A hesitant driver, waiting for a traffic jam to clear, came to a stop on the expressway ramp. The traffic thinned, but the timid driver still waited. Finally, an infuriated voice came from behind shouting: “The sign says Yield, not give up.”
The primary actors in today’s parables neither yielded nor gave up. In fact, that really is the lesson of these parables: The Power of Persistence.
Jesus told two parables with almost identical messages about persistence. The stories are different only in their setting; they make the same point. The first story is recorded in Luke 11:5-13. Jesus told that parable just after he had taught his disciples to pray, using the prayer we call the Lord’s Prayer. We can imagine the parable answering a question from Peter, “Master, should we really bother God with small concerns like our daily bread?” Jesus answered such a thought, spoken or unspoken, with a story right out of the experiences of everyday life, the parable of the friend at midnight. Both Jesus and his listeners would have enjoyed the humor of this story:
Once upon a time a traveler arrived at his friend’s house at midnight. Perhaps he had been traveling by night to escape the hot sun of Palestine. Perhaps he had been delayed by business, by a mishap of some kind, or by a stop to help someone along the way. In any case, he was not expected, but he knew his friend would give him a place to sleep for the night. The friend, in the best traditions of Eastern hospitality, would not dream of sending a guest to bed without food. However, he was caught unprepared without a crumb in the house. So he went at once to his neighbor’s house and began to knock on the door and to call out, “Friend, lend me three loaves [the usual portion for one person]; for a friend of mine has arrived on a journey, and I have nothing to set before him.” The neighbor, walked out of a sound sleep, was anything but sympathetic. He and his wife and children were asleep on their sleeping mats in their little one-room house. Maybe the baby had been teething and had just fallen asleep. At any rate, the neighbor said in effect: “What do you mean by waking me up at this hour?! Before you know it you’ll wake the children too. Go away. I won’t get up and stumble around in the dark trying to find loaves of bread for you.” Nevertheless, his friend continued to knock and to ask for bread. We can imagine the neighbor saying, “O.K.! O.K.! Don’t wake up the whole neighborhood. I’m getting up. I’ll get the bread.”
This second story of persistence has no humor about it. It tells of a judge “who neither feared God nor regarded man.” A poor widow kept coming to him for justice against her adversary. Since the widow brought her case before a single judge rather than before a jury, it was probably a money matter. Perhaps a debt, a pledge, or a portion of her inheritance was being withheld from her. Scripture speaks frequently of the plight of widows, their poverty and the exploitation they too often suffered. This widow evidently had no influence, no one to speak for her, and no money with which to bribe the judge. Yet she kept returning and pleading with him to hear her case. Scripture is very plain about the judge’s motive for his action when he finally acted on the widow’s behalf. It says that though the judge cared nothing about the justice or about the widow, he vindicated her in order to get rid of her. Her persistence wore him down.
In both instances someone—the reluctant neighbor and the unjust judge—did the decent thing because it was the least bothersome thing to do. They didn’t do it out of love or mercy or justice. They did it because they were badgered. Jesus is making the big point that resistance can be battered down by sheer persistence. He also makes the point that if it’s true with two not-so-admirable persons, how much more may we expect God to respond to us as we keep our needs before Him. Let’s glean some significant truths from the parable.
I.
If goodness is produced by less than righteous, even evil powers, we can expect limitless goodness from God.
Jesus said it very clearly in the passage recorded in Luke 11:11-13. He set the stage by asking the disciples a question: “Those of you who are fathers, if your son asked you for some fish to eat would you give him a scorpion?” Then Jesus made his telling point: “If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?” Matthew records the same saying of Jesus, but with a different ending, “How much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!” (Matthew 7:11).
