The School of Prayer | Part 4 | Don’t be a Prayer School Dropout
We’re there in Luke 18. We’ve been going through a series called “The School of Prayer” and we’ve really been with Christ in the school of prayer. We’ve narrowed ourselves down to these specific teachings by the Lord Jesus Christ upon this earth on the subject of prayer. And we’ve been learning from Jesus about how to pray. And the reason for that if you remember is because after Jesus has a session praying, his disciples asked him to teach them how to pray. It’s interesting that they never asked Jesus how to preach or how to administer a Church or any other spiritual discipline mentioned in the Bible.
Now before he got into how to pray, he taught them how not to pray. Then the second sermon in this series was called prayer 101 and we went through what’s normally referred to as the Lord’s prayer. We went through that first part and we learned about the basics of prayer, what the purpose of prayer is and what it is not. Our Heavenly Father know the things that we need even before we ask them. It is for us to remind ourselves of who God is and who we are in his will. Then last week we looked at the last part of the Lord’s prayer. And we learned about making requests and how we should bring our request to the Lord and all of that. We’ve finished what’s known as the Lord’s prayer or what I like to call “the model prayer”. And now we are moving on to other passages where Jesus taught on prayer and that’s where we are in Luke chapter 18.
We have the Lord Jesus Christ teaching a parable on prayer. There are actually two parables that Jesus taught on the subject of prayer. We’re going to look at both of them today but we’re going to focus in on this one. Luke 18 is the parable that’s known as “The Parable of the Unjust Judge”. And I’ll tell you right now that this parable is one of those parables that’s highly misunderstood. So I’d like to give you just some introductory thoughts on the parable itself before we dig in. There are some things that are interesting about this parable.
One of the unique things about this parable is that Jesus right up front gave us the purpose of the parable. Luke 18:1 “And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;”. There is something unique about this parable in the sense that right up front, Jesus says I’m going to teach you a parable. The Bible tells us the purpose of the parable is that men are always to pray and not to faint. And it’s almost like Jesus knew that people would misunderstand this parable and they would get confused with it and they would misapply it.
So he says right up front, I don’t want you to get confused with the details of this parable. The intent of this parable is to teach you that men are to always pray & not to faint. The purpose of the parable is to teach us to be persistent and consistent in prayer and not quit. We’ve called the series “The School of Prayer”. We’ve been learning with Christ in the school of prayer and the idea of today’s sermon is don’t drop out of the school of prayer. Don’t quit in the school of prayer. Jesus is about to teach us a lesson about why you should not quit and why men are to always pray and not to faint. So that’s a unique thing there about the parable.
Let me give you another thought in regards to this parable. Verse 2 “2 Saying, There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, neither regarded man:”. Here the Bible says that this judge doesn’t fear God. Notice verse 3 “3 And there was a widow in that city; and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary. 4 And he would not for a while: but afterward he said within himself, Though I fear not God, nor regard man; 5 Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.”.
I want you to understand about this parable because like I said, people will often misunderstand this parable and they’ll think that God is like this unjust judge who is up in heaven and doesn’t want to answer our prayers and we just have to bother him until he changes his mind. But I want you to understand that is not the purpose of this parable. Remember the purpose of the parable is to pray and not faint. He is teaching us about being persistent in our prayers and consistent in our prayers and not quitting on our prayers. But something you need to understand about parables in general is that some parables are parables of comparison and some parables are parables of contrast.
There are some parables if you’re familiar with the New Testament and you’re familiar with the gospels such as “the kingdom of heaven is likened unto”. That is a parable of comparison. He is using an earthly situation and compares it to how God is with us here on this earth. With this parable in Luke 18, that is not the case. He does not begin the parable by saying “the kingdom of heaven is like unto an unjust judge that doesn’t want to listen to your prayers”. This parable is not a parable of comparison. It is a parable of contrast. It is not teaching us that God is this judge up in heaven that does not want to hear our prayers. The purpose of this parable is actually the exact opposite. It is to tell us that God is not an unjust judge, that God is just and fair and that he’s not disconnected from our feelings. But he actually is very connected and very compassionate and he cares about the things that we are going through and he wants to hear our prayers. So this is not a prayer of comparison. It is not the kingdom of heaven is like unto. This is a parable of contrast. It is teaching us what God is not like. Judges on earth can be unjust and unfair but that is not God.
