22nd Sunday
after Pentecost October
16, 2016
Luke 18:1-8 Keep
Praying! Time Is on Your Side!
Dear fellow
redeemed,
No one likes to see a baby cry. So how long is too long?
*
Well,
it depends on whom you talk to. Some say
let a baby cry for 15 minutes.
Otherwise, he’ll
figure, “Just a little longer! “Mommy will come running!
Time is on my
side!
*
Others
say, it’s cruel to let the baby cry, for he can’t communicate what he
needs.
Therefore,
you shouldn’t let him cry at all.
*
Still
others say it depends on the age.
If he’s no
longer wearing diapers and no longer requires feeding at night, perhaps he’s
simply
demanding
attention, in which case you might let him cry a bit longer.
*
And
still others will point out a goal of parents.
Try not to
let your baby associate sleep with another activity such as rocking or sucking
on a bottle.
You don’t
want them to associate being put down with not being rocked or loved a certain
way.
*
The
last thing you want, in other words, is to give your little one a reason to
believe if I stop
crying I’m
going lose out.
*
So,
how long shall God let the believer
cry?
Jesus speaks
of believers “who
cry to him day and night.” It’s a reference to prayer.
*
What
do you think? Is God being cruel? Sometimes we have to wait a bit longer than
15 minutes.
*
Sometimes
we keep up our crying for 15 days, 15 months, or longer.
Without debating about the best way to handle a crying baby,
we may agree that crying out to God is a good thing.
Keep praying, for
time is on your side!
*
Unfortunately,
time doesn’t always seem to be on our side.
There are
times, when we’re inclined to give up.
*
Or
if the shoe is on the other foot, there are times when we’re inclined to give
in for the wrong reason.
First we
comment on how:
I – We may elect to give up, when time
seems against us.
*
Today’s reading immediately
follows Christ’s prediction that there would be some tough times
ahead for the disciples.
False Christs will arrive on the scene.
People will reject the Christian faith and live as though there’s
no tomorrow.
Soon thereafter, judgment will follow.
*
At such times, the
temptation will be to grow weary, to even join the world and call it quits.
So the Lord
told his disciples a parable that they should always pray “and not lose heart.”
He speaks
of a judge in a certain city “who neither feared God nor respected man.”
*
In the same city was a
widow who kept coming to him and pleading for justice against her adversary.
*
It’s a story, but very real
to life. On the one side is this
defenseless woman. She’s being afflicted
by
someone who’s trying to cause her harm or take something from her
illegally.
*
On the other side is this
judge who’s proved himself to be a heartless unbeliever.
He has contempt for anyone who would look to him for help and a
sense of fairness.
*
What shall she do? She’s helpless,
having no other option but to persist despite his cold heart and
where it’s gotten her so far.
We may be
thankful our heavenly judge is not so heartless.
*
But maybe this day you’re
feeling just as hopeless.
1)
During your latest visit to
the clinic it was revealed that your condition cannot be reversed.
You may control it for a time, but eventually it will worsen.
2)
Or you’re feeling your son’s
desperation, having just heard his wife is moving out.
That you happen to like her and she still likes the family is no
longer enough.
3)
Or you’ve tried to
apologize to a good friend. But
evidently it’s not going to cut it.
She wants you to change who you are.
*
And you’re thinking,
“really?!” Is this going to cost us our friendship?
4)
Or
it’s our country’s future that’s depressing you. With the recent coverage on
the presidential
race and both
candidates being beat up so badly, who do you vote for? You feel so helpless!
*
Losing heart is not a choice.
Instead of feeling hopeless about your personal circumstances;
instead of getting depressed that the country is going down the
tubes, Keep Praying!
Time is on Your Side!
Sometimes there are only two options.
You lose heart or you pray. You “pray
without ceasing” (1
Thess. 5:17).
*
So, which is it? Is it time to pray, or is it time to finally
give up?
At the end of
today’s Gospel, Jesus puts it this way, “when the Son of Man comes, will he find
faith on earth?”
