Luke 18:1-30
“Hello, I’m calling about a research proposal that was approved 11 months ago, but no contract has yet been issued. Yes, I’ve called before.” My father owns a small business in California that primarily does chemistry research for the US government. Last October, at the start of the new fiscal year, he was approved on a fairly sizable research project by a project manager for a research office within the US government. These projects are highly competitive, as funds have become scarce, and being approved on such a project is a significant achievement. It means that a highly polished detailed research proposal has been prepared, and that it has gone out for review – both reviewed by people within the government and by peer reviews – and that it has risen to the top or near the top of the stack. After receiving notification of approval from the office of the project manager, it goes to a financial affairs/proposal procurement/federal compliance branch or agency, and one would expect that after a few weeks of going back and forth over contract details, the project is awarded and the funds become available. Well, maybe you would expect that – but after years of talking with my father, I would not expect that. It is always slower and more complicated than it should be.
But this most recent proposal took everything to a whole new level. There would be silence for a few weeks, so my father would call and learn that the person who was working on it was fired, and a new person had the job. A few weeks later he would call again and learn that yet another person now had the job. A few weeks later he would call and find that all the paper was lost, so he would send it again. A few weeks later he would call and they would say everything is fine – it should be good to go. A few weeks later the person would change again, and they had no record of the proposal, and on and on and on. This went on for 11 months! Just this week they finally sent the official notification letter. Long since this point my father lost all trust in their competence or ability to get anything done, and these last few days he was calling several times a day to make sure everything that was supposed to be getting done was getting done – and even then in several cases it wasn’t. One example – they wanted a timetable of deliverables – no contract could be approved until this was given. “Um, sir, the timetable is on page 2 of the proposal.” “Oh.” “Hello, I just wanted to let you know that I faxed back the contract to you with my signature. When can I expect a fax back of the copy that includes your signature as well as mine? When today? In an hour?” OK, I’ll be looking for it. And so on.
I doubt any of you have dealt with this exact situation, but you probably have dealt with something similar at one point – perhaps dealing with medical claims rejected by an insurance company, or if, heaven forbid, you have ever had to deal directly with the IRS. If so, you are well prepared to hear the following parable.
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said:
"In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.' - Luke 18:1-3
Most of you know that we have been going through the entire book of Luke, line by line, and so you have heard me say before that when reading parables it is important to not try to turn it into something more than it is meant to be. A parable usually only has a single main point – it is not an allegory, where everything stands for something else. This is one of those parables where you can come up with some pretty messed up conclusions if you try to do this. And in this case, it seems like the consequences would have been so serious that even Luke explains the point even before the parable is given.
So what is the point? Persist in prayer. Now the parable has two characters: a judge and a widow. The judge “neither feared God nor cared about men” – so what do think he did care about? Himself! Did he have lots of money and power? Probably. Was he an honest judge? Probably not. Did he take bribes? Probably.
The contrast could probably not be greater between this judge and a widow. We have talked before how in this culture being a widow was a serious thing. Not only had you gone through the tragedy of losing your husband, but you had also lost your means of income, your means of survival, in many cases. According to the laws of that culture, and in contrast to what usually goes on in our culture, the husband’s property did not revert to the wife. If they had children, it would revert to them, but if she didn’t it would revert to the nearest male family members of the husband – in other words, to her in-laws. Even if she did have children, it was not uncommon for the husband’s family to just come and an forcefully take what they wanted, especially if they never much cared for the wife, or if she had only been a wife for a short time. The listeners to this parable would assume that it was over an issue like this that the poor, powerless widow was coming before the rich, powerful judge. And like the true story of my father’s business, this widow was persistent. “Hello, judge. Yes, I see you remember me. Well, once again I am coming to see if you can do something about my situation. Well, last time you said that you didn’t think it was a case you could do something about. Well, this time I brought a few more papers that verify some of the things I have been saying. You don’t have time to look into it today? Oh, I see. Well, I will come tomorrow then. You don’t have time to look into it tomorrow? Oh, well, I can come the day after that. Have a good day, your honor. And have a good tomorrow too.”
"For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!'" – Luke 18:4-5
Some of the Greek words here are quite picturesque. The Greek word for “bothering” is kopos, a word that means to cause distress or trouble, such as would be felt after receiving a beating! And the Greek for “wear me out” is hupopiazo, which literally means to give a black eye to! We sometimes in English use the phrase “is giving me a black eye” in a somewhat related way – in our case we mean it is making me look bad. And just as those federal guys finally moved quickly to make my father stop calling them, the judge in our parable decides to give her justice just so she will go away.
