Sermon on the Parable of the Persistent Widow
"Hear what the unjust judge said. And shall God not avenge His own elect who cry out day and night to Him, though He bears long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?” ~Luke 18
God commands us to pray to Him. Why? Because He loves us. He wants to hear His children ask Him for everything they need. And we need a lot. If you could only see how many demons lie in wait for us, how many dangers threaten our souls, how many evils are ready to overwhelm us, then you would not think Jesus is exaggerating when he says, “Watch and pray always that you may be counted worthy to stand before the Son of Man.”
Man’s reason cannot fathom the truth of God profound. The natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, nor can he know them. So our flesh doesn’t believe that prayer does any good. “What will change?” it blithely asks. “What difference does it make?”
And even our hearts that have been kindled with the fire of the Holy Spirit, so that we confess that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe in our hearts that God has raised Him from the dead, yet our hearts are so weak, surrounded by an awareness of our sins, and we come to the quick and awful conclusion that God will not hear our prayers because we are such miserable sinners. Elijah could pray and stop the rain for three and a half years, but what can my prayer do? What mountains have I moved with my little faith? What mulberry bush have I planted into the sea with faith as small as a mustard seed?
But Jesus spoke this parable to us, so that we know that we always need to pray and not to lose heart. The word for lose heart here is actually to give in to evil or fail to do something good. It is the same word that Paul uses in Galatians 6, when he says, “Let us not grow weary in doing good.” It actually means, let us not sinfully give up doing good.
Not praying is giving into evil. It always is. It doesn’t matter if we think we’re doing ok and see nothing particularly egregious that we’ve done. When we stop praying, we stop talking to God. Why did you stop talking to God? What is wrong? Something evil. Not praying is giving into evil. Not praying is evil. It is as sinful as murder, adultery, theft, and breaking any other commandment.
We are so weak. But there was a widow who was very weak. She is the in the worst social position a person can be in. She has no husband to defend her and speak for her and protect her from her enemy. The judge from whom alone she can expect some help neither fears God nor respects man. She has nothing in front of her eyes that could give her hope for what she is asking. She has nothing in her person that would make people pay attention to her. But she has persistence. She has a prayer that she continues to repeat day and night. And so she convinces an evil judge who doesn’t care about right and wrong to give her justice.
What is required to pray is faith. “How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed?” “But when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?” Will He find us trusting in Him, walking in the light as He is in the light, or will He find us walking in darkness, worshiping the dirt, bowing down to our worries and pleasures and cares of this life, instead of to Him who tells us not to worry about anything, but to cast all of our care on Him who cares for us? When the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth? Will he find us walking in repentance and crying out to Him for help every morning and night, or will He find us looking for comfort in things that will pass away, in people who do not call upon God or know Him, in works that are darkness, which if a man do them he will not inherit the kingdom of God? When the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth? Will He find us rich in confidence that God will avenge us speedily, or will He find us despairing of Him because of our sins, as if He did not bleed to wash them away, as if He does not live to be the advocate for every sinner before the throne of God?
How can we call on Him in whom we do not have faith? In whom do we have faith? An unjust judge who doesn’t fear God or care about man? No. We have faith in Jesus, the only begotten Son of God, to whom God has given all judgment, that all should honor the Son just as they honor the Father. We have faith in the God whom became a man to fear God above all things and love every man as much as He loves Himself. We have faith in Him who was made to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him. And so we pray to God with this Judge as our advocate.
But you say, “No, I am too much a sinner; God will not hear my prayer.” But God knew you were a sinner when He commanded you to ask. The reason you do not have is not because you are a sinner, but because you do not ask, because if God gave His Son for sinners, His most precious treasure, then what else will He not give us? You say, “No, I fallen too many times, and I know I will fall again.” I say what St. John says, “If any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the Righteous; He is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but for the sins of the whole world.” Propitiation means the sacrifice that takes God’s anger away. If God’s anger is taken away, then what is there between you and God but His longing to see you come before Him, with your tears, with your fears, with your sins, with your needs, and lay them all before Him and cry out, “Abba! Daddy! I ruined it all, but I give it all to you to fix!” That is what is waiting for you every moment of every hour, day and night, the God who began a good work in you, and promises to perfect you and bring it to completion in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Do not look at the dust and worship it. Turn away from your sins to the one who bore them. Do not continue in drunkenness, in fornication, in busyness that excuses you from thinking about the one thing needful. Repent. Now is the day of salvation. Now is the time to call upon the name of the Lord and you shall be saved.
