Holy Persistence

Scripture can be found here

Jesus tells us a story this morning, about a widow seeking justice.

The problem is, the judge who can give it to her, is not interested in justice.

Jesus is on a journey, the journey to Jerusalem. This road will lead him to the cross, and therefore he has urgent business: he wants to tell his friends and followers everything. He wants them to be ready for whatever may come (read: his death), and the chaotic time that will come after it. He wants them to be prepared.

If you read the passage just before this one, you get some context. You hear the kinds of things that are going through Jesus’ mind. He’s been recounting passages from the bible that are familiar and unsettling. The story of Noah: a legendary flood and massive loss of life. The story of Lot’s wife: she’d the one who is turned to a pillar of salt as she looks back at a city going up in flames. And he makes predictions: In the days to come, people will disappear, and there will be no accounting for them.

Jesus wraps all this up with a disturbing image: “Where the corpse is, there the vultures will gather.”

Our passage comes next, at the beginning of chapter 18. The narrator introduces it by saying: “Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.”

Well, that makes sense. In preparation for a time of anxiety and chaos, Jesus wants to help people to find the quiet center. He wants them to stay grounded. He wants them to be able to find courage. Prayer will do all these things, and more.

But Jesus describes prayer in a fascinating way. Prayer, he says, is like a widow who takes her case before a judge who doesn't care about God, and who doesn’t care about people. Makes you wonder why this guy is a judge in the first place. But I digress.

Give me justice! the woman cries. “Grant me justice against my opponent!”

Now, the bible is very clear about widows. And orphans. And people from other countries—immigrants and refugees. Throughout scripture, in both testaments, widows, orphans, and immigrants are named as the people who are most dangerously vulnerable—the people we must care for, the people we must not let slip through the cracks.

Unless she has a brother or father or grown son, a widow is at risk of starving to death, or being forced to sell the only thing she has: herself. Unless they have extended family, orphans are liable to find themselves slaves. Unless they find people who are willing to extend hospitality, immigrants are in danger of being exploited, or worse—we have seen the things a fear-filled country will do to immigrants.

We don’t know who the widow’s opponent is, or what her case is all about. It’s possible her dead husband’s family refuses to take care of her. Whatever her situation, the widow is quite sure that Jewish law is on her side, and she’s right. And so, she is not giving up.  In fact, she returns to petition the judge, again and again. She is there, in the front row, when the gavel drops in the morning. She is outside the courthouse at the end of the day, when he leaves for his evening meal. Give me justice, she cries! And each time she asks for it, he says, No. 

And this is Jesus’ description of prayer: Prayer is like a widow who takes her case before a judge who doesn't care about God, and who doesn’t care about people, and she keeps on coming back, and he keeps saying, No.

I don’t know about you, but, at times, that is exactly what my prayer life feels like.

And…Jesus acknowledges this! I don't know about you, but I feel seen. I pray and you pray and we all pray, and maybe we see big miracles; or maybe we see tiny, incremental things move in small, barely measurable ways. But maybe not.

But! The parable isn’t over, because that dreadful judge, who never should have become a judge in the first place? Even he, eventually, can be worn down by this woman, who, in holy persistence, continually presents herself before him and cries out:

Give me justice!

This seems to be the year in which I have discovered that God is always hiding in the parables, usually in the place I least expect.

Who keeps coming to us—in the guise of the news every morning and evening, in the faces of the people who lose their lives every day to injustice… who keeps praying to us, day after day, “Give me justice!”

God, that’s who.

I know this is meant to be a parable about our need to pray continually, but really, isn’t it also God who prays continually to us, day after day? God prays to us in the stories about people who lose their lives to racism, or to transphobia, or to sheer, cold indifference… praying to us to see that hearts are changed, that justice is not forgotten, and that at some point, these precious lives will once again be considered precious.

The reign of God is like a widow who takes her case before a judge who doesn't care about God, and who doesn’t care about people, but she keeps on coming back, and he keeps saying, No. That is, until he finally says, Yes.

The judge finally answers the widow’s prayers—not because the judge is godly or good, but because he finally realizes this woman might actually do him harm. Our translation definitely cleans this up: the Greek word means, “to bruise,” or, “to beat black and blue.” The judge is afraid the widow will haul off and give him a black eye! Or worse, give his reputation a black eye.

Just to be clear, at this point, Jesus’ listeners are in stitches. Imagine: this is his description of prayer. And don’t we appreciate humor that helps us to break out of anxiety and worry? Which, maybe, is at least part of the point here. Go ahead, Jesus seems to be saying. Wear God out with your prayers. Won’t God—who is all good, and all just, and who cares very much about us—who loves us, in fact, who loved us right into being—won’t God answer our prayers a lot faster than this dreadful judge?

Prayer shores us up. When we’re falling apart, prayer stitches us back together. Even when we don’t get the answers we are hoping for, prayer transforms the shifting sand of our lives to solid ground, upon which we can stand—or maybe, to everlasting arms, upon which we can lean. Prayer—even the kind of prayer described as a woman basically nagging an unjust judge into giving in—makes our relationship with God tangible. It becomes a conversation, a relationship, something we participate in, rather than something that is out there, like an early morning fog that dissipates before we even get out of bed. Through prayer, our relationship with God becomes real.

This morning, Jesus tells us a parable, so that we will pray always, and not lose heart.

This morning, Jesus also reminds us to pay attention to God’s very clear, not at all subtle prayers to us—prayers that we will show up for justice, that we will stand with the vulnerable ones in our midst, that we will open our hearts to those who are begging us to show by our actions that their lives matter, too.

This morning, Jesus tells us to go ahead and storm heaven with our prayers, and with our own holy persistence we will find that God is with us, that God does hear us, that God’s love is the answer to every prayer.

Thanks be to God. Amen.