And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. 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? 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?" – Luke 18:6-8
Now here is not how to understand the parable: We are like the poor widow, and God is like the unjust judge. If we pester Him long enough with our prayers, He will finally relent and give us what we ask for. Is that right? No! No! No! God is not “like” the judge.
In fact, the point hinges directly on our understanding that of course God is not like that judge! The point is that if persistent petition gets a nasty evil judge to do something, how much more will persistent prayer receive action from God!
What about the word “quickly”? The Greek word for this is tachos, from which we get tachometer, which measures the speed of rotation of a rotating shaft. Does God really bring about justice quickly? What about when it doesn’t seem like God answers quickly?
In answer I think about 2 Peter 3, 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. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. – 2 Peter 3:8-9
When the time comes, His justice will be swift and complete. But sometimes it is better that it doesn’t come yet. The phrase “When the Son of Man comes…” in our Luke passage draws me back to last week’s passage in the previous chapter, which dealt extensively with the return of Christ. Why does Jesus ask “if He will find faith on the earth” when He comes? I believe because persisting in prayer is an essential part of living in faith. When you lose faith, you certainly do not persist in prayer.
This passage does not dig deeply into the “why” we should persist, but rather simply that we should do it. I don’t have time to adequately address the “why” today, but I do have one thought. We misunderstand or misuse prayer if we think it is solely a one-way conversation. Even as we pray for needs we have for ourselves and for others, prayer should always be an invitation to God to make Himself and His ways more fully revealed to us. Every delay serves a purpose, even if we don’t get to see what that purpose is on this side of eternity. Persistent prayer opens us up more fully to God, and it gives God the opportunity to open Himself more fully up to us.
Why did Jesus tell His disciples (and us) this parable? To encourage us! Even a ding-dong corrupt selfish judge responds to persistent prayer. How much more does it matter to God, who loves us more deeply than we could even imagine such love to exist?
One last thought on persistent prayer: I have found that when I am persistently in prayer for some situation, what I actually pray for rarely persists! Especially if it is something in my own life I am praying for, over time my original prayers grow to seem immature, or insincere, or avoiding deeper issues. Persistent prayer is not safe! But do it anyway, or do it just because it is not safe! If our spiritual life is safe, there is something seriously wrong with it.
To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable:
"Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.' – Luke 18:9-12
We move on now to another parable – one that is very well-known. And perhaps the fact that it is so well-known is a problem. Can we hear it anymore? Do you picture some self-righteous boastful Pharisee with his nose up in the air making this prayer? It is easy to become spiritually inoculated with “Christianese” and say, “Of course I’m not confident in my own righteousness.” Well maybe you aren’t when it comes to salvation, which the Pharisee in the parable probably was. But when we see someone whose life is a mess for whatever reason, what do we think? Is being thankful that we aren’t like that really so bad? Is feeling good about how your life is more or less in control really so bad? Well, apparently, the answer is yes.
"But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.' – Luke 18:13
Tax collectors, as we have talked about in past weeks, were generally corrupt in that they would charge more than was what they were supposed to collect. The Romans didn’t care – as long as they collected the taxes, they were fine. They didn’t care how they got it done. And tax collectors could also be, much like modern day bill collectors, masters at making someone’s life miserable until they paid up. They could be a whole different kind of persistent petitioner!
It is interesting to compare the two prayers, that of the Pharisee and that of the tax collector.
'God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.'
'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.'
They both start by addressing God. They both end by describing themselves – although the descriptions could not be more different – a good man versus a sinner. But the middle is where the greatest differences lie. The Pharisee simply thanks God based on an opinion of his own goodness based on comparisons with other men, but the tax collector prays for mercy. He prays for mercy from God because it is based on God’s opinion of himself that he knows his total need for mercy.
"I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." – Luke 18:14
And here we come to the crystal clear point of the parable: the humble man is the one (and the only one) who receives that mercy. People who don’t ask for mercy don’t receive mercy. This principle is at the heart of the gospel – only people who ask God to come into their lives, to forgive them, to remake them into what God would desire – only people who do these things receive these things.
People were also bringing babies to Jesus to have him touch them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. But Jesus called the children to him and said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." – Luke 18:15-17
We have a tendency to misuse this passage or the parallel passages in the other gospels a bit in our culture – at any Christian bookstore you can find a quote from a portion of this passage and a picture of Jesus, smiling, surrounded by little children (usually children 3-5 years old). The point of these pieces of art is clearly that Jesus loves children. Well, this is true – Jesus does love children, and this was a fairly radical theme back at the time of Christ, where children were viewed as unworthy of serious attention. But there is a greater point here, and artwork like this tends to make us miss it.