*
We
may find his question a bit depressing.
But Christ
isn’t suggesting when he returns that he won’t necessarily find any believers.
*
What
he’s asking is that we examine ourselves to see whether our faith is properly
focused.
Are we ready
to continue crying out for his assistance until we get his final answer?
*
It’s
what you and I are entitled to do this very day.
What do you
see when you examine your health, when you reflect upon your son’s marriage,
when you stew
over your lost friend?
*
Yes.
You see defenselessness. You see how sin has gotten its way when it should not
have.
You may even
see the wages of sin; how death isn’t as far as it used to be.
*
But
can you also see your chance to trust in your righteous judge, who hears your
prayers?
Thank God we
can!
It isn’t time to give up.
II – When time seems against us, however, we
may also elect to give in for the wrong reason.
*
Shifting
gears, we consider the unrighteous judge’s point of view.
As
indefensible as his position may be, we can understand how his mind is working.
*
For
a time, the judge refuses to help the woman, since, as he freely admits, he
neither fears
God nor
respects man.
*
But
eventually it occurs to him that he’s not coming out ahead denying her justice.
Unless he
gives in, this widow will keep bothering him and “beat (him) down by her continual
coming.”
*
We
may appreciate what it means being a squeaky wheel.
No. A squeaky wheel can’t talk. But if it could, it would be telling us, “deal
with me or
I’m just going
to keep squeaking and irritating the heck out of you!
*
Long
story short, for you or I to be a squeaky wheel is to cause that certain
authority to come
around
despite the fact that they have no relationship with us.
Getting back to the widow in our reading, we should know
there’s more at play than her relentless
pestering for justice.
*
When
the judge finally gives in, “so that she will not beat me down by her continual coming”,
this suggests
he may have been afraid what affect her resolve would eventually have on
his
reputation.
*
He
might have thought, “others are picking up on this woman and her cause.
Some, no
doubt, are sympathizing with her.
It would seem
I have a choice. I can lose a small
portion of self-respect.
Or I can lose
a large portion of my respect with the community.”
*
So
the unrighteous judge is finally convinced to do something, only because his wellbeing
is likely to
be affected.
*
Now,
we surely would never acknowledge that we “neither fear God nor respect man.”
But there are
those times when we too finally act, not out of interest for this person in
need
but out of an
interest for ourselves.
1)
We
finally quit that habit that’s irritating our loved ones.
2)
We
agree once again to volunteer, “since no one else is coming forward!”
3)
We
consent grudgingly to spend less time out with our buddies and more time at
home.
*
We
do the Christian thing only because we’re convinced we have no other choice.
*
But
we could have prayed, put the matter in God’s hands, and trusted that the right
thing for
So-and-so
would also be the right thing for me.
The opposite of praying is to lose heart and grow weary.
*
Whether
we’re tempted to give up or to give in to fear and resentment, we’re taking it
too
personally. We need to acknowledge that God always has a
purpose in having us wait.
*
In
the words of Peter: “In this you rejoice, though now . . . you have been
grieved by various
trials, so that the tested
genuineness of your faith–more precious than gold that perishes
though it is tested by fire–may be
found to result in praise and glory and honor at the
revelation of Jesus Christ.” (1 Peter
1:6-9).
*
As
we pray for a given cross to be removed from our life, we may be assured in the
mean-time
that our faith will be served by it until the return of Christ.
*
Of
course, many refuse to believe that God has any use for us bearing a cross in
life.
Paul warns
that “the time is
coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but
having itching ears
they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions.”
*
It
would appear they’re done with their crying and that it’s time to act.
They’re
thinking “time is not on my side! The
Lord’s clock needs fixing.
*
And
so they make their teaching and preaching about today and how we humans shall
overcome sin
and its effects, rather than trusting in our Lord to overcome sin.
As for you and me we realize we can expect to bear crosses in
this life.
