Luke 18:1-14 “Principles Regarding Prayer”

Introduction: In this passage there are two parables that teach about prayer. Not about prayer in a general sense, but about prayer in light of the salvation that is promised in Christ. Though there are general applications that can be taken from these parables, Jesus’ primary intent in telling these parables was to help His disciples understand how prayer related to two specific aspects of one’s salvation.

I. A Parable about Perseverance in Prayer: (vs.1-8) The first parable is taken from the civil side of Jewish life, featuring an ungodly judge, and a victimized widow. In this parable Jesus uses this story to teach His disciples about the need to persevere in their prayers; specifically, in regard to God’s deliverance of them from this evil world. Luke opens this passage by writing; “Then He spoke a parable to them” (vs.1a). Luke’s use of the pronouns here indicates that Luke is linking the narrative in this chapter with that of the last chapter. The pronoun “He” of course refers to Jesus, who was teaching in the previous narrative. The pronoun “them” refers to Jesus’ disciples, since they had been the ones Jesus had been speaking to in the previous passage (17:22). Finally, we are told that Jesus was now going to teach them by using another of His parables. In this passage, Luke breaks his usual pattern and introduces the theme of Jesus’ parable prior to recording the parable itself. Luke writes; “that men always ought to pray and not lose heart” (vs.1b). The idea of praying at all times, is something that is repeated in the teachings of the Apostle Paul (Eph.6:18; I Thess.5:17). The admonition should not be interpreted as meaning that one never stops from offering formal prayers all day long. Instead, the intent is that Jesus’ disciples should have an ongoing conversation with their God; that they are to speak to Him over and over again throughout each day. The Greek word translated as “lose heart”, means to grow weary in the sense of discouragement or hopelessness. Therefore, this parable was designed to give the disciples of Jesus a reason to continue in their prayers to God, by informing them why should not give into despair. Jesus opens the parable by introducing the first of the two central characters of the parable; “There was in a certain city a judge who did not fear God nor regard man” (vs.2). It is helpful to keep in mind that parables are fictitious stories depicting real life scenarios, which illustrate some theological or ethical truth. Therefore, Jesus is not recounting a story about an actual person. We are told that this first character in the parable is a judge in a “certain city”. It is typical for parables to include anonymous individuals and places. We are told two important things about this judge; he did not fear God, nor did he have regard for man. To understand how a first century Jewish audience would hear this, it is helpful to know what sort of a judge is pictured here. In light of the fact that the parable centers on a dispute between two individuals, we can be sure that a Jewish judge is in view. Though the Romans had ultimate authority over the land of Israel, it was their custom to leave local matters and the day to day operation of justice in the hands of the people of that given nation. All judges in Israel, including those who presided over civil matters, were to execute the responsibilities of their office as agents of God. From the time of Jehoshaphat, king of Judah, we have a passage that informs us what was supposed to be expected of judges in Israel:

“So Jehoshaphat dwelt at Jerusalem; and he went out again among the people from Beersheba to the mountains of Ephraim, and brought them back to the LORD God of their fathers. Then he set judges in the land throughout all the fortified cities of Judah, city by city, and said to the judges, ‘Take heed to what you are doing, for you do not judge for man but for the LORD, who is with you in the judgment. Now therefore, let the fear of the LORD be upon you; take care and do it, for there is no iniquity with the LORD our God, no partiality, nor taking of bribes.’” II Chronicles 19:4-7

