Luke's Gospel

So tonight's reading is in luke chapter 18 verses 1 to 8, and that's on page 1051. Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said, in a certain town, there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with this plea grant me justice against my adversary. For some time, he refused But finally, he said to himself, even though I don't fear God or care or care what people think, yet because because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice so that she won't eventually become an attack me.

And the Lord said, listen to what the unjust judge said says, and will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones who cry out to him day and night will keep putting them off. I tell you, he will see that they get justice and quickly. However, when the song of man comes, will he find faith on the earth? Thank you, Sophie. A very good evening to you.

Lovely to see the hall, so packed. My name is Ben. I'm 1 of the members here at Cornerstone Church, and it's a joy, isn't it, to be looking at God's word again? Let me pray as we open his word. Law, we thank you that we can have a Bible in front of us open it and hear from you the very word I've got.

And we probably wouldn't just hear it, but instead we would we would understand it. That we would love you more, that our view of you would be even greater, that our joy of you would be greater. Lordby, thank you for the lord Jesus Christ, who has rescued us from our sins, and we pray that the holy spirit be at work in this room in transforming our lives to be more like Christ. Oh, men. So I wonder if anyone here had made any resolutions, any new year's resolutions.

Just as a stop take, we're now 33 days in. I wonder if your list of resolutions that you've broken is now longer than the list of ones you've kept 33 days. Now imagine 365 days. It's the end of the year, it's the end of 20 20, Think forward to the 30 first of December 20 20. You've stayed up till midnight.

You are watching the fireworks where you precariously set off from the London eye. You are following discussions about maybe it now being the start of the new decades and you are waiting for Craig David to reappear out of nowhere. I want you to think where are you going to be? But not physically, I want to ask, where are you going to be spiritually? Where are you gonna be spiritually end of this year?

Have you resolved to still be a Christian, a follower of Christ by the end of this year? And if I could take your spiritual temperature, What would it be do you think? Lukewarm, stone cold, or or maybe even sub 0? Will you have fallen away? Will you have lost your faith, or will you have kept your faith?

Because our words from Luke tonight are going to encourage us to look forward, potentially passed in the 20 20 and onto the day of Jesus' return because Jesus is asking, are we ready? Have a look at the second half of verse 8. When the son of man comes, will he find faith on earth Will he find faith in you when he returns? We're in the long weary gap between Christ's first coming and his second coming, and we're in a grace period. But as we know grace periods, they come to an end.

And he will return to judge. And God doesn't want us to have fallen away in that period. If you were here last week, we were looking at Luke 17 with Ben, and it was so helpful to see that Christ's return is coming. And Jesus is speaking here to his disciples to his his close followers, and he's telling them how to be prepared He's about to leave them, and he wants to coach them. It's a marathon that they're on, and as with any good marathon runners, The best thing they can do is listen to the coach.

And so Jesus gives 2 very clear warnings in Luke 17. And they act as shots across the bow to wake us up. The first ones in verse 17 of Chapter 27 I'll read it to you. The people were eating, drinking, marrying, and being given in marriage up to the day of noah. Entering the arc.

Secondly, there's the warning about lot that's in verse 28. It was the same in the days of lot. People were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting, and building. Now, Jesus hasn't singled out a particular sin here. He's describing life, isn't he?

He's highlighting the fact that people are just carrying on. As if nothing's gonna happen, as if God didn't matter. If it's as if judgment isn't coming, they were intentionally ignoring the warning. Guinness pints are being poured. World markets are being traded.

Houses are being purchased. Amazon parcels are being delivered. Tales are ringing, houses are being purchased, people are marrying, and buildings are being built all without any acknowledgement of god. And judgment came in the days of Noah, and only 8 were spared. Judgment came in the days of lot, and only 3 were spared judgment is coming warns Jesus.

Are we prepared? Will we be spared? On the day of Jesus return. Here's gonna come like lightning. Like a surprise, no one's gonna miss it.