What’s more, the Lord will not give my faith and Christian
life more than I’m able to bear.
*
It’s
why we pray.
*
But
what’s our basis for prayer?
How do we
know time is on our side and we needn’t lose heart?
*
The
answer is in God’s Word, his holy Scriptures. It’s breathed out by God, is
without error
of any kind,
and is therefore able to make us wise for salvation.
*
Our
Lord keeps us from losing heart by letting us see into his heart.
What we see is
a God who’s been on our side from all eternity.
“And will not God give justice to his elect” Jesus
asks, “who cry to
him day and night?”
*
Don’t
give up! Don’t give in just to serve
yourself!
III – Keep Praying! As God has elected to save you, time is on
your side.
*
The
elect are those whom God has chosen from before time even began to spend
eternity with him.
You and I may
assume that we’re among the elect, since we have faith in our Savior. We
believe
he entered
time with us to suffer what time
would do to us.
*
“And will not God
give justice to his elect?” Just read what’s between the
lines here!
If God hasn’t
given up on you yet, shall you give up on him?
*
The
Lord God, who’s holy, without any kind of sin, has known you from eternity to
be steeped in sin,
worthy of nothing
good from him.
Nevertheless,
out of grace and mercy, he’s elected you to heaven!
*
Shall
you give up on this God, on the basis of a relatively short period of grief?
The Lord doesn’t give up on his chosen, even though we might argue
he has every reason to.
*
So,
is that to say that he finally gives in; he’s heard enough of our pleas for
help?
Does the Lord
treat us like the squeaky wheel that finally receives that desirable oil?
*
Not
at all! Unlike the unrighteous judge who
comes through to shut you up, our
righteous
judge comes
through to open you up, to supply you
with the faith you need to keep on praying.
*
Unlike
the unmerciful in our lives whose first inclination is to deprive us of our right, the Lord
God’s first
inclination is to give us our right
as a believer.
*
So
what’s our right? To plead for justice against our adversaries,
the devil, the world and our
own sinful
flesh. “My times are in your hand”
David declares;
“rescue me from the hand of
my enemies and from my
persecutors!” (Psalm 31:15).
*
On
our own we have no such right.
On our own,
time could only serve as our worst enemy.
*
But
Jesus Christ has given us this right on the basis of his suffering and death
for us.
By faith in
our crucified Lord, whose blood paid the necessary ransom for our sins, we may
pray today
and every day, and never lose heart.
How long shall we pray and cry out?
*
From
our point of view it may seem very long at times.
But from
God’s point of view the time is relatively short.
*
“Will he delay long
over them?” Jesus
asks.
“I tell you, he will give justice to them
speedily.”
*
Look
at it this way: The present is but an instant; not so our past and our future.
Looking back,
we can find no starting point. Having
been elected us from eternity,
there was not
even the briefest moment when the Lord God did not know us as his elect.
*
And
looking ahead we can find no ending point, for our time with our Savior is
eternal.
*
That’s
why we keep praying.
If time is on
our side, whether looking back eternally or looking ahead eternally, then time
must also be
on our side, in between, looking to the present, which happens to be very short.
If you don’t like to see people cry, young or old, keep in
mind that crying can be healthy.
*
For
the young child it serves as an opportunity for learning.
On the one
hand, he learns to communicate that he’s in need.
On the other
hand, he learns that life doesn’t always offer immediate relief.
*
For
the grieving and the hopeless it’s the same.
From our
crying, we learn how to talk to God and how God talks to us, the believer.
*
And
we’re assured of the same thing in every case.
God’s not letting you cry too long.
He didn’t
wait too long to elect you. He didn’t
wait too long to die for you.
So he’ll
surely not delay long in relieving you. Amen.
May the peace of God which passes all understanding keep your
hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.
Keep Praying! Time Is on Your Side!
I – When time seems against us, we may elect
to give up.
II – When time seems against us, we may elect
to give in.
III
– Keep Praying! As God has elected to save you, time is on
your side.
