this phrase me ekkakein. Literally, it means, “not out of bad.” In other words, those who give up praying show their true colors. They expose a root of faithlessness and cowardice. They stopped believing that God cares.
Certainly the world is full of circumstances that seem impossibly evil. Small or large, evil action and callous disregard is a common experience in life. After you have prayed and prayed and prayed, and nothing seems to have happened, what are you supposed to do? Sometimes we are tempted to say, “Well, I guess nothing can be done,” or “It’s too late now.” Jesus tells us otherwise. God does not work in chronos time. He is not bound by the clock. He operates in kairos and kairos is whenever it is the right moment. That means we never stop looking to God for His invasion into this life. That means the next moment can always become the kairos moment.
Notice that Jesus does not give an answer to the question, “When will God act?” He focuses only on our side of the equation. Keep praying. Don’t stop. When God acts is up to Him. Praying is up to us.
Have you stopped praying over something because it seems hopeless? Maybe you need a fresh look at the widow and the unjust judge?