By the way, who is Jesus rebuking – the Pharisees? No, not this time – here it is the disciples. And if you think about it from the point of view of making disciples, Jesus really was doing almost everything He was doing as much or more for the disciples’ sake as He was for anyone else’s. Jesus was investing everything He had in these guys – they were going to be His messengers to the world. And so any rebuke He had for them should be considered carefully by us, His 21st century disciples.
Jesus’ message was actually quite shocking. Why? Because children were viewed as foolish until they learned wisdom from their parents, from the Scriptures, and when necessary, from discipline and correction including “the rod.” So to say that one had to somehow revert to be like these babies and toddlers, knowing next to nothing about God, perhaps not even knowing how to properly go to the bathroom, was a seemingly outrageous thing to say.
So what did Jesus mean? Why did He basically have the children all come so that He could display them as a kind of “living parable” for His disciples? There are several ideas I have read on this. Some think it is because they symbolized innocence. I think we can safely discount this idea for the reasons I already mentioned – children were not viewed as “little angels” back then, and anyone who has had children knows that their moments as “little angels” are balanced by their moments as, well, “little devils.”
Some say it is because they are open and trusting. I think this is closer to the mark, but what makes the most sense to me, especially keeping in mind the context of the previous verses is that they were specifically open to, as it says, receiving the kingdom of God. What does it mean to be open to receiving the kingdom of God? Well, first and foremost, I think it requires humility. Going back to the Pharisee and tax collector, it was only the tax collector who begged for mercy – he was the only one really open to receiving anything from God. The Pharisee didn’t want to stoop to the level of “receiving charity.” The children who came to Jesus did not first pontificate about their worthiness. They simply received whatever there was to receive – in this case, likely Jesus giving them a blessing in the presence of their parents.
We had a birthday party for our son Jonathan yesterday, and gifts were given to Jonathan, and we gave some gift bags to all the children as they left the party. Not a single child said, “O, I cannot take that – I don’t need your charity.” And at a party like this I have never heard the young birthday child say, “O – you are too generous. I cannot accept this. How could I ever repay you?” No, children simply receive. It is a rare child who is too proud to receive a birthday gift.
But when adults give gifts, it often becomes complicated. It becomes “our turn” to give a gift back. There are many unwritten rules about how much the gift can cost, about the occasion on which it is given, and so on. You will get nowhere if you approach Jesus on these kinds of terms. The word “priceless” has become a cliché, but truly no gift has ever been more priceless than that of Jesus’ life on the cross for our salvation.
A certain ruler asked him, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" "Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.'" "All these I have kept since I was a boy," he said. – Luke 18:18-21
Now Matthew’s parallel account (chapter 19) describes the ruler as young, and a few verses down in our Luke passage, he is described as very wealthy. He was an “archon,” a leader of some kind either in the Temple or in the Sanhedrin courts.
His question reveals that he believed in eternal life, so he was probably a Pharisee. And he believed that obtaining eternal life was done by “doing” – that is, by earning or meriting through your actions. Notice that he addresses Jesus as “good teacher,” and it is in this greeting that Jesus chooses to work on his mistaken values system.
What is wrong with this ruler’s value system? Well, he believes that people can be “good people,” to use a common phrase. He measures goodness with his own ruler, not the true standards of God. How do we know this? In part, by his reply to Jesus’ answer. He says he has never committed adultery, never murdered, never stolen, never given false testimony, and always honored his father and mother, ever since he was a boy. Apparently, he missed Jesus’ sermon on the mount, where He explained that ever looking at someone with lust is the same in God’s eyes as adultery, ever hating someone is the same as murder, coveting is the same as stealing, and so on. Now those last two, he may well have redefined so as to say he was keeping them, as many Pharisees did. He might have said that he had never openly brought disgrace to his family, so in that sense he had completely honored his father and mother. He might have said that he had never lied about someone in a court proceeding so as to get them put away for a crime they did not commit, so that in that sense he had completely obeyed the commandment about false testimony. You see how easy it is to convince yourself you are good? If you ask unsaved people how good is good enough to go to heaven, you almost always, if you persist in conversation with them, basically end up with a line that is just a little below their own personal level of behavior.
Now some people get freaked out about Jesus comment that no one is God except God Himself. Does this mean that Jesus is not God, and moreover, that He is not even good? No – Jesus did not say He is not good; He just questioned why this young ruler would say so. In effect, Jesus is “God in disguise” during this interview. In fact, Jesus has done this through most conversations He has had with anyone up to this point. Why? Because the time to fully reveal Himself has not yet come.