Notice verse 6. “6 And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith.”. I want you to notice he highlights for us what he wants us to get from the parable. The Bible tells us at the beginning that he spake a parable to this end that man ought always to pray and not to faint. Then in verse 6 he tells us “the Lord said”. So Jesus is giving this parable and then the Lord Jesus Christ interrupts his own parable and he says to them “hear what the unjust judge saith”. Notice verse 7 “7 And shall not God avenge his own elect, which cry day and night unto him, though he bear long with them?”. And again the idea is that God is interested in you and God wants to hear your prayers. So I hope that helps you understand a little bit of the context of this parable. And we’re going to just jump into the actual application of the parable.
I want to give you 3 thoughts this morning in regards to this parable. And we’re going to look at another parable that is very similar as well. Number 1 – The parable teaches us about the posture of prayer. This parable teaches us about the posture of prayer. And when we say posture of prayer, posture means the way you stand or the way that your body is formed. But oftentimes when we talk about the posture of prayer, there’s a lot of thought that goes into the posture of prayer. What is the proper way to pray? Throughout the Bible, you find different Bible characters praying effectively in different postures of prayer. Some pray down on their knees while others standing upright. They’re in different postures in regards to how to pray. And this is a question that I often get asked. “How should I pray?”. One time got mad at me because he thought I should tell everyone that they have to be down on their knees hours a day praying. Here’s the thing. I believe in praying on your knees and I think it’s good to do that and I’m not against that. But this parable teaches about the posture of prayer.
Verse 1 “And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;”. Now I do believe that we should find a set time alone with God but the Bible also teaches that we should always pray. That means that we ought to live our lives in a spirit of prayer. That means that you can be praying even if you’re not on your knees. That means that you can be praying even if you’re driving down the road, even if you’re walking down the street, even if you’re not in that proper posture of prayer. The Bible teaches that we should be always in a spirit of prayer.
Please do not misunderstand me. I believe that we should have a formal time of prayer. Something that I’ve been doing recently is doing my prayer on the elliptical. There are a few reasons for this. It keeps me from falling asleep. I am able to multitask by working out and doing my prayer. But I also believe that we should take time to get on our knees and pray. In fact 1 thing that I have been doing recently is praying through the Lord’s prayer. I haven’t been praying the Lord’s prayer like a Catholic and with a vain repetition but praying through the Lord’s prayer. I mean taking the aspects we learned and coming to God as the intimate and infinite Father and that his will should be done and that he would provide my daily needs. Not praying for a year’s worth of food but that God will give me neither poverty nor riches. Praying that God would guide and lead me rather than me guiding myself. Making sure that I am not only asking God to forgive me but that I am not holding bitterness or anger towards anyone. We shouldn’t vainly repeat the Lord’s prayer but it does give us a great outline of how to pray.
Matthew 6:6 “6 But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.”. So I believe in prayer and I believe in formal prayer. But you need to understand that there are all sorts of different types of prayer. Here Jesus taught us about formal, secret prayer where you get alone with God in some room by yourself and you pray. But Jesus also said “My house shall be called a house of prayer”. And he talked about the fact that there should be a public prayer and that’s what we do on Wednesday nights. When we have our prayer sheet and we pray collectively as a congregation for the request of our church family. The Bible talks about two joining together in prayer and bringing those requests before God. We talked about in 1st Timothy that there is intercessory prayer where we pray for certain individuals and needs. We should have a set time where we get alone with God and pray choosing a time, place, plan and pray through that prayer list. So don’t misunderstand me. There should a time of formal prayer.
Sometimes people ask if prayer should just be informal. For example, you work in an assembly line and speak in prayer to God or you are driving and pray to God or on the elliptical or whatever. People will ask if prayer should be formal or informal time of prayer. The answer to this question is that we should have times that we get alone with God but that we also are in constant communication with our Heavenly Father. Let me say this, you can still communicate reverently with God at any moment. Even if you are driving down the road or on an elliptical, you can still acknowledge the fact that God is our Heavenly Father and is hallowed and intimate. I’m not saying that if it is informal to be irreverent. I’m saying that we should live with the understanding that we have the Holy Spirit of God in our bodies and that we are living in the presence of God and therefore we should be able to communicate reverently with God at any posture. Sometimes we can emphasize too much how we pray the posture of prayer. And again I’m not against it but I think we can emphasize it too much.