How is he going to find us? Christian, will you have endured? Or graciously, God has chosen to it help us. He is gonna sustain us to the end. And its patterns tonight are going to instruct us how to survive.

And in the form of a simple parable, and I say it's simple because Jesus unlocks the passage for us. Have have a look at verse 1. Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. Jesus has left the keys of his parable hanging in the door So Quicken and Houdini, the answer is revealed, always pray and do not give up Jesus's kind to shed light on the subject of prayer for the good of our soul's health. Always pray and do not give up.

Christian, that is how to endure. Always pray do not give up. And what that means is complete dependent upon Jesus. Now for telling us the meaning of the parable, He goes on to introduce us to 2 characters, and this is my first point. The judge and the widow.

So I follow along from verse 2 where they're introduced. He said In a certain town, there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared what people thought, and there was a widow in that town. Who kept coming to him with a plea. Grant with justice against my adversary 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 attack me. Enter stage left, the judge, our first character.

So pitch the scene with this guy, He's a judge. He'd been sat in a tent surrounded by advisors, and his job would be to ensure that justice is done. So people would have brought their cases to him and he would have decided what was right and what was wrong. But if we're in the theater, if we're in Panto, this guy would not have got a cheer. He would have got a boo because no 1 would have liked it.

He had 2 big poops. The first 1, He didn't love God, and the second 1, he didn't love people. Now in the old testament, being a judge of the opposite of that, it meant you should fear God and love people. He's got neither. And without the fear of gods, He had no sense of accountability.

He doesn't care what's right and wrong. He can make up his own rules. And if he doesn't care about people, then he doesn't care about the effects of his decisions. He doesn't care what happens after he sends them off. People were there in front of him for them to be abused or used by him.

Ironically, a better description this guy would been a judge of injustice. You'd actually expect to find him in the dock rather than the judge's seat Just imagine. Imagine this guy presiding into your case. Would you would you like that? An unfair, unloving, uncaring judge.

I doubt you'd put that on your CV. Now, the spotlight turns to our second character. This is the widow, and she'd introduced in verse 3. And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with a plea grant me justice against my adversary. She is worlds apart from the judge.

And being a widow can be a a lonely situation to find yourself in. But in Jesus' day, it was far, far worse than just being lonely. Because if you were a widow, it probably meant you didn't have an education, you didn't have a job, you didn't have an income, You had no property, you had no status, and you had no power. It was not a good position to be in. And if you didn't have family, it probably meant you were homeless as well.

You were on the streets begging. So for a woman who was a widow in the first century, that probably meant you were homeless, helpless, and hopeless. She was alone there. She is a woman in society with very little status. She's at the opposite social and economic extreme than the judge.

They couldn't be further apart. Now, I was trying to think of administration to describe this and the closest I could get were the tragic events that happened at grenfell in 20 17. You know that Kensington and Chelsea is 1 of the wealthiest local authorities contendings for the most expensive houses in the world and it has the rich sorry, the biggest gap between the richest and the poorest. Now as a resident of 1 of those flats, you were vulnerable Due to years of neglect, you were very vulnerable. You have viewed as a nuisance.

You wanted to be silenced You have no voice. You're polite on society. And I think it's very similar to the widow here. Sadly, she has been left very vulnerable and easy to exploit, and that's exactly the situation she finds herself in. She has been exploited by someone and therefore she brings herself before the judge.

But but the judge, he's not paying any attention to her at all. He refuses to see her. Why why would he see her? I mean, it wasn't uncommon for for judges in these days to take bribes. He would have been expecting a bribe in order for him to hear her case.

He is a corrupt judge. I kind of witnessed this a few years ago when I was visiting family in Ethiopia Because if you have a minor traffic offense, you're pulled over and your number plate is taken away. And at that point, you have a choice Either you pay the policeman there and then a bribe to get your plates back and drive on, or they take your plates away and you have to drive to the police station and then eventually pay the government official fine. But if you chose the op If you then drive into the police station the next day and you were caught by another policeman without your number plates on, you can be fined again. And you have to pay another bribe.

