Insights

Rev Gav

How do we remain resilient?

Luke 18:1-8

Jesus told the disciples a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. He said, ‘In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, “Grant me justice against my opponent.” For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, “Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.” ’And the Lord said, ‘Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?’

Reflect

It’s not easy to keep going when things get tough, and when life gets difficult, the temptation to give up is strong. I don’t doubt that all of us have ‘quit’ something when we’ve faced opposition or ‘immovable’ obstacles! I know I have.

Luke wrote his gospel decades after Jesus had lived, died, been resurrected, and ascended, and the hope of the early Christians was that God’s kingdom would soon come fully, and that God’s sovereign rule would finally be fully established. It’s not difficult to understand where this idea came from because it was so embedded in Jewish thought — the hope that the Messiah, God’s Anointed One, would establish authority over the whole earth — and, after all, Christianity began as a Jewish sect. On top of this, Jesus himself demonstrated that he was the Messiah and alluded that their hopes would come to fruition. Worse still, at the time Luke wrote his Gospel, Christians were being persecuted and this injustice was the exact opposite of the glorious justice they expected — so how come the whole ‘kingdom’ thing hadn’t yet happened? This was not how the story was supposed to go! What was going on?

In response to this, Luke recounts a story that Jesus told — one that would encourage his followers to pray and not lose heart — and as always, we must ditch our cultural lenses and not make this about us as individuals, but understand that the widow in the story represented the poor, marginalised, and oppressed Christian community, and that the unjust judge represented the oppressors — the Roman Empire and their corrupt local authorities. The story is about the widow’s divine hope and persistence that justice will prevail. The message is ‘don’t give up!’ and that ultimately God will keep God’s promise of salvation and redemption for the world.

The story began with a short explanation from Luke, “Jesus told the disciples a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.” Now, there is a connection between prayer and not losing heart. Unfortunately, for many of us in the Western church, we have diminished prayer to simply ‘asking God for stuff’ and interpreted Jesus’ parable as evidence that if we simply keep ‘asking’ we will eventually get a result, but this is not what the parable or prayer is about.

The word for prayer in the Greek is ‘proseuchesthai’ and it means a whole lot more than simply ‘ask’. It is a word that describes relational activity that includes of notions having an open posture towards God, intimacy with God, and involvement with God’s will and purpose.

The inference is that widow in the story is persistent and not losing heart, not because of her prayers, but because she prays. There is a subtle but important difference. Through prayer we become open to God, have intimacy with God, and align ourselves with God’s will and purpose, and when the community prays there is a transactional element at play through which God forms, shapes, and equips us to face the inequalities and injustices in the world.

God does not leave us as orphans to fend for ourselves. It is not a case of finding within us the strength to not lose heart, but to draw on strength from God — and to do this through prayer.

The message for Luke’s readers was to not lose heart in the face of oppression, and the same message is relevant for us today. When we struggle to find strength, when we are losing heart and hope, or when it seems that those with power and political agendas are ‘winning’ and our situation is hopeless, we too must be like the persistent widow, continually pray, and wear down our enemies with love.

In the same way that the widow’s non-violent protests pay off as she continually seeks justice, so we trust that love will win in the end. We may not see it in our life-time, but the whole world is at stake, and we can only remain resilient and stand firm if we remain open to hearing from God, and allowing God to empower us with divine, Spirit-filled strength.

Today’s Bible Reading ends with a question, “…when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” This was not a rhetorical question but a challenge Jesus posed to his listeners and a challenge Luke posed to his readers. It is therefore a challenge to us. We know God’s kingdom or sovereignty is in the process of coming, and we know that we are called to be ambassadors for Christ and embody the kingdom here on earth. Each of us is a vessel for God’s Spirit to move and work out God’s will and purpose, but we must continue to stay connected to God through prayer.

I understand that we all lead busy lives, but we must do our best to find time to connect with God. I think this is why the daily devotions — our Daily Bread — on FAB are so important. They provide for us, a moment to disconnect from the world and connect with God. Therefore, let us do so, with an open heart, drawing close to God, and allowing the Spirit to move in and through us.

Amen.

Photo by Lucas Chizzali on Unsplash
Thanks to Simon Cross.