I’d like to read this lighthearted poem that kind of illustrates the points that I’m trying to make this morning. It’s called “The Prayer of Cyrus Brown”.
“”The proper way for a man to pray,”
Said Deacon Lemuel Keyes,
“And the only proper attitude
Is down upon his knees.”
“No, I should say the way to pray,”
Said Rev. Doctor Wise,
“Is standing straight with outstretched arms
And rapt and upturned eyes.”
“Oh, no; no, no,” said Elder Slow,
“Such posture is too proud:
A man should pray with eyes fast closed
And head contritely bowed.”
“It seems to me his hands should be
Austerely clasped in front.
With both thumbs pointing toward the ground,”
Said Rev. Doctor Blunt.
“Las’ year I fell in Hodgkin’s well
Head first,” said Cyrus Brown,
“With both my heels a-stickin’ up,
My head a-pinting down;
“An’ I made a prayer right then an’ there –
Best prayer I ever said,
The prayingest prayer I ever prayed,
A-standing on my head.”
That just kind of illustrates for you that you need to be ready to pray at a moment’s notice. You’ve heard me say this before. The emergency room is not where you want to be getting right with God. You need to be able to live in a spirit of prayer.
1st Thessalonians 5:17 “17 Pray without ceasing.”. The word cease means to end or to bring to a finish. And Paul said you should pray without ceasing. Have a time of prayer where you get on your knees and get in the closet and pray to God. Praise the Lord for it. Not enough Christians have that. I hope you have that. But when you finish that, go about your day and live in a spirit of prayer or in fellowship with our Heavenly Father. We should pray without ceasing. 1st Timothy 2:8 “8 I will therefore that men pray every where, lifting up holy hands, without wrath and doubting.”. You should pray at work, pray in your car, etc…The idea is that we should have a time of formal prayer and we should live in a spirit of informal prayer.
Let me give you a biblical example of this in a real-life situation. In the story of Nehemiah, Nehemiah is a captive and he’s been given a position where he is the cupbearer for the king. News has come to him that Jerusalem is in ruin, that the wall of Jerusalem has been broken down and that the people are in a great affliction and reproach. The wall of Jerusalem also was broken down he was told. Nehemiah was used by God to go back to Jerusalem to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem and help the people. However, I want you to notice how he got there.
Nehemiah 2:1 “And it came to pass in the month Nisan, in the twentieth year of Artaxerxes the king, that wine was before him: and I took up the wine, and gave it unto the king. Now I had not been beforetime sad in his presence. 2 Wherefore the king said unto me, Why is thy countenance sad, seeing thou art not sick? this is nothing else but sorrow of heart. Then I was very sore afraid,”. Now the history books tell us that in this Persian empire, you were not allowed to show anything but happiness or joy in the presence of the king. And Nehemiah seems to connect or assure that history. Because he is sad and the king is surprised by it.
Verse 3 “3 And said unto the king, Let the king live for ever: why should not my countenance be sad, when the city, the place of my fathers’ sepulchres, lieth waste, and the gates thereof are consumed with fire? 4 Then the king said unto me, For what dost thou make request? So I prayed to the God of heaven.”. Nehemiah is the cupbearer to the king. He has a relationship to the king but the king could have killed him or imprisoned at a moment’s notice. Here he finds himself in this crucial point where the king has noticed that he has a sad countenance. And he explains because Jerusalem is destroyed.
In verse 4 the king asks Nehemiah what he requests. But notice the end of verse 4 “4 Then the king said unto me, For what dost thou make request? So I prayed to the God of heaven.”. He prays to God. Verse 5 “5 And I said unto the king, If it please the king, and if thy servant have found favour in thy sight, that thou wouldest send me unto Judah, unto the city of my fathers’ sepulchres, that I may build it. 6 And the king said unto me, (the queen also sitting by him,) For how long shall thy journey be? and when wilt thou return? So it pleased the king to send me; and I set him a time.”. I want you to notice here that Nehemiah is asked by the king and Nehemiah prays to God. I don’t believe that Nehemiah left and went to his prayer closet to talk to God. I believe he prayed right then and there. The king asks what he needs. Right there in a spirit of prayer, Nehemiah in his mind and his heart said “Lord please help me right now”.