A crop system. The widow finds herself in an unfair situation. She couldn't afford a bribe, There was no way of her earning the judge's favor. But she doesn't give up. Her middle name is persistence, She carries on again and again.

Not not knock. Not not not judge. Can you imagine her waiting outside his workplace? And maybe she's tapping him on the shoulder while he queues up for a Starbucks. She she's gone further than that.

She's gone to his front door. She's waiting outside the courthouse. She is pleading with him. Imagine her at the window As he as he's tucking into his dinner, she's there at the window. Pleading.

Will you hear my case? And she continues for some time. And and a judge, he just gives her the cold shoulder. He is not interested at all. But there's a breakthrough.

Have a look at verse 4. For some time, he refused. But finally, he said to himself Even though I do not 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. Finally, after all her persistence, she finally gets justice The judge hears her case, but not because he's kind or merciful.

It's just because he he wants her off his back. You can see from his reaction that he is being hounded to the point where she's almost gonna give him a black eye. She's gonna wounds him. She is wearing him down like a dripping tap. I don't know if you've experienced that on holiday at some point.

You get off the coach or out the car, and you are swamped by people selling you naf merchandise and souvenirs. Why do you buy it? Because you're swamped. You want them off your back. Or maybe walking down the high street and the the the charity people there They are chasing you down like a cheater.

They are after your money. And and why do you give the money? Why are you giving the money to the Donkey sanctuary in Poland because you want them off your back. 75 pounds a week. You want them about a council actually.

You want them off your back. The judge in the same case here. He caves in and relents. So so to summarize, we we've seen the main characters and and we've heard their stories. But with every parable, there's there's meaning behind the surface, isn't there?

We need to go behind the scenes. And this is my second point, God and us. Now before I get in into this part, I want to give a little side note because there's there's a potential here of misunderstanding this parable and getting it wrong, and that'd be a real real clamorated to do that. Because you if we draw a straight comparison between the judge and God, You end up with a very grumpy, disinterested, unloving, and in fact monstrous gods, which none of us want anything to do with. And if you take it even further, then we can conclude if we badger God again, again like a woodpecker attacking a tree, then he might just cave in and give us what we want.

But that's not true. All those conclusions are untrue. I'm glad to say that that is fake news. The truth is that everything hangs on the God being different from the judge. Jesus wants to show us the contrast.

Imagine white text on a black background. It makes the whites stand out, doesn't it? Because of the contrast. Jesus wants to show us that God is good. God is good, and he's gonna make that crystal clear to us.

And he has this line of thinking, which I've called the the how much more. I'll put this on the screen so you can read it as I as I read it aloud. If an unrighteous judge grants the request of a nagging widow just to get the woman off his back. How much more will God grant justice to his own children who cry out to him? So let's first look at the contrast between the judge and God.

The judge was unrighteous, unjust, and unloving. He had no care at all for anyone. Contrast that, with what we know about God. God's perfectly righteous. God, who is perfectly just a god who is perfectly loving, and all these amazing qualities are perfectly demonstrated in ultra high definition on the cross, where God has willingly sent his son to be murdered.

Jesus has died so that people could be set free from their sins and be saved for eternity. They are saved from God's wrath, from his judgement. By his son dying in our place, and yet he still remains fair and right and just in doing that. Because his son is punished instead of us. Can you see the judge in the parable?

How much better is God? How much better is our heavenly father? Just imagine that the richest man in Kensington and Chelsea. He invites the Grenfell residents into his own house. Not only that, it lets them stay there No.

He lets them live there, permanently live there. He adopts them. He gives them inheritance. He provides them a room. He clothes them.

He helps them, and what we all want most, he loves them. How much more will our heavenly father do for us. So you've seen the first contrast? Let's look at the second contrast. It's between the widow and us.

The widow was isolated. She was vulnerable. She was poor. She was hopeless. She was helpless.