When Jesus heard this, he said to him, "You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me." When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was a man of great wealth. Jesus looked at him and said, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." – Luke 18:22-25
What is interesting to me is Jesus’ approach at this point. You might think He would re-give His sermon on the mount to this person so he could understand that he falls far short of God’s definition of goodness. Instead, in Jesus’ perfect wisdom, perhaps because He knew that the young ruler wouldn’t respond to such an approach anyway, He takes a different tact, one that also instructs and challenges His disciples.
Now of course, Jesus’ response makes us uncomfortable. Sell everything you have? Trade off the certainty of present riches for only the promise of future riches (and probably the future riches are of an entirely different kind)? Again, Jesus is using this real-life situation as a living parable. The man, who Jesus knows is presently hopelessly attached to his money, who loves his money and power and position, is unwilling to even seriously consider this proposal. As Jesus taught them before, you cannot serve two masters, God and money. And he taught them these statements as well:
"For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it" (Luke 9:24).
"If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters -- yes, even his own life -- he cannot be my disciple. And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26-27).
"In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple." (Luke 14:33)
"Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it" (Luke 17:33)
The man (naively) thought he was keeping the last 5 commandments, but Jesus has just shown him that he has a real problem with the first 5, especially, “You shall have no other gods before Me.”
Now some people like to try to argue away the uncomfortable statement about the camel and the needle by saying there was a gate called the “needle’s eye” in Jerusalem that camels could only just squish through. But there is no evidence of such a gate, in writings or through archaeological discoveries. Jesus said the statement precisely to shock and shake up His disciples into thinking about what God’s standard really is regarding getting into heaven.
Those who heard this asked, "Who then can be saved?" Jesus replied, "What is impossible with men is possible with God." Peter said to him, "We have left all we had to follow you!" "I tell you the truth," Jesus said to them, "no one who has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God will fail to receive many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life." – Luke 18:26-30
And so the disciples, rightly shocked, say, “Who then can be saved?” And Jesus confirms what we know if we know the gospel – nobody can be saved on their own merits. Nobody! It is impossible with men. Not just rich men, but all men.
But it is possible with God. To be precise, at the time of Luke 18, it is still not yet possible, but when Jesus completes what He has come to earth to do at the end of Luke, then it will be possible. And Jesus promises those of us that follow Him, who do what He asks us to do, that we will be given two kinds of things: first, He says we will be given many times as much in this age – now does this mean money, possessions, things? I would say no. The disciples themselves never became wealthy, and most were persecuted and ultimately killed for their faith. But they (and we) receive the Holy Spirit in this age. They (and we) received the precious blessings of fellowship with other believers in this age. They (and we) received the priceless gift of being God’s ambassadors on earth, of being God’s messengers, of seeing before our very eyes people’s futures change for eternity. And the second kind of thing we are given is the most priceless thing of all, eternal life in heaven with Him.
Looking back on this passage as a whole, I think the parables and living parables have four key lessons for us.
1. Become a persistent prayer. I of course don’t mean to conduct meaningless repetition – the Scriptures specifically say not to do this (Matthew). But be serious with God. Talk to Him, repeatedly, ongoing-ly, about issues and problems in your life and the lives of those around you.
2. Humble yourself and repent of your sin. This is so basic, but sometimes we need to hear the basic things. To have sin is to be human. To come to God asking for mercy over it is to be like the tax collector. To not do so and act like everything is OK is to be like the Pharisee. There is no other outcome!
3. Receive what God would have for you. Like the little children, we need to accept God’s gifts. Can you see the influence of the Holy Spirit in your life, teaching you, encouraging you, empowering you to live for God? If not, it could well be because your focus on “life” is crowding Him out. Spend real time with God, daily. Practice listening as well as praying. Like the little children, let Jesus touch you. Let the Father bless you. Let the Spirit fill you.
4. Give Him everything. It’s all His anyway! Rededicate it all to Him and let Him lead you. Tell Him you will follow Him. And then do it, as He leads.