We talk a lot about the mystery of evil -- what about the mystery of goodness? We receive daily the gifts of God’s grace poured out freely without regard for our merit. God still makes the sun shine on the evil and the good, and the rain fall on the just and the unjust. But even more mysterious is God’s Spirit at work bringing good out of the actions of weak, fallible, and sinful human beings. Joseph recognized that mystery when he confronted his brothers, who had sold him into slavery in Egypt. Joseph said, “You meant evil against me; but God meant it for good, to bring it about that many people should be kept alive, as they are today” (Genesis 50:19-20).
In 1954, Harper & Brothers published a collection of testimonies from German refugees who were expelled from their homes by the victors in World War II and had to travel, without food or clothing, through what was enemy territory. Yet these testimonies tell of unexpected kindness, a protection and mercy shown by their enemies. Indeed there were instances where “enemies” actually risked their lives to care for people whose nation’s soldiers had invaded their land.
How rarely do acts of kindness, mercy, and generosity become news?! We live in a time where newspaper headlines and television news shows are dominated by stories about deceit, selfishness, immorality, corruption, catastrophe, murder, rape, hatred, and suspicion. Through some perverted sense of the dramatic, it is assumed that evil alone is news. This point of view warps our judgment and leads us to the pessimistic view that there is little good left in the world and that few people have the capacity for goodness. To be sure, if we know our own hearts, we cannot deny the existence of evil, but we cannot deny the presence of goodness either.
Where does this come from—this goodness, this decency, this humanity? Does a mechanical theory of evolution account for spiritual qualities such as brotherhood and love? Can a blind, inhuman force create persons who put their duty to their brethren above their own comfort? Shall we assume that evil is a mystery but kindness is automatic? Jesus did not think so and neither should we.
Jesus looked about him and saw the unmistakable signs of God. The marks of a divine origin in His fallen children spoke of a pure source of concern and care. If a man will give his neighbor bread from unworthy motives, how much more may we depend upon the God who is the Father of all? If a judge will vindicate a woman just to get rid of her, how much more may we expect justice from God? If we can never quite escape our hunger for righteousness, what does that say about our Creator? All of these experiences, says our Lord, bear testimony to the greatness and goodness of God. Rejoice and be glad that through all the changing scenes of our earthly life, we can be sure of God and His care.
There was a violin teacher, though not a very successful one, who had a good deal of wisdom that was refreshing. A friend called on him one day and said, “Well, what’s the good news today?” The old music teacher went over to a tuning fork suspended by a cord and struck it with a mallet. “There is the good news for today,” he said. “That, my friend, is A. It was A all day yesterday. It will be A all day tomorrow, next week, and for a thousand years. The soprano upstairs warbles off-key, the tenor next door flats his high ones, and the piano across the hall is out of tune. Noise all around me, noise; but that, my friend, is A.” [1]
Jesus is telling us something like that in these to parables. You and I are not always good, but God is.
II.
There is a second lesson from the parables that is not primary, but it is a lesson well worth paying attention to: sometimes we’re made better in spite of ourselves.
The unjust judge didn’t want to be good—the reluctant neighbor didn’t want to be good—they were made good, or at any rate they did something that was good, in spite of themselves.
We talk too much about “guilt by association”; we ought to talk more about “goodness or virtue by association.” It works both ways. Wise persons will seek the kind of friends who lift them up and encourage them to be their best, to set high standards, and to give themselves unselfishly to others. Our companions rub off on us. Many people can bear witness to the fact that their lives have been lived on a little higher plane than would have been possible had it not been for the example and encouragement of a friend. [2]
At every level of life we find people responding to the circumstances in which they find themselves being better in spite of themselves. Sometimes a particular office or responsibility brings out our best. Historians have noted that the presidency of the United States has brought out the best in many men. Some of our presidents have been far better than their previous records would have led anyone to expect. And the needs of the moment have led many humble men and women to be better than they had ever expected to be.