He who has ears to hear, let him hear, and he who has eyes to see, let him watch. Watch! Look at the world and your flesh in the light of God’s Word and you will see your need. Don’t you see your flesh lurching for food that is not food, for fun that is not innocent, for praise that is not God’s, for love that is finally only of yourself, for sin that kills you and would damn you in chains of unbelief? Watch, and you will see your need. Pray, and you will see God give you what you need. You need God’s Word and God Himself! My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God! When shall I come and appear before my God? My soul thirsts for You like a dry and thirsty land. Whom have I in heaven, but You? And there is none that I desire on earth besides You! My heart and my flesh may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever.
Therefore let none of us say that God is far from us, unless we want to continue in ignoring our sin and joining the heathen who are without hope and without God in the world. If you have a sin that is besetting you, controlling you, so that you can’t pray to God because you are afraid of His judgment, and your flesh is too proud to give up what it wants, then there is no help for you but to fall down before God and acknowledge that you are not strong enough to take care of yourself. You are not strong enough leave your sin. You are not worthy of forgiveness. You have forgotten God, the fountain of living waters, but now He comes to you, and He talks to you, and let the ears that He made to hear listen to what He says. He speaks the peacethat saves you from your sin, the words that are the power to make you abandon sin, and raise you from dead works to serve the living God.
He says, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” He says, “The Lord is near to the brokenhearted and saves such as are crushed in spirit.” He says, “Come to Me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.” He says, “Whoever comes to Me, I will in no wise cast out.” He says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” He said, “Where sin increased, grace abounded all the more.” He says right now, “Be of good cheer, your sins are forgiven.” And He has authority on earth to forgive sins because He is the Son of Man who bore all sins and suffered their punishment, and it can only be prideful unbelief that denies this and uses my sin as an excuse not to call upon Him who gives grace to the humble.
But you say, “I have no cause like the widow. She needed justice from her adversary. Justice would be to condemn me.” But justice is in the hands of Jesus. Who is the devil to accuse you of sin when Jesus already bore it? The devil may not put you in double jeopardy! The sin has been tried and convicted and punished – it cannot be punished again. What is the world to claim you as its own, when God baptized you and put His name on you; how dare that pompous and arrogant world attack you with its evil examples of pride and lust and power? And who is your Old Adam that he dares rise again every day to claim you? Didn’t God drown Him in the blood of Jesus? If one died for all, then all died. We were buried with Christ through baptism into death. Why is the flesh claiming to be alive when Jesus slew it? How unjust are your enemies! How unjust are your adversaries! Yes, you deserve but grief and shame, but Christ has given you honor and joy. You deserve to be punished, but the punishment that Christ bore has brought you peace with God. How dare the devil rob you of peace that Christ bought with His own blood! How dare the world offer peace that is no peace! How dare your flesh look for peace in what finally only gives pain! What injustice against the justice of Christ that He wept and bled and suffered and died for! What injustice against the words that call you just and righteous!
So you must pray! There is no faith that saves except the faith cries in indignation against such impudent adversaries! Dear Jesus, give me justice from my adversary! You chose me, elected me from the foundation of the world to be holy and blameless before you in love. But look at how my enemies attack me and deny Your gracious choosing, Your loving election of me! Give me justice! I have your righteousness that avails before the throne of God and will avail on the Day of Judgment, and they dare act as if I am not righteous, when You can only speak the truth and you call me righteous in truth! They ignore You. They blaspheme Your name by denying me the grace and mercy and forgiveness that You promise is mine!
And so I cry now, and I cry tonight, and I cry in the morning. I pray. I speak even if my throat has no more strength. My heart cries out for the living God to judge my foes away, to give me righteousness, to silence the lies of the devil, to shame the pride of the world, to subdue the lusts of the flesh. It is wrong for them to attack me, because I am holy, I am clothed in the spotless robe of white that qualifies me to stand among the saints in light. My dad is God. My father is the Maker and ruler over all things.
There are many things to do in this life, but there is nothing more important than to hear the word of God and to pray. If you go a day without it, it is a day that is wasted, no matter what you think you accomplish. Do not lose heart. Do not give in to the evil thought that prayer can be pushed to a later time. Now is the time of your need. Ask and you shall receive. Seek and you shall find. Knock and the door will be opened to you, and when the Son of Man comes, He will find faith on the earth. It will be the faith that is looking for Him and is delighted to see Him. Amen.