“Hello, I’m calling about a research proposal that was approved 11 months ago, but no contract has yet been issued. Yes, I’ve called before.” My father owns a small business in California that primarily does chemistry research for the US government. Last October, at the start of the new fiscal year, he was approved on a fairly sizable research project by a project manager for a research office within the US government. These projects are highly competitive, as funds have become scarce, and being approved on such a project is a significant achievement. It means that a highly polished detailed research proposal has been prepared, and that it has gone out for review – both reviewed by people within the government and by peer reviews – and that it has risen to the top or near the top of the stack. After receiving notification of approval from the office of the project manager, it goes to a financial affairs/proposal procurement/federal compliance branch or agency, and one would expect that after a few weeks of going back and forth over contract details, the project is awarded and the funds become available. Well, maybe you would expect that – but after years of talking with my father, I would not expect that. It is always slower and more complicated than it should be.But this most recent proposal took everything to a whole new level. There would be silence for a few weeks, so my father would call and learn that the person who was working on it was fired, and a new person had the job. A few weeks later he would call again and learn that yet another person now had the job. A few weeks later he would call and find that all the paper was lost, so he would send it again. A few weeks later he would call and they would say everything is fine – it should be good to go. A few weeks later the person would change again, and they had no record of the proposal, and on and on and on. This went on for 11 months! Just this week they finally sent the official notification letter. Long since this point my father lost all trust in their competence or ability to get anything done, and these last few days he was calling several times a day to make sure everything that was supposed to be getting done was getting done – and even then in several cases it wasn’t. One example – they wanted a timetable of deliverables – no contract could be approved until this was given. “Um, sir, the timetable is on page 2 of the proposal.” “Oh.” “Hello, I just wanted to let you know that I faxed back the contract to you with my signature. When can I expect a fax back of the copy that includes your signature as well as mine? When today? In an hour?” OK, I’ll be looking for it. And so on.
I doubt any of you have dealt with this exact situation, but you probably have dealt with something similar at one point – perhaps dealing with medical claims rejected by an insurance company, or if, heaven forbid, you have ever had to deal directly with the IRS. If so, you are well prepared to hear the following parable.
Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said:
"In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with the plea, 'Grant me justice against my adversary.' - Luke 18:1-3
Most of you know that we have been going through the entire book of Luke, line by line, and so you have heard me say before that when reading parables it is important to not try to turn it into something more than it is meant to be. A parable usually only has a single main point – it is not an allegory, where everything stands for something else. This is one of those parables where you can come up with some pretty messed up conclusions if you try to do this. And in this case, it seems like the consequences would have been so serious that even Luke explains the point even before the parable is given.
So what is the point? Persist in prayer. Now the parable has two characters: a judge and a widow. The judge “neither feared God nor cared about men” – so what do think he did care about? Himself! Did he have lots of money and power? Probably. Was he an honest judge? Probably not. Did he take bribes? Probably.
The contrast could probably not be greater between this judge and a widow. We have talked before how in this culture being a widow was a serious thing. Not only had you gone through the tragedy of losing your husband, but you had also lost your means of income, your means of survival, in many cases. According to the laws of that culture, and in contrast to what usually goes on in our culture, the husband’s property did not revert to the wife. If they had children, it would revert to them, but if she didn’t it would revert to the nearest male family members of the husband – in other words, to her in-laws. Even if she did have children, it was not uncommon for the husband’s family to just come and an forcefully take what they wanted, especially if they never much cared for the wife, or if she had only been a wife for a short time. The listeners to this parable would assume that it was over an issue like this that the poor, powerless widow was coming before the rich, powerful judge. And like the true story of my father’s business, this widow was persistent. “Hello, judge. Yes, I see you remember me. Well, once again I am coming to see if you can do something about my situation. Well, last time you said that you didn’t think it was a case you could do something about. Well, this time I brought a few more papers that verify some of the things I have been saying. You don’t have time to look into it today? Oh, I see. Well, I will come tomorrow then. You don’t have time to look into it tomorrow? Oh, well, I can come the day after that. Have a good day, your honor. And have a good tomorrow too.”
"For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself, 'Even though I don't fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually wear me out with her coming!'" – Luke 18:4-5
Some of the Greek words here are quite picturesque. The Greek word for “bothering” is kopos, a word that means to cause distress or trouble, such as would be felt after receiving a beating! And the Greek for “wear me out” is hupopiazo, which literally means to give a black eye to! We sometimes in English use the phrase “is giving me a black eye” in a somewhat related way – in our case we mean it is making me look bad. And just as those federal guys finally moved quickly to make my father stop calling them, the judge in our parable decides to give her justice just so she will go away.
And the Lord said, "Listen to what the unjust judge says. 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? 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?" – Luke 18:6-8
Now here is not how to understand the parable: We are like the poor widow, and God is like the unjust judge. If we pester Him long enough with our prayers, He will finally relent and give us what we ask for. Is that right? No! No! No! God is not “like” the judge.