That this judge did not fear God, meant that he had no concern about violating God’s commandments and risking Divine punishment. The implication is that this man did not believe in God, and God’s revelation of what was right and wrong meant nothing to him. We are also told that this judge did not “regard” man. This word carries the sense of respect for another, or giving heed to what another person thinks or says. The ancient middle eastern culture is built around shame and honor. Most often, right was viewed in terms of what would gain honor, and wrong as what would bring shame. This judge is described as one who could not be shamed before other people, because he did not care what anyone thought of him. A person who feels no accountability to God or other people is a law unto himself; a person who is driven by self-interest alone. This sort of judge, is one that would use his office to his own advantage, and thus his judicial rulings were for sale. Jesus then introduces the second character in the parable; “Now there was a widow in that city; and she came to him, saying, ‘Get justice for me from my adversary’” (vs.3). In the ancient near east, a widow was extremely vulnerable. For all the power in society belonged to men. A woman in fact would never come before a judge unless she had no man in her family to represent her interests. Since this widow was not from a rich and influential family, she would be unlikely to get a fair hearing in court unless the judge she came to was a particularly righteous individual. Well, as we are told this judge was not. In light of all we are told, it is likely that the widow’s adversary was someone with whom she was having a financial dispute. She was owed money, and the adversary was withholding it from her. So, the widow came to the judge asking for justice; that her adversary be made to pay her what she was owed. Then Jesus tells us about the judge’s initial response to the widow’s call for justice; “And he would not for a while” (vs.4a). We are told that the judge was unwilling to give her justice. The implication from the wording is that he would not even hear the case, but summarily sided with the adversary. This went on for some undefined amount of time. Jesus tells us how the situation changed; “but afterward he said within himself, ‘Though I do not fear God nor regard man, yet because this widow troubles me I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me’” (vs.4b-5). Sometime later, we read about the internal thoughts of the judge. Jesus puts in the mind and mouth of the judge the exact same description that Jesus gave him in verse two. The reason for repeating that the man did not fear God or regard man was to make it clear that the change in his response to the widow had nothing to do with a spiritual or moral enlightenment that took place within him. Instead, the reason for the change in his response was as self-centered as his original choice to ignore the widow. The judge describes the woman as troubling him. The idea is that from his perspective she was pestering him. The judge resolves that he would grant the widow the justice she was seeking from him. In this translation, the rendering has the word “avenge”. This is unfortunate because it is exactly the same word that was in verse three, and it was translated there more accurately as “justice”. Then the judge explains his rationale for reversing his earlier resistance to the woman; “lest by her continual coming she weary me”. The Greek word translated as “weary” literally means to render someone bruised in the face. This term was used in referring to what would happen in a boxing match. However, it is not likely that the woman was violent (something like that would not have been tolerated in that time). Therefore, the expression is to be taken metaphorically. There are two possible metaphorical meanings. The judge could be saying (using a modern expression) that the woman would give him a black eye in the sense of destroying his reputation. That is unlikely because Jesus has already told us that this character doesn’t care what people think about him. Therefore, the only alternative is that he was saying that she was annoying him. We are told how she was doing this; by continually coming to him. The picture in this story is that the woman was coming to him over and over with the same complaint, and no matter how many times he refused to grant her request, she would come back again. The widow wore him down over time. The idea was that she was so persistent that he decided that the only way to have some peace, was to give her what she wanted. Then Luke turns to record what Jesus said about His parable; “Then the Lord said, ‘Hear what the unjust judge said’” (vs.6). Luke is referring to how Jesus at this point drew the attention of His disciples to what the judge in the parable said. The specific saying of course is what was recorded in verses four and five “Though I do not fear God nor regard man, yet because this widow troubles me I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me’”. Jesus then went on to give the application of the parable; “And shall God not avenge His own elect who cry out day and night to Him” (vs.7a). The argument (or reasoning) of this verse was a common one in