But, god, he has graciously chosen to elevate our position above the role of the widow. Because did you see in verse 7? Have have a look at that, that sentence. He calls us his chosen ones, and will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones. On a different translation, we're called his elect.

God has set his father upon his disciples, upon his followers, upon Christians. Disciples are no longer in the category of strangers. They are now in the category of friends. Of child, in fact, we have been adopted as children. Once, we had no access to gods, and now we have open access.

Once we were outsiders, now we have an advocate in Jesus Christ, who speaks on our behalf. His divine authority has transported us from a court of law to a throne of grace. I'm hoping the contrast is clear here. If the widow's request is heard, how much more will a child's request be heard by our father. And Luke has already begun to bring this thinking to mind, and it chapter 11, it's in verse 13.

If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children. How much more will your father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him? How much more. Jesus is giving us an encouragement to pray to our heavenly father. Peter, in the book of 1 Peter says this in chapter 4 verse 7, the end of all things is at hand.

Therefore keep sane and sober in your prayers. The pressures of worldliness are greater and greater as we edge towards the end time. Therefore, all the more we must watch and be sober with prayer and not lose heart. So will you come to the highest court in the land? To the judge who presides over all who listens to us cry out, and who will bring justice as we battle our adversary, the devil?

We're about to start the the media fasts bible feast. And what a golden opportunity to do that? It's 1 of the bonuses, isn't it of this week, that there is more time. Media is cut and there is more time. So I hope that the silence, the gaps in media would give birth to a week of prayer, that we would love to pray to our heavenly father.

That this week of prayer would therefore fuel our faith. Pra to God, who hears our prayer. It's the same for the prayer meetings that we run once a month, that we want to meet together, to pray for each other, to pray for our world, to pray for injustices, to pray for perseverance. We want to be a church committed to prayer, praying to our heavenly father. Maybe there's been a situation that you you have been praying about for years, and there has been no answer Maybe there's been an injustice in your life or in your family's life.

I mean, the the persecuted church as we were hearing from Dave. I'm sure they could write reams and reams about their injustices. Why doesn't God answer their prayer? Well, I believe that's the second encouragement that Jesus gives them in verse 7. 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?

I tell you, he will see that they get justice and quickly. Jesus promises that there will be justice There will be a judgment day. Look look back at history. It happened in the days of lot. It happened in the days of Noah.

Justice and judgment will come. They will happen. Remember that this power will fall falls in a passage where he's talking about the end times. He's preparing his disciples for his return. Injustices haven't been forgotten, they haven't been overlooked, God knows, he hears, he sees, he's watching and listening.

And as the saints cry out, justice is coming. Now with the widow her request isn't just heard. It's answered And it'll be the same for Christians who cry out. Their hurts and their cries will bring about justice. Because his delays are not delays of inactivity.

They are delays of preparation, preparation for judgment day. And and we know that God's timing is not our own. The parable encourage us encourages us to pray persistently and also encouraged us to pray patiently. Patient looking at our spiritual watches, as we hear the ticking, as we count down to his return. And I I believe by having a correct view of God that Jesus' presenting here.

It will shape and fuel our prayer life. Alternatively, we risk having a view of God like the judge. Which will lead to a distorted and muddled prayer life. So as the curtain falls on this parable, we're left with some choices to make. And this is my final point, an encouragement and a warning.

These words from Jesus act as a helpful blend of an encouragement and warning. We've already begun to see the encouragement, and encouragement to pray to our heavenly father as valued children. And I have to say that I I've personally profoundly struck by this passage. It has struck me because I think my prayer life in retrospect has suffered because I think I can do it on my own. I don't lean on Christ, I lean on myself.

I think I can cope. But by better understanding God, it informs our prayer life, doesn't it? I have been personally encouraged to to pray more. And I I hope you are too by these verses. And then here's the second part of it, the warning.