In fact, the point hinges directly on our understanding that of course God is not like that judge! The point is that if persistent petition gets a nasty evil judge to do something, how much more will persistent prayer receive action from God!
What about the word “quickly”? The Greek word for this is tachos, from which we get tachometer, which measures the speed of rotation of a rotating shaft. Does God really bring about justice quickly? What about when it doesn’t seem like God answers quickly?
In answer I think about 2 Peter 3, 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. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance. – 2 Peter 3:8-9
When the time comes, His justice will be swift and complete. But sometimes it is better that it doesn’t come yet. The phrase “When the Son of Man comes…” in our Luke passage draws me back to last week’s passage in the previous chapter, which dealt extensively with the return of Christ. Why does Jesus ask “if He will find faith on the earth” when He comes? I believe because persisting in prayer is an essential part of living in faith. When you lose faith, you certainly do not persist in prayer.
This passage does not dig deeply into the “why” we should persist, but rather simply that we should do it. I don’t have time to adequately address the “why” today, but I do have one thought. We misunderstand or misuse prayer if we think it is solely a one-way conversation. Even as we pray for needs we have for ourselves and for others, prayer should always be an invitation to God to make Himself and His ways more fully revealed to us. Every delay serves a purpose, even if we don’t get to see what that purpose is on this side of eternity. Persistent prayer opens us up more fully to God, and it gives God the opportunity to open Himself more fully up to us.
Why did Jesus tell His disciples (and us) this parable? To encourage us! Even a ding-dong corrupt selfish judge responds to persistent prayer. How much more does it matter to God, who loves us more deeply than we could even imagine such love to exist?
One last thought on persistent prayer: I have found that when I am persistently in prayer for some situation, what I actually pray for rarely persists! Especially if it is something in my own life I am praying for, over time my original prayers grow to seem immature, or insincere, or avoiding deeper issues. Persistent prayer is not safe! But do it anyway, or do it just because it is not safe! If our spiritual life is safe, there is something seriously wrong with it.
To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else, Jesus told this parable:
"Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.' – Luke 18:9-12
We move on now to another parable – one that is very well-known. And perhaps the fact that it is so well-known is a problem. Can we hear it anymore? Do you picture some self-righteous boastful Pharisee with his nose up in the air making this prayer? It is easy to become spiritually inoculated with “Christianese” and say, “Of course I’m not confident in my own righteousness.” Well maybe you aren’t when it comes to salvation, which the Pharisee in the parable probably was. But when we see someone whose life is a mess for whatever reason, what do we think? Is being thankful that we aren’t like that really so bad? Is feeling good about how your life is more or less in control really so bad? Well, apparently, the answer is yes.
"But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.' – Luke 18:13
Tax collectors, as we have talked about in past weeks, were generally corrupt in that they would charge more than was what they were supposed to collect. The Romans didn’t care – as long as they collected the taxes, they were fine. They didn’t care how they got it done. And tax collectors could also be, much like modern day bill collectors, masters at making someone’s life miserable until they paid up. They could be a whole different kind of persistent petitioner!
It is interesting to compare the two prayers, that of the Pharisee and that of the tax collector.
'God, I thank you that I am not like other men—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.'
'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.'
They both start by addressing God. They both end by describing themselves – although the descriptions could not be more different – a good man versus a sinner. But the middle is where the greatest differences lie. The Pharisee simply thanks God based on an opinion of his own goodness based on comparisons with other men, but the tax collector prays for mercy. He prays for mercy from God because it is based on God’s opinion of himself that he knows his total need for mercy.
"I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." – Luke 18:14
And here we come to the crystal clear point of the parable: the humble man is the one (and the only one) who receives that mercy. People who don’t ask for mercy don’t receive mercy. This principle is at the heart of the gospel – only people who ask God to come into their lives, to forgive them, to remake them into what God would desire – only people who do these things receive these things.
People were also bringing babies to Jesus to have him touch them. When the disciples saw this, they rebuked them. But Jesus called the children to him and said, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. I tell you the truth, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it." – Luke 18:15-17
We have a tendency to misuse this passage or the parallel passages in the other gospels a bit in our culture – at any Christian bookstore you can find a quote from a portion of this passage and a picture of Jesus, smiling, surrounded by little children (usually children 3-5 years old). The point of these pieces of art is clearly that Jesus loves children. Well, this is true – Jesus does love children, and this was a fairly radical theme back at the time of Christ, where children were viewed as unworthy of serious attention. But there is a greater point here, and artwork like this tends to make us miss it.