rabbinic teaching of the day; it is arguing from the lesser to the greater. The idea is that if something were true in a less likely scenario, it would certainly be true in a more conducive one. As Jesus interprets the parable, we see that the figure of the unjust judge is paralleled with God, and the figure of the widow is paralleled with the elect. However, this parallel is built upon an extreme contrast. The unjust judge has absolutely no concern for what is right, and had no compassion for the widow and her situation. God on the other hand is absolutely righteous. The people of God are called “His own elect” to remind the disciples that they belong to God because God Himself chose them for Himself; this stresses that He initiated the relationship because He wanted them to be His people. Therefore, the people of God are objects of deep compassion by God. Therefore, if, in the lesser case, a wicked judge would relent to persistent requests from one he was indifferent to, how much more will the righteous God respond to the pleas of those whom He dearly loves. God’s response is translated as “avenge”, and once again is a form of the same word found in verses three and five. The word refers to justice, and carries the idea of being vindicated and delivered from oppression. This tells us that Jesus is referring to a specific sort of prayer. Jesus was teaching that God will specifically respond to vindicate His people, as they persevere in their prayers to Him to do this. This means that Jesus is not saying here that if we repeat a request enough times that God will give it to us, even if at first, He was unwilling to do so. God only grants answers that are consistent with His will. In the following verse Jesus makes it clear that He has a very specific context in mind. Jesus added an additional comment to His interpretation of the parable; “though He bears long with them?” (vs.7b). This comment is separated from the rest of the verse because there is a great deal of debate as to what Jesus meant in saying this. The basic problem of interpreting the phrase is determining who “them” is, and in what sense God is “bearing with” them? In light of the flow of thought, the pronoun “them” must refer to the elect. But, this translation (NKJV), creates the false impression that God is enduring with patience some sort of undesirable behavior by the elect. However, the NIV has a much better translation that smoothly fits into the context in a way the other translation does not. The NIV renders this phrase as “Will He keep putting them off?” In other words, this phrase completes the thought of the first half of the verse. Jesus was saying what God would not do, in the form of a rhetorical question that expects a negative response. God will vindicate His people in response to their prayers, rather than putting them off indefinitely. Jesus then adds; “I tell you that He will avenge them speedily” (vs.8a). Jesus adds that not only is it certain that God will respond to the pleas of His people for vindication, He will do so “speedily”. This last word adds an element of ambiguity. There has long been a debate about this word. The word could refer either to something that would happen soon, or something that would happen rapidly. Many interpreters argue that the word cannot mean “soon” because the saints have been calling out for ultimate vindication for twenty centuries and that vindication has not yet come. In light of the last phrase of the verse it is clear that the vindication that Jesus is talking about is what takes place at the second coming. The problem with this conclusion is that all the lexical information we can gather on this word indicates it does always means “soon”, and not how “quickly” something takes place. But how can Jesus’ return be seen as soon? It is interesting that interpreters spend a great deal of time on this, and theologians write extensively to try to justify this language in light of what God has done. It is interesting because Jesus does not share that priority. Instead, Jesus’ focus is not on justifying what God does, or on how it qualifies as soon; rather He addresses the weakness in God’s people; “Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?” (vs.8b). Apparently, Jesus simply assumes that what God does will in fact be soon, without seeking to justify this in regard to how the future may unfold. What is in doubt is what will these and future disciples do. Here Jesus makes it clear that He is talking about His second coming. The question is will there be any disciples with faith when He does return? The sort of faith that Jesus has in mind is the faith illustrated in the parable; a faith in the promise of Christ’s return and His vindication of the righteous; a faith that expresses itself in continual prayer for God to send the deliverance that Christ will bring. That is the part of the future that is in doubt. Sometimes the Scriptures simply do not answer our questions in the way we want them to, and offering speculation about the unknown is not wise. Also, the point is not that God does not know if there will be faith at all, the question is meant to challenge the disciples to make the proper choice, with a focus on their individual responsibility to be ready for Christ’s return.

