1 Then Jesus used this story to teach his followers that they should always pray and never lose hope. 2 “In a certain town there was a judge who did not respect God or care about people. 3 In that same town there was a widow who kept coming to this judge, saying, ‘Give me my rights against my enemy.’ 4 For a while the judge refused to help her. But afterwards, he thought to himself, ‘Even though I don’t respect God or care about people, 5 I will see that she gets her rights. Otherwise she will continue to bother me until I am worn out.’”
6 The Lord said, “Listen to what the unfair judge said. 7 God will always give what is right to his people who cry to him night and day, and he will not be slow to answer them. 8 I tell you, God will help his people quickly. But when the Son of Man comes again, will he find those on earth who believe in him?”
Read Luke 18:1-8 in context and/or in other translations on BibleGateway.com!
In Jesus’ illustration in our passage for this post, we might get the wrong idea if we are not paying attention. The parable of the persistent widow is shared in the context of prayer and asking God for help, and if it were not for how Luke frames the opening of this parable, we might misunderstand the reason Jesus shared this parable.
The passage opens by saying, “Jesus used this story to teach his followers that they should always pray and never lose hope.” (v. 1)
This teaches us that prayer itself is beneficial for the one praying, even if an answer is not received immediately. In our lives, and especially with prayer, we should never lose hope.
However, before we think that God will take the role of the stubborn, indifferent judge, Jesus shares how God is different by saying, “God will always give what is right to his people who cry to him night and day, and he will not be slow to answer them.” (v. 7)
Jesus said that God will always give “what is right” to His people, and this phrase got me thinking about the sort of answers we receive from God since this means that not all prayers/requests will be answered the way we asked them.
The first possible answer we can receive is a “Yes”. In this response, God answers quickly and gives us the thing we asked for. It is really the answer we always want to receive, but there are other possible responses as well.
The second possible answer we can receive is a “No”. By responding this way, God is telling us that our request is not “right for us”, or simply not best for us in the big picture. God has a different perspective, and He uses His “eternity perspective” when looking at answering our personal prayers. However, a “No” answer might not really be a “No”.
The third possible answer we can receive is a “Not yet”. God understands what we need and what we are asking, but the timing isn’t quite right. Perhaps we need to grow more, or perhaps things outside of our awareness need to change before the timing is right to answer this request. Like a “No” response, a “Not yet” comes because God is looking from His “eternity perspective” and this is a much better perspective to frame answering our prayers. However, before thinking there are only three types of responses, there is a fourth, and in some ways, it might be the most common response God gives.
The fourth possible answer we can receive is a “No, but here is something better”. This says that God acknowledges our prayer, but instead of answering it in the way we prayed it, He answers it using His infinite knowledge and perspective. While we might not always agree with His idea of what is “better”, when we are given the chance to look back on this response from Heaven’s perspective, we will almost certainly agree with God’s chosen response.
All these possible responses are given, because, “God will always give what is right to his people who cry to him night and day, and he will not be slow to answer them.” (v.7)
This thought was inspired by studying the Walking With Jesus “Reflective Bible Study” package. To discover insights like this in your own study time, click here and give Reflective Bible Study a try today!
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