By the way, who is Jesus rebuking – the Pharisees? No, not this time – here it is the disciples. And if you think about it from the point of view of making disciples, Jesus really was doing almost everything He was doing as much or more for the disciples’ sake as He was for anyone else’s. Jesus was investing everything He had in these guys – they were going to be His messengers to the world. And so any rebuke He had for them should be considered carefully by us, His 21st century disciples.
Jesus’ message was actually quite shocking. Why? Because children were viewed as foolish until they learned wisdom from their parents, from the Scriptures, and when necessary, from discipline and correction including “the rod.” So to say that one had to somehow revert to be like these babies and toddlers, knowing next to nothing about God, perhaps not even knowing how to properly go to the bathroom, was a seemingly outrageous thing to say.
So what did Jesus mean? Why did He basically have the children all come so that He could display them as a kind of “living parable” for His disciples? There are several ideas I have read on this. Some think it is because they symbolized innocence. I think we can safely discount this idea for the reasons I already mentioned – children were not viewed as “little angels” back then, and anyone who has had children knows that their moments as “little angels” are balanced by their moments as, well, “little devils.”
Some say it is because they are open and trusting. I think this is closer to the mark, but what makes the most sense to me, especially keeping in mind the context of the previous verses is that they were specifically open to, as it says, receiving the kingdom of God. What does it mean to be open to receiving the kingdom of God? Well, first and foremost, I think it requires humility. Going back to the Pharisee and tax collector, it was only the tax collector who begged for mercy – he was the only one really open to receiving anything from God. The Pharisee didn’t want to stoop to the level of “receiving charity.” The children who came to Jesus did not first pontificate about their worthiness. They simply received whatever there was to receive – in this case, likely Jesus giving them a blessing in the presence of their parents.
We had a birthday party for our son Jonathan yesterday, and gifts were given to Jonathan, and we gave some gift bags to all the children as they left the party. Not a single child said, “O, I cannot take that – I don’t need your charity.” And at a party like this I have never heard the young birthday child say, “O – you are too generous. I cannot accept this. How could I ever repay you?” No, children simply receive. It is a rare child who is too proud to receive a birthday gift.
But when adults give gifts, it often becomes complicated. It becomes “our turn” to give a gift back. There are many unwritten rules about how much the gift can cost, about the occasion on which it is given, and so on. You will get nowhere if you approach Jesus on these kinds of terms. The word “priceless” has become a cliché, but truly no gift has ever been more priceless than that of Jesus’ life on the cross for our salvation.
A certain ruler asked him, "Good teacher, what must I do to inherit eternal life?" "Why do you call me good?" Jesus answered. "No one is good—except God alone. You know the commandments: 'Do not commit adultery, do not murder, do not steal, do not give false testimony, honor your father and mother.'" "All these I have kept since I was a boy," he said. – Luke 18:18-21
Now Matthew’s parallel account (chapter 19) describes the ruler as young, and a few verses down in our Luke passage, he is described as very wealthy. He was an “archon,” a leader of some kind either in the Temple or in the Sanhedrin courts.
His question reveals that he believed in eternal life, so he was probably a Pharisee. And he believed that obtaining eternal life was done by “doing” – that is, by earning or meriting through your actions. Notice that he addresses Jesus as “good teacher,” and it is in this greeting that Jesus chooses to work on his mistaken values system.
What is wrong with this ruler’s value system? Well, he believes that people can be “good people,” to use a common phrase. He measures goodness with his own ruler, not the true standards of God. How do we know this? In part, by his reply to Jesus’ answer. He says he has never committed adultery, never murdered, never stolen, never given false testimony, and always honored his father and mother, ever since he was a boy. Apparently, he missed Jesus’ sermon on the mount, where He explained that ever looking at someone with lust is the same in God’s eyes as adultery, ever hating someone is the same as murder, coveting is the same as stealing, and so on. Now those last two, he may well have redefined so as to say he was keeping them, as many Pharisees did. He might have said that he had never openly brought disgrace to his family, so in that sense he had completely honored his father and mother. He might have said that he had never lied about someone in a court proceeding so as to get them put away for a crime they did not commit, so that in that sense he had completely obeyed the commandment about false testimony. You see how easy it is to convince yourself you are good? If you ask unsaved people how good is good enough to go to heaven, you almost always, if you persist in conversation with them, basically end up with a line that is just a little below their own personal level of behavior.