When the steam ship Halifax was in a collision at sea, just off the coast of Massachusetts, a fire broke out on board. Many of the crew members deserted their posts. Terrorized passengers leaped into the water. But a deckhand saved the day. He went into the deserted engine room where he had no obligation to be and put out the blaze. During the formal investigation that followed, he was asked if there wasn’t a great deal of smoke in the engine room. He replied that there was.
“Didn’t you realize that it was dangerous for you to stay there?” he asked.
“I don’t know, sir,” he replied. “I was not the judge of that.”
“But you stayed, didn’t you?”
He answered, “Yes, I did.”
And then when he was pressed to say whether he stayed out of a sense of duty or simply because he didn’t know what else to do, he replied with quiet dignity, “I saw that someone was needed there.” [3]
We can expect limitless goodness from God, and let’s remember that sometimes we’re made better in spite of ourselves.
III.
We have yet to come to the core truth of this parable. Neither the judge nor the reluctant neighbor is the central actor in this drama. The spotlight must be kept on the widow, and the fellow who had an unexpected guest drop in at midnight. And the lesson centers on the power of persistence. The specific point has to do with prayer. Both parables immediately follow the request of the disciples for Jesus to teach them how to pray.
So, Jesus is teaching us about prayer. And I believe he’s saying at least three things:
1. Sincere prayers are always answered.
2. Persistent prayers are always answered.
3. Prayers that voice our deepest needs in keeping with God’s will are always answered.
Note that Jesus does not picture either the unjust judge nor the reluctant neighbor as a symbol or a metaphor for God. He’s not teaching us about the nature of God—he’s teaching us about the nature of our praying. Sincerity, persistence, the voicing of our deepest need in keeping with God’s will. That’s what prayer is all about.
Many of us would be embarrassed to knock on a neighbor’s door at midnight. But the parable of the friend at midnight tells us that we can call on God at any time. Many of us would be reluctant to admit that we hadn’t been prepared for the very small emergency posed by the arrival of just one unexpected guest. Many of us hesitate to pray when we know we are at fault and have not done everything we should have done to remedy the situation. But this parable tells us to ask God’s help no matter what we have done or what we have failed to do. Many of us quickly take one “no” or even a “maybe” as a final answer to any request. Both parables we are studying in this chapter tell us to persist, to keep on asking and seeking and knocking until we receive what God wants to give us. Prayers give God the opportunity to meet our needs.
IV.
Life demands persistence; life rewards persistence.
The more we know about human psychology and physiology, the better we are able to appreciate Jesus’ wisdom in insisting on persistence. How often do we approach the issues of life in a state that could only be described as half-conscious, half-awake, half-alive, or half-aware. There may be some things we can do that way, but prayer is not one of them. Jesus spent long hours in prayer wrestling with God’s will for his life and seeking the strength he needed to live out that will. Jacob wrestled with an angel at the ford of the Jabbok. David repented and fasted and lay upon the ground all night praying to God for the life of his child. The psalmists cried out to God in praise and lament. The prophets cried out to God in a way that we might come nearer to labeling confrontation than prayer. There seems to be written in the nature of our relationship with God the necessity for us to pray wholeheartedly in order for God to be able to answer our prayers.
The same is true of everything else that is important in life, of everything that we desperately want to achieve, of everything that we hold as valuable. These things do not come to us by half-conscious, halfhearted efforts—they come through persistence.
If our commitments are great enough, if what we seek to achieve is important enough, if we really want to be effective in witness, it we want to be disciples worthy of the name of Jesus—we must keep at it—persistence is the key.
The next time you are tempted to give up remember this: Life rewards persistence. Another knock on the door may awaken the reluctant neighbor—another session of persistent prayer may be the key to new understanding, new directions, renewed strength of will, and energizing inspiration. Life rewards persistence.
1. The Parables, by Gerald Kennedy; Harper & Brothers Publishing, 1960, pages 24-25
2. The Parables by Gerald Kennedy; Harper & Brothers, 1960; page 19
3. Barry Boulware, “The Best of All,” August 26, 1984
