Tues Devo: Prayer and faith

Luke 18:1-8 “Now He was telling them a parable to show that at all times they ought to pray and not to lose heart, saying, ‘In a certain city there was a judge who did not fear God and did not respect man. There was a widow in that city, and she kept coming to him, saying ‘Give me legal protection from my opponent.’ For a while he was unwilling; but afterward he said to himself, ‘Even though I do not fear God nor respect man, yet because this widow bothers me, I will give her legal protection, otherwise by continually coming she will wear me out.’’ And the Lord said, ‘Hear what the unrighteous judge said; now, will not God bring about justice for His elect who cry to Him day and night, and will He delay long over them? I tell you that He will bring about justice for them quickly. However, when the Son of Man comes, will He find faith on the earth?” (NASB)

Hello,

I think this is a very interesting passage in scripture. Many times we read the reason for a parable after Jesus tells it, but this time we see the intent right up front. I love that Jesus knows us enough to understand that we struggle with waiting. We want more immediate answers to prayer. But His timing is not ours, so we have to not lose heart.

The He gets into the story of this judge who helped a woman simply out of annoyance and personal reasons. Nothing to do with her, just selfish focus by him. (I can see a lot of us in that judge and the way we operate) Jesus contrasts that man doing the right thing for wrong reasons against the holy God who does the right things for the right reasons, in the right times. But notice carefully the end of this story. Jesus asks “…and will He delay long over them?”. This is a rhetorical style question, with the answer immediately given that God will bring justice quickly. Certainly challenges our view of quick vs long? We scope to a percentage of time out of a handful of years, but His scope is eternity.

Then He challenges even further – will He find faith on the earth upon His return? How long will we endure? One of the challenges I take from this is that we cannot translate God’s speed of answers to prayer into our level of faith. Rather, we need to translate our faith into our endurance for praying.

I hope this challenges you as well.

Will Hill