Now some people get freaked out about Jesus comment that no one is God except God Himself. Does this mean that Jesus is not God, and moreover, that He is not even good? No – Jesus did not say He is not good; He just questioned why this young ruler would say so. In effect, Jesus is “God in disguise” during this interview. In fact, Jesus has done this through most conversations He has had with anyone up to this point. Why? Because the time to fully reveal Himself has not yet come.
When Jesus heard this, he said to him, "You still lack one thing. Sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow me." When he heard this, he became very sad, because he was a man of great wealth. Jesus looked at him and said, "How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God! Indeed, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." – Luke 18:22-25
What is interesting to me is Jesus’ approach at this point. You might think He would re-give His sermon on the mount to this person so he could understand that he falls far short of God’s definition of goodness. Instead, in Jesus’ perfect wisdom, perhaps because He knew that the young ruler wouldn’t respond to such an approach anyway, He takes a different tact, one that also instructs and challenges His disciples.
Now of course, Jesus’ response makes us uncomfortable. Sell everything you have? Trade off the certainty of present riches for only the promise of future riches (and probably the future riches are of an entirely different kind)? Again, Jesus is using this real-life situation as a living parable. The man, who Jesus knows is presently hopelessly attached to his money, who loves his money and power and position, is unwilling to even seriously consider this proposal. As Jesus taught them before, you cannot serve two masters, God and money. And he taught them these statements as well:
"For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it" (Luke 9:24).
"If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brothers and sisters -- yes, even his own life -- he cannot be my disciple. And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:26-27).
"In the same way, any of you who does not give up everything he has cannot be my disciple." (Luke 14:33)
"Whoever tries to keep his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life will preserve it" (Luke 17:33)
The man (naively) thought he was keeping the last 5 commandments, but Jesus has just shown him that he has a real problem with the first 5, especially, “You shall have no other gods before Me.”
Now some people like to try to argue away the uncomfortable statement about the camel and the needle by saying there was a gate called the “needle’s eye” in Jerusalem that camels could only just squish through. But there is no evidence of such a gate, in writings or through archaeological discoveries. Jesus said the statement precisely to shock and shake up His disciples into thinking about what God’s standard really is regarding getting into heaven.
Those who heard this asked, "Who then can be saved?" Jesus replied, "What is impossible with men is possible with God." Peter said to him, "We have left all we had to follow you!" "I tell you the truth," Jesus said to them, "no one who has left home or wife or brothers or parents or children for the sake of the kingdom of God will fail to receive many times as much in this age and, in the age to come, eternal life." – Luke 18:26-30
And so the disciples, rightly shocked, say, “Who then can be saved?” And Jesus confirms what we know if we know the gospel – nobody can be saved on their own merits. Nobody! It is impossible with men. Not just rich men, but all men.
But it is possible with God. To be precise, at the time of Luke 18, it is still not yet possible, but when Jesus completes what He has come to earth to do at the end of Luke, then it will be possible. And Jesus promises those of us that follow Him, who do what He asks us to do, that we will be given two kinds of things: first, He says we will be given many times as much in this age – now does this mean money, possessions, things? I would say no. The disciples themselves never became wealthy, and most were persecuted and ultimately killed for their faith. But they (and we) receive the Holy Spirit in this age. They (and we) received the precious blessings of fellowship with other believers in this age. They (and we) received the priceless gift of being God’s ambassadors on earth, of being God’s messengers, of seeing before our very eyes people’s futures change for eternity. And the second kind of thing we are given is the most priceless thing of all, eternal life in heaven with Him.
Looking back on this passage as a whole, I think the parables and living parables have four key lessons for us.
1. Become a persistent prayer. I of course don’t mean to conduct meaningless repetition – the Scriptures specifically say not to do this (Matthew). But be serious with God. Talk to Him, repeatedly, ongoing-ly, about issues and problems in your life and the lives of those around you.
2. Humble yourself and repent of your sin. This is so basic, but sometimes we need to hear the basic things. To have sin is to be human. To come to God asking for mercy over it is to be like the tax collector. To not do so and act like everything is OK is to be like the Pharisee. There is no other outcome!
3. Receive what God would have for you. Like the little children, we need to accept God’s gifts. Can you see the influence of the Holy Spirit in your life, teaching you, encouraging you, empowering you to live for God? If not, it could well be because your focus on “life” is crowding Him out. Spend real time with God, daily. Practice listening as well as praying. Like the little children, let Jesus touch you. Let the Father bless you. Let the Spirit fill you.
4. Give Him everything. It’s all His anyway! Rededicate it all to Him and let Him lead you. Tell Him you will follow Him. And then do it, as He leads.
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