Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost

Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost (C—Proper 24)

October 16, 2016

Text: Luke 18:1-8

            Do you ever wonder if your prayers really matter?  Do they change things?  If God knows what we need even better than we do, and if He will accomplish His will whether or not we pray, why pray?  And does God even hear?  For often I pray and see no results for all my trouble.  And who am I that Almighty God should care about my piddly concerns or hear my petitions?  And anyway, I don’t know what to pray.  So often the words fail me.  And so often I just don’t have the heart, the desire to pray.  There is so much evil in the world, and prayer seems so futile.  God knows we have trouble when it comes to prayer.  And so our Lord teaches us this morning that we ought always to pray and not lose heart (Luke 18:1).

            The questions we ask about prayer are not at all uncommon.  Why should we pray?  Because God commands to pray.  That’s the Law.  Do it.  Because God says so.  Whether you feel like it or not.  But so also, God invites us to pray.  That’s the Gospel.  God wants to hear you.  Because He is your Father.  He wants to hear your needs and the desires of your heart, your joys and your sorrows, your confession of sin and plea for forgiveness, your confession of faith in the Gospel of Jesus Christ, and your thanks and praise for all that He has done for you.  Doesn’t God already know what you need?  Of course He does.  Then why pray?  You parents know what your children need, too.  Does that mean you wish they would never talk to you?  Well… maybe there are moments.  But not with God.  Your Father always wants to hear you.  He loves you.  Just look at the crucifix.  Just ponder what the Father sent His Son to do for you, to make you His own.  If He did that, if He did not spare His own Son, but gave Him up to death for you and for us all, how will He not also, along with Him, graciously give you all things (Rom. 8:32)?  And listen to these beautiful passages of Scripture: “call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me” (Ps. 50:15; ESV).  “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.  For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened.  Or which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone?  Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent?  If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him” (Matt. 7:7-11).

            So you pray because God wants to hear you.  He commands and invites you.  Yes, even you.  Even your piddly concerns and petitions.  For who are  you that God should care for you?  You are one for whom Christ died.  God’s only-begotten Son, crucified, for you.  And you are baptized into Christ.  You live in Christ.  The risen Jesus has raised you to new life.  And you are clothed with His righteousness.  So when you pray, you pray with and in Jesus.  When you pray, the Father hears Jesus.  What is the Father going to say to Jesus?  Do you really think He will deny Jesus’ prayer?  Will He then deny your prayer prayed in Jesus?  And the Spirit, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, carries your prayers before the throne of the Father, and makes them perfect before God.  He prays with and in you.  Your prayers are weak and blemished and even downright sinful when you utter them.  But they are redeemed by the blood of Jesus Christ.  They are cleansed.  They are sanctified.  Now, it is true, sometimes you ask for downright silly things, or even inappropriate things, things that can hurt you or others, things that would not be beneficial for your salvation.  Here is the great thing.  Just as your Father will not give you a stone when you ask for bread, or a serpent when you ask for fish, neither will He give you a stone or a serpent when you ask for one.  He will always give you something better than you ask.  And you won’t always understand it.  Sometimes He will give you something you think is bad.  You will think He has not heard you.  You will think He is like the unrighteous judge in our text, who would not give in to the widow, and when he finally gave her justice, it was only out of self-interest, so that she’d leave him alone.  But that’s not the point of the parable.  The point is that if even the unrighteous judge finally responded to the widow and gave her justice, how much more will your righteous Father hear your prayers and do what is good for you?

            The fact is, you know that children often ask for silly and even harmful things.  Good parents don’t give children everything they ask for.  In fact, good parents often give children what they do not want, like discipline and broccoli.  But good parents always hear their children, and always give their children what is good.  So it is, even more so, with our Father in heaven.  And being a child of the heavenly Father, you can ask Him anything.  He delights in hearing your voice.  And you can ask in confidence that He will say no if you’re asking for something bad.  But He won’t just say no.  He will give you something better.  You can trust Him on this.  He knows what you need even better than you do. 