What can we learn? We learn about the posture of prayer. We learn about the process of prayer. What is the process of prayer? Men should always pray and be in a continual spirit of prayer to pray at a moment’s notice. You’re able to reverently pray to God and say “God, I need your help right now. Lord I need you to step in at this moment.”.
Notice secondly this morning, not only does this parable teach us about the posture of prayer but it teaches about the persistence of prayer. Luke 18:2 “2 Saying, There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, neither regarded man: 3 And there was a widow in that city; and she came unto him, saying, Avenge me of mine adversary. 4 And he would not for a while: but afterward he said within himself, Though I fear not God, nor regard man; 5 Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.”.
Jesus is teaching this parable and he gets to that point of the story where he says “6 And the Lord said, Hear what the unjust judge saith.”. Jesus pauses the story in verse 6 to highlight something. From verse 5 “5 Yet because this widow troubleth me, I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.”. This teaches us the persistence of prayer. What is this parable trying to teach us? Here’s what he’s trying to teach us. We should have a continual coming to God. We should come to God continually. We should be persistent in our prayer.
Go to Luke 11. Luke 11:1 “And it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples. 2 And he said unto them, When ye pray, say, Our Father which art in heaven, Hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done, as in heaven, so in earth. 3 Give us day by day our daily bread. 4 And forgive us our sins; for we also forgive every one that is indebted to us. And lead us not into temptation; but deliver us from evil.”. This is all the things we have learned the last several weeks from Matthew.
Now in Luke 11:5 we have a different but similar parable. Luke 11:5 “5 And he said unto them, Which of you shall have a friend, and shall go unto him at midnight, and say unto him, Friend, lend me three loaves; 6 For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?”. This is a parable of a man who has a friend who has been traveling and shows up really late. He doesn’t want to help. Verse 7 “7 And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee.”. But notice verse 8 “8 I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.”.
Importunity means persistence especially to the point of annoyance. Here Jesus is teaching us about praying to God. God is not a friend that won’t help us. But what God is teaching is the persistence in prayer and we should have a continual coming. Why don’t we come to God? We simply don’t think we need God. We wouldn’t say that out loud but that is the reason why we don’t come to him. Oftentimes prayer becomes the last resort instead of our first resource. If we realized our inability then we would practice importunity.
Look at verse 6 again. “6 For a friend of mine in his journey is come to me, and I have nothing to set before him?”. Isn’t it true that when we run into problems and have nothing that then we go to God in prayer? “7 And he from within shall answer and say, Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee. 8 I say unto you, Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth.”. We need to get to the place where we stop trying to strategize and make plans and look at budgets and go off our own wisdom. Before we do all of our planning, we need to go to God continually, consistently and persistently. We need to come to God and tell him that we don’t know what to do and we don’t have the power and we need to rely on him.
I don’t think this parable teaches that we need to keep bringing the same requests over and over to God. There is nothing wrong with doing that though. You can keep coming to God with the request until it is clear that his answer is no or until God changes your request. The Apostle Paul had a thorn in the flesh. He brought it to God three different times, three different seasons of prayer. The first time, God didn’t give a clear answer. The 2nd time he didn’t get a clear answer. The third time he got a clear answer from God when God said “My grace is sufficient for thee. Stop asking for this. I’m not going to answer.”. Then Paul responded “Thy will be done. I will rather glory in my infirmities that the power of God may rest upon me.”. So you go ahead and keep bringing the same request to God over and over until God changes the request and makes it clear that that’s not the answer. But that’s not what I believe God is teaching us here. He’s not saying to annoy God with 1 request but show us that we aren’t annoying God when we continually pray to him. Prayer should not be our last resort. It should be our first resource.