II. A Parable about Humility in Prayer: (vs.9-14) In this second parable, Jesus tells a story of two men coming to worship in the Temple. Using the radical contrast between these two men, Jesus teaches what sort of posture one should have in prayer when seeking to be right with God. Luke introduces the second parable in this passage by writing; “Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others” (vs.9). The first question is to whom is this parable addressed? Some interpreters suggest that Jesus was addressing some Pharisees. Though it is true that some of the Pharisees would certainly have fit this description; it is very unlikely that Jesus was speaking to the Pharisees here. First, there is nothing in this or the previous passage that hints that Jesus was doing so. Second, actually using a Pharisee in the parable itself would not be an effective way of confronting the Pharisees with their short-comings. This is why we never see Jesus doing this in any of the parables that are specifically addressed to them. The most natural way to read this verse is that Jesus is continuing to address His disciples, and Luke was applying this unflattering description to some of these disciples. This actually fits well in this section of Luke’s Gospel because in it we see Luke intermixing accounts of Jesus’ teaching His disciples with confrontations between Himself and the Pharisees. The reason was that the Pharisees represented what happens to zealous believers when they grow distant from God; they become legalists. Some of Jesus disciples would face that very temptation, so here Jesus teaches them about the danger of going down that path. The characteristics that Jesus addresses are trusting oneself to be righteous and despising others. Trusting oneself to be righteous is believing that one has achieved a level of virtue that makes one acceptable to God. This almost inevitably leads to despising others who are not as diligent in their pursuit of holiness as the self- righteous person perceives that he or she is. This is what happened to the Pharisees and it has also happened countless times to Christians throughout the ages. Jesus begins the parable by introducing the two central characters; “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector” (vs.10). In the story, two individuals go to the Temple to pray. Jesus refers to the men going up, because the Temple was built on an elevated site, and from the city it was an uphill walk to get there. Their purpose of going to the Temple was to pray. We should not think of this as an individualistic experience; rather the normal understanding of the day in hearing this would have been to conclude that Jesus was describing these two men going to the Temple to pray as a communal activity. These times of prayer were held twice a day, first at 9:00am, and then again at 3:00pm. Therefore, in the courtyard of the men there would have been a number of people who were praying at this time. In light of the tax collector’s request, it is likely that this was the latter time of prayer that followed the evening sin offering. These two men were polar opposites both religiously and socially. Though in our time, Pharisees are seen exclusively in a negative way, in the first century they were seen as the most pious of people. They were also admired socially. However, a tax collector was seen socially as a traitor, and religiously as the worst sort of sinner. So, to a Jew hearing this story, the Pharisee would at first be perceived to be a godly man, and the tax collector would be seen as the most despicable sort of person. As the parable continues, Jesus tells us about the prayer of the Pharisee; “The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men — extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess’” (vs.11-12). It was customary in Judaism to stand while one prayed, with one’s face and hands lifted toward the heavens. We are told that the Pharisee prayed “within himself”. A better rendering of these words is that he prayed about himself. The Pharisee starts off with thanksgiving to God. However, in the prayer, he does not thank God for anything God did; but for what he himself was. The Pharisee saw himself as different from all the others around him. In his prayers he categorizes his fellow worshippers as thieves, as being generally disobedient to God’s Law, and as adulterers. Finally, he compares himself favorably to the tax collector, that he was nothing like that terrible man; implying that he was spiritually and morally superior to him and everyone else who was in the temple courtyard. The Pharisee then gave two examples of his pious lifestyle. First, he fasted twice a week, and second, he paid a tithe on all he had. In both cases the Pharisee not only was keeping the Law of God, he was exceeding its requirements. The Mosaic Law only required the Jews to fast on the Day of Atonement (Lev.16). Pharisees however, established a pattern of fasting every Monday and Thursday. The Mosaic Law cited certain things that one did not need to pay a tithe on, but the Pharisees tithed on everything. The entire prayer is characterized by pride and self-righteousness. Then Jesus tells us about the prayer of the tax collector; “And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’” (vs.13). The description “standing afar off” means that this man chose to stand as far away from the altar as he could, toward the back of the court of the men. In prayer, he could not raise his eyes to heaven. And instead, of crossing his hands across his chest, he beat his fist against his chest. All of these things speak of shame, and deep conviction of sin. The custom of beating one’s chest was something a person would do when in deep anguish. The man’s prayer contained no praise of himself, but only a simple plea to God for mercy. The man literally refers to himself not as “a sinner” but as “the sinner”. The distinction in that language would be to isolate one’s self from others. He saw only one sinner in that courtyard; himself. The word that Jesus puts in the mouth of the tax collector is quite significant. It is not the usual word for mercy. It is a word that has a very specific theological meaning. In the Greek translation of the Old Testament the word refers to atonement for sin; and in the New Testament it is translated as “propitiate”. Therefore, the man was asking God to make a propitiatory atonement for his sins, because in himself he had nothing to offer that would make him acceptable to God. Then Jesus says something that to His hearers, would sound absolutely shocking; “I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other” (vs.14a). The average Jew listening to the story would have assumed that the Pharisee would be the one whom God would accept, and that there would be no hope for the evil tax collector. Jesus begins with the words “I tell you”. Since Jesus was obviously speaking, He was not informing His listeners what He was doing. This was a way of saying that what was about to be said was important, and that they needed to pay close attention to it. Jesus said it was the tax collector, walking down the hill to his home who was “justified”. This is another important theological word. It means to be declared righteous as a pronouncement of God. The tax collector’s own life was anything but righteous, but he was declared to be righteous because God answered his prayer and made propitiation for his sins. This was important because it is the manner of salvation made possible by the work of the Messiah, and that is at the heart of the Gospel Jesus had been teaching His disciples. This made clear that God granted righteousness to those who genuinely believed and had no confidence in their own righteousness. What would be revealed soon was how this atonement would be made. In contrast to the tax collector, Jesus said “rather than the other”, meaning that the Pharisee left the Temple unrighteous, and still lost in sin. The contrast teaches that in seeking salvation from God one must abandon any reliance upon making oneself good enough to be accepted by God. Instead, one must seek for salvation on the basis of the grace of God and the atoning sacrifice He has provided. It is no accident that here Luke uses keep theological terms that are so prominent in the writings of Paul. Luke was demonstrating that Paul’s theology was rooted in the teachings of Jesus the Christ. Jesus completed His interpretation of the parable with a spiritual axiom; “for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted” (vs.14b). The statement is expressed as a chiasm, a typical Hebraic way of laying out an idea:

A everyone who exalts himself B will be humbled, B he who humbles himself A will be exalted

The axiom is built around two different sorts of humiliation and exaltation. Exaltation is a word of advancement, while humiliation is a word of demotion. Jesus was saying that those who attempt to gain acceptance with God through their own efforts of righteousness will instead find themselves receiving eternal punishment, while those who make no pretense about being righteous, but who humbly seek salvation on the basis of God’s grace alone will be saved. The Pharisee served as an illustration of the former, while the tax collector served as an example of the latter. In regard to prayer, Jesus teaches us here that we are to approach God in the truth of our sinfulness rather than attempting to cover it up with a false front of righteousness. We are lost, depraved and broken. We can never save ourselves or change our condition on our own; we must throw ourselves upon God’s mercy, for salvation is a work of God.

Conclusion: The vast majority of the religions and philosophies of the world have one basic idea; that each person has within themselves the capacity to make themselves righteous or good. True Biblical Christianity stands in opposition to this and teaches that we need to unlearn this deadly delusion. The first principle we need to learn is that when we come to God, we acknowledge the truth of our sinfulness and inadequacy. Second, when we come to God we are to do so in confident belief of His goodness; that He desires to save anyone who is willing to truly put his or her faith in Him.