Aggressive prayer (Part 2)
Verse of the day: Luke 18: 4-5 "For some time he refused. But finally he said to himself: Even though I don’t fear God or care what people think, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually come and attack me!"
In the parable of the unjust judge, Jesus shows us the importance of perseverance without giving up. In the beginning, I did not understand the message of this parable because I had trouble understanding how Jesus taught us the illustration of an unjust judge mercilessly representing God! I found the explanation in verses 6 and 7 (Luke 18: 6-7), where he said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off?"
If perseverance can push the villain to do justice to someone, what will happen to God who is holy and who Himself is justice? The verse of the day says that the perseverance of the widow was keep bothering the judge while the perseverance of a child of God is a source of pleasure for the Lord. God takes great pleasure when his child cries out to him in prayer.
The judge granted the widow in order to get rid of her while God grants us to reward us. Just at the end of the parable, Jesus clarified that the teaching was based on faith because without faith it is impossible to persevere in prayer; He asked them the following question: “when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?"(Luke 18: 8)
As I often say in my teachings, God does everything through prayer and some requests encounter more resistance in the spiritual world than others. Some requests are answered instantly while others require a certain period of prayer and sometimes fasting.
If someone knocks on a door for five or ten minutes and no one opens, he will conclude that there is nobody inside the house and leave. If you see someone knocking for one hour, two hours or more, it means that he is convinced that there's someone on the inside and the person will eventually open. As I said, it is the duration of persistence that determines the level of faith. It is not the knocking that opens the door but when we knock, we inform the one inside about our request and he is the one who decides to open.
To be continued in the third part
Chris Ndikumana