1st Peter 5:7 “7 Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you.”. The word “care” there means anxiety or stress. The Bible tells us that God wants us to cast all of our care upon him. He is not like the unjust judge that can’t be bothered. That was not a parable of comparison. Those are parables of contrast. God actually cares for you so you should come to him continually casting all your cares upon him. It teaches about persistence. Philippians 4:6 “6 Be careful for nothing; but in every thing by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God.”. As human beings we tend to worry about so many things. But Paul is telling us not to be worried in all of these things but pray unto God.
Go back to Luke 19. This parable teaches us about the posture of prayer; that we should live in a spirit of prayer. That’s not against formal prayer. I believe in formal prayer. But also we should be living in the spirit of informal prayer. It teaches about the persistence of prayer. We should continually come to God with our prayers. We should just persistently, consistently and continually come to God with our requests. We should get in a habit of bringing our care to him. Why? “He careth for you”.
Thirdly I’d like you to notice something else. The parable teaches about the performance of prayer. Luke 18:1 “And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;”. The word faint is referring to growing weak or weary or losing energy. He says when it comes to prayer, don’t faint. This speaks to the performance of prayer. What does he mean by that? Go to Colossians 4. Prayer is a spiritual discipline that is a lot of work. Prayer is difficult. If you’ve ever tried to pray for 1 hour on your knees, it’s hard work.
Colossians 4:12 “12 Epaphras, who is one of you, a servant of Christ, saluteth you, always labouring fervently for you in prayers, that ye may stand perfect and complete in all the will of God.”. We are told that Epaphras labored fervently praying. We should all have a desire to pray but there are some people who we refer to as prayer warriors. These are people who have made prayer their ministry. Would to God that our church would be filled with those types of people. That is not just like a normal Christian who just kind of prays every once in a while. Maybe you so “Pastor I’d love to go soulwinning but I’m not able to physically.”. Now I understand that maybe some of you are in that position but you could spend that time in prayer for those who are going soulwinning from 10 am to 12 every Saturday. Could you pray for your Pastor as he travels around the country and preaches at different places? Could it be said of you that you labor fervently in prayers. One of the reasons why we don’t have the spirit of God upon our lives is because our prayer life lacks. I’m not against these things but remember that the disciples never asked Jesus how to write or deliver a sermon or study the Bible or read it effectively. When the disciples made a request, they asked Jesus to teach them to pray.
James 5:16 “16 Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. 17 Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. 18 And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit.”.
Here we have Elias which is Elijah praying fervently and the Bible gives it as an example to us that we need to pray fervently. I wonder if our prayer lives could be described in that way of effectual and fervent. It said that Elijah has like passions as us meaning he was just a normal man. He was just a regular guy. Elijah whose spirit would be given double to Elisha and also given to John the Baptist, Elijah who met with Jesus and Moses on the Mount of Transfiguration and Elijah who is one of the two witnesses. This was a great man. We realize he was a great prophet of God but really consider who Elijah was and consider what Elijah did. Was Elijah a great preacher? Well it doesn’t mention his sermons. I’m not saying he wasn’t a great preacher but it doesn’t document it. Elijah is really known for 2 things. His ministry brought the famine that brought Ahab to his knees and he called down fire from heaven. Both of these things were as a result of his prayer life. Elijah knew how to get a hold of God. I believe he had a time of formal prayer. I believe he lived in the spirit of informal prayer. He prayed fervently and effectively and there was nothing special about him. He was a man subject to like passions as we are except he prayed earnestly and the Lord heard him.
I believe that the missing ingredient in our Christian lives is prayer. So today I want to encourage you. Don’t be a school of prayer drop out. Stick with it. Be persistent. Be consistent. Stay at it. Don’t quit. Understand that the posture of prayer is that men are always to pray. Understand that the persistence of prayer teaches us that we must come to God continually. Our inability should lead to importunity. The performance of prayer is that we should not faint. We should not quit. We should be willing to put in the hard work of prayer.
In Matthew 6 Jesus taught us about finding a place or getting to a closet alone with God reverently. He is our Heavenly Father. “Hallowed be thy name. 10 Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”. But then Jesus also taught this parable in Luke 18:1. “And he spake a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint;”. So don’t drop out on prayer. Stick with it. Stay with it. Bring your prayers continually to God making your request unto God. Casting all your care upon him for he careth for you.
Let’s pray.