Luke 18:1-8

Pentecost 19 | October 16, 2022 | Luke 18:1-8 | Ryan D. Mills |

¹Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. ²He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. ³In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my opponent.’ ⁴For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, ⁵yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’ ” ⁶And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. ⁷And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? ⁸I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” (Luke 18:1-8, NRSV).

In the Name of the Father, and of the Son +, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

         Several years ago my wife and I watched the movie “Little Pink House,” which is the story of a court case some of you might remember, the story of Susette Kelo from New London, Connecticut. Susette’s little pink house and her neighbors’ houses were slated to be taken and demolished by eminent domain to make room for a pharmaceutical plant along the river in New London.  And the movie is the story of her toughness, her determination, her organizing and standing up for her neighborhood and neighbors, of her doing whatever it would take to save her little pink house and the others in her neighborhood from destruction. Of course, those of you who remember the case or have seen the movie know that her cries for justice, her demand for her rights, eventually led all the way the U.S. Supreme Court, where unfortunately she lost. Her house, along with many others, were taken away and demolished sadly all for seemingly nothing: today the place where her house and neighborhood once stood is empty, a neighborhood of empty lots that are home to no one.

And Susette reminds me today of the widow in today’s parable that Jesus tells us.  A tough, determined, persistent widow has a court case to argue, and won’t give up demanding that the judge give her justice, “Grant me justice against my opponent,” she cries. She won’t be silent, she won’t sit down, she won’t give up until she gets what is right. But the judge in the case, Jesus tells us, is unjust: he neither fears God nor respects people.  The judge reminds us of so much of the world today: he has no fear of God or any care to do what is right; he has no respect for other people, no compassion, and no sense of how to treat others as he would be treated. The judge is what today we would a narcissist, he only cares about himself; or a sociopath, other people don’t matter at all to him. He shows us the worst of what the power of sin does to us, that without God and his amazing grace in our lives we collapse into ourselves, taking everybody down with us.

But to this unjust judge, our persistent widow comes day and night, 24/7, again and again, refusing to be dismissed, demanding to be heard, saying, “grant me justice,” or in another translation, “justify me!”

And finally this unjust judge just can’t take it anymore and says to himself, “Self, even though I don’t fear God or respect anyone, because this woman keeps bothering me I’ll give her justice, so she won’t wear me out!”

And if an unjust judge who doesn’t care about anything or anybody will give what is right to a powerless widow, well then, says the Lord, how much more will your heavenly Father who loves you give you justice and answer you who call to him day and night.

See, Jesus told us this parable because he knew it’s easy for us to lose heart, it’s easy for us to become discouraged in prayer, it’s easy for us to wrongly think that our requests fall on deaf ears.  But if an unjust judge will answer you, how much more will your Father in Heaven, who created you, who has given you everything, who provides day to day for your every need, who has sustained you to this very moment, who longs to hear from you, and who even gave for you his only-begotten Son, how much more will God listen to you and give you what you need? He who did not withhold his own Son from you, won’t he give you everything else, far more than you could ever ask for or imagine? Jesus told this parable, the gospel says today, about our need to pray always, and to not lose heart.

Prayer is just our faith breathing, it is listening to what God has to say to us, realizing you and I have been spoken to, addressed by God in Christ, and praye is our responding in conversation with the voice of our heart, with our mind, with our lips, with our lives. I’ve learned over the years that if you really want someone to pray for you, don’t ask a pastor, don’t put your name on a list, but go and ask a widow.  Like Susette they know how to pray, they know how to hold God’s feet to the fire and they don’t give up until he gives what is needed. There’s a reason that in the early church the worshippers were instructed that the holiest thing in the sanctuary to bow before, besides the altar, were the widows, because they know how to pray, how to ask God for everything that we need.

Of course the thing that we all need the most, even though we don’t always realize it, is to be made right with God. We secretly wonder if we’re worth it, if we are worthy enough, we fear sins we commit and our unfaithfulness may have finally cut us off from him, we wonder if there is hope for our lives and for this world. The widow cries today, “Give me justice,” or “justify me,” and finally the judge says, “I will give her justice,” “I will justify her,” not because of her case, not because of her wonderful merits, not because of anything, but just because he chooses to.  And so God looks on you and me in love and says the same thing, “You are justified, you are made right with me, you are made worthy to stand, I give you what you could not do for yourself, not because of what you’ve done, not because you’ve earned it, but out of love, as a gift, by grace, by my choice.” God chooses for his own reasons to make you his own again this morning, to give you the deepest thing that you need. While you were still weak, while we were still sinners, while you did not deserve it, Christ gave himself on the Cross for you, he died so that you could live, he was pronounced guilty so that you are indeed pronounced ‘innocent.’

And he who gave everything for you, even his own life, now lives and reigns and prays for you. The amazing thing about prayer is that it’s not about us, but it’s grounded in Jesus continuing persistent prayers for you, and God’s Spirit praying within you before you open your mouth. You can pray always, you can pray and not lose heart, you can pray because Jesus prays for you, and his Spirit prays in you. He prayed for you in the Garden that night in which he was betrayed, he prayed for you in those long hours upon the Cross, he prays for you now, seated at the right hand of the Father. He prays for this world still starving for justice, he prays for his broken church, purchased with his precious blood, he prays for you, for every need you know and for every need that you don’t know, because every hair on your head is counted and you are fully known and precious to him. So even if our prayer is slow, and halting, and timid, it’s grounded and supported by his praying and his Spirit that prays and groans within us with sighs too deep for words. “Give me justice, give me what’s right,” we cry, and Jesus says out “Not only that, but I’ve given you everything, I give you myself, I hold nothing back from you.”

We come in a moment to the Holy Communion, where once again he gives us the gift of himself, his broken, risen body in the bread, his poured-out blood in the wine. If he gives you even that, won’t he give you whatever else you need? Strengthened by these gifts, we will go back to our lives this week, to live in true faith towards God, to stand up for what is right, to love and defend our neighbors and speak well of them, and to pray always, not losing heart, knowing that the God who loves you and gave himself for you has made you his own, and will give you everything that you need.

And the Peace of God which passes all understanding guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus, Amen.

The Rev. Dr. Ryan Mills

New Haven, Connecticut

Pastor@TrinityLutheranNH.org