Week 39 Luke 18
The story is about a widow who brought a legal case before a mean & wretched judge. He didn’t care about her case at all. But she kept coming back. Again & again & again. Until finally he acted.
The story wasn’t really about the law. it was about prayer. Luke said the Lord told the story to illustrate people’s need for constant prayer and to show them that they must never give up.
So there are two lessons about praying:
a) I should pray as much as possible
b) even if nothing happens I shouldn’t get discouraged & quit praying.
Praying but not getting depressed need to go hand-in-hand.
A big factor – at least when it comes to Ask / Request Prayers – is the time element. I go to a coffee shop and I wait a minute or two for my order. Not twenty. With an Ask Prayer it’s a different thing. If I ask and nothing happens then my normal reactions – impatience frustration annoyance – are counterproductive. They’re more of a hindrance than a help.
Luke is saying that Ask Prayers have different response times. They range from Right Away all the way up to A Very Long Time (months or maybe even years).
No one needs patience for a Right Away response. But years? That sounds like Frustration Country.
Still…my normal reaction – getting mad & quitting because an Ask Prayer isn’t answered – isn’t what Luke recommends.
Note: quote from Luke 18:1 (NLT)