            All that being said, prayer is hard.  There are times when prayer comes easily, but very often it is a struggle.  Jacob in our Old Testament lesson (Gen. 32:22-30) is the picture of the Christian at prayer.  There he is on his journey to the Promised Land, great suffering and tribulation lay behind him, great trial and peril lay before him.  And he wrestles with God all night long.  Literally, wrestles with God… God in the form of a man.  Now, think about a few things here.  Jacob doesn’t come to God.  God comes to Jacob.  And He wrestles Jacob, but if God were in it to win the match, He could simply have consumed Jacob with His might and glory.  Instead, God comes as a man.  And He gives Himself to be overpowered by Jacob.  He touches Jacob’s hip.  He gives Jacob a wound.  But still, He gives Himself to be overpowered by Jacob.  And what is Jacob ultimately wrestling for?  A blessing.  “I will not let you go unless you bless me” (v. 26).  And God blesses Jacob by giving him a name.  He changes the name from “Jacob,” which means “Cheater,” to “Israel,” which means “Strives with God.”  He changes his name from “Sinner” to “One Who Clings to God through the Struggle.”  Now, what does this teach us about prayer?  It’s a struggle.  It’s a wrestling match with God.  It happens in the context of our journey to the Promised Land of eternal life in heaven and the resurrection.  It happens in the context of suffering and tribulation, trial and downright peril.  And God comes to us.  He comes, but not to obliterate us in our sin and weakness.  He comes as a man.  He comes as Jesus.  That’s who wrestled with Jacob.  That’s who wrestles with us.  He comes as a man to be overpowered.  That is what happened on the cross.  God gives Himself to be conquered there.  For you.  To impart the blessing.  Life.  Salvation.  A new name.  He gives it in Baptism.  God’s Name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.  Your name is “Christian,” one who clings to God by faith through the struggle.  One who will not let Him go until He gives a blessing.  Jesus “told them a parable to the effect that they ought always to pray and not lose heart” (Luke 18:1).  It is a struggle, this faith, this prayer.  And sometimes God touches your hip, or some other place in your body or your soul, and it hurts.  Jacob’s hip hurt.  He never walked the same after that.  Why does He do it?  So you cling that much tighter to Him in the struggle.  So you recognize that apart from His blessing, you are utterly helpless.  But He always gives the blessing, because He has been overpowered in the flesh of Jesus Christ. 

            So that’s you at prayer.  It’s hard.  But it’s good.  There are some gifts God has given to help you pray.  Jesus teaches you to pray, “Our Father, who art in heaven…”  When you can’t pray anything else, pray that.  The prayer our Lord teaches us encompasses every need in the world, and God loves to hear it.  He’s also given you the Psalms.  When you don’t know what to pray, pray the Psalms, which are the prayers of Jesus and His Church.  And if nothing else, pray the Kyrie: “Lord, have mercy.”  That is the perfect prayer for any time and situation.  You hear or see something grievous?  “Lord, have mercy.”  An ambulance is racing by your place of work?  “Lord, have mercy.”  You’re having a conflict with a friend or a family member, and you don’t know how to resolve it?  “Lord, have mercy.”  In any and every situation, our primary need is the Lord’s mercy.  So just ask for it.  He knows what to do.  And pray the wonderful written prayers of the Church.  Take home your bulletin and pray the collect every day.  These prayers are the ancient petitions of the Church.  They are rich.  They are concise.  And they are our heritage.  Pray the hymns in the hymnal.  Pray parts of the liturgy.  That’s what’s great about the liturgy.  We know it by heart and it teaches us the language of prayer, and it’s all right out of Holy Scripture.  Of course, you can just make up prayers, too, but don’t get hung up on that when you find yourself at a loss for words.  Go to the gifts God has given you.  But by all means, pray.

            Because God promises: “The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working” (James 5:16).  The prayer of one justified by the saving work of Jesus Christ is heard and acted upon by our Father who is in heaven.  Your prayers matter.  They are precious to God.  They change things.  Because God uses you as His instrument, to be an intercessor for your neighbor, to be Christ to your neighbor, to plead before God on his behalf.  Because your Father loves to hear you, and He promises to answer your prayers.  Always pray and do not lose heart.  Cling to Jesus.  He will bless.  In the Name of the Father, and of the Son (+), and of the Holy Spirit.  Amen.