That comes in verse 8. When the son of man comes, will he find faith on earth? Can you see that Jesus has intrinsically linked faith and prayer? He tells a parable about prayer, and then he asks a question about faith. He's helping us here by revealing that faith and prayer are 2 strands of the same rope.

1 is supporting the other. You take away 1, and the other will creek and groan. Augustustine said this, which I think was helpful. When faith fails, prayer dies, in order to pray then, we must have faith, and that our faith not fail, we must pray. Keeping in prayer is what's gonna keep us dependent upon God.

He's the 1 that's gonna take us to the end. And Jesus highlights prayer because not only does it act as the evidence of faith, it's what will help us keep faith. So to to paraphrase that, prayer is what shows that we have faith and helps us keep faith. Because without persevering in prayer, our faith is gonna become lukewarm and dull. Our prayer lives reveal whether we're ready or not for Christ's return, because it keeps us reliant and dependent upon him upon him.

It's how we commune with him, isn't it? It's how we talk to our heavenly father. It's like it's like breathing in pure spiritual air to sustain us, rather than the toxic air that's around us. That's partly what this week heads about, isn't it? Breatving pure spiritual air.

Because if not, we wish the same judgment that occurred in the days of Noah, and in the days of lot. The warning here is to be ready, to keep praying, to keep faith. And I I think as we as we listen to Jesus talk about prayer and talk about faith, it would be good to review and to reflect and to think So so firstly to address those who don't trust in Jesus yet. Having heard what you've seen in in these 8 verses, We seriously consider Jesus' return. There's a warning there that Jesus is coming back.

Verse 24, the previous chapter says this, for the son of man in his day will be like the lightning which flashes and lights up the sky from 1 end to the other. Jesus is coming back. And it's going to take many by surprise, hence the lightning vision there. So I would implore you to come follow Christ. Come to a God who is fair, who is right, who is just, who is loving, who is all knowing, and let him transform me from being a stranger into a child.

Let him rescue you from the judgment that is coming up and allow his son to bear the punishment that we all deserve for our rebellion. But maybe you're in a different position tonight. Maybe you're a follower of Jesus. Well, can I encourage you politely to do an MOD, a self mot on your prayer life? And please don't leave this building thinking you've got to pray out of guilt.

But but pray out of a renewed sense of who God is, a renewed sense of who you are. JC Ry will put it like this. Let us resolve to pray steadily, patiently, preservingly, and let us never doubt that it does us goods. However, long the answer may be in coming. Still, let us pray on.

So as we draw to a close, I want to give a few suggestions on what to pray for. And we'll be doing this in tables in just a moment. Because prayer is such a privilege, isn't it? The ability to pray to our heavenly father here and now, day and night. We can pray to him.

We can we can bring our request before him. We're in a spiritual battle. And prayer is going to be 1 of the most most important tools in that fight. So let Here a few suggestions on the on the screen behind me. First, the idea to to pray for perseverance.

That you would endure to the day of Jesus' return and would not faint. Secondly, to pray for injustices in this world that Christians face, Whether that be close to home or far away that we would pray as we were doing earlier for injustices done against our brothers and sisters, that they would persevere, that justice would be done, that Christ would return, and judge. Lastly, we want to pray for those who have fallen away that they return to the Lord before he returns. They are they are 3 great things to pray for. There there's lots more from this passage, but I think that'd be a good place for us to start.

Let me pray, then on our tables, we'll spend a bit of time praying together. As Dave said, if you'd rather not pray, just listen along the prayers and think about what we've heard. And then in a moment, Abri will draw us back together. Lobby, thank you. For the joy of faith and prayer.

We thank you for this encouragement to pray to our heavenly father who loves us thank you that we have been elevated above the position of the widow, that we are now 1 with our heavenly father that you you hear our prayers. And lord, in many ways, we look forward to the day of your return where you will bring about judgment and justice, and all the wrongs will be righted But in another way, we we see those who who are far from you or who are who are fainted, who have known you, but have gone away. We pray a lot that in this grace period many would return to you. Ah, men. Let us pray on tables.