Pray and Don’t Give Up: Luke 18:1-8
Not giving up is one of the most important ideas in any sort of undertaking. In fact, praying and not giving up is one of the most important things in life!
Some people think that, If I lay that prayer down once, that should do the trick! That wasn’t the idea Jesus left with us! In fact, in Luke chapter 18 Jesus told His disciples a parable and started it off in verse 1 like this, “Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.” (NIV)
Who does this apply too? Disciples of Jesus. If you’re a disciple, or follower of Jesus it applies to you. What’s Jesus showing His disciples? They should always pray and not give up!
If you’re a disciple of Jesus, you don’t just send off a prayer and consider that the end of the matter! No! You always pray and don’t give up.
This is the story of the parable. In a particular town there was a judge. He had no respect for God and didn’t give a rip about men! He was the kind of guy who was into himself and his issues, but not worried about what God thought and certainly didn’t care at all about other people. Self-consumed might be a good way to describe that judge.
A widow in town kept coming to the judge asking for justice in some matter that was important to her. She came to the judge over and over asking for justice against her adversary.
What did the judge do? He refused her request for justice because he simply didn’t care about her situation! In the 1960’s we would have said he was “shining her on.”
Finally, the judge said to himself, “I don’t care at all about people, and I certainly don’t respect God, but this girl is not going to let up on me. She is wearing me out!”
The judge went on, “you know what I am going to do? I am going to make sure she gets the justice she is seeking so she does not wear me out!”
Jesus drives the point home, “just look at what the unjust judge said.” His point is to look at the situation and learn from it.
Then Jesus says it this way 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?” (NIV) He is asking a rhetorical question. The answer to the question is, “no, He won’t keep putting them off!”
The point is when you keep coming to God in prayer, He won’t put you off over and over, but will eventually give you the justice you seek, or answer your prayer in the affirmative. He will say “yes” as long as you’re asking for things that are His will!
The Lord says if you keep at it in prayer God will grant your request and will do it quickly! One important point is the answer to the question, “who defines quickly?” God defines quickly!
His answer may not appear to come at warp speed to us, but on God’s terms it will come quickly. I’m convinced He answers the prayer in Heaven with a “yes,” but it doesn’t show up before us until His time is right.
I want to tell you about the prayer of a woman who prayed and didn’t give up. Her name is Hanna. Her history is found in 1 Samuel chapter 1.
Hanna is a married woman. Her husband was a guy named Elkanah, who was an Ephraimite. Elkanah had two wives. Hannah, whom he loved dearly and Penninah who wasn’t loved like Hannah. Penninah had children, but Hannah did not.
Hannah was in anguish over not having a child, knowing she was dearly loved by her husband. His other wife wasn’t loved like Hannah, but she had children.
The family would go yearly to Shiloh to worship the Lord.
Elkanah would give meat from the sacrifices to the family, but a double portion was given to Hannah because he loved her so much.
When Hannah went to worship, and was fed, Penninah would provoke her and irritate her. Why? She had children and Hannah didn’t, and she knew Elkanah loved Hannah, not her. Penninah was holding not having children over Hannah’s head and using it against her.
In 1 Samuel 1:10 it says, “In bitterness of soul Hannah wept much and prayed to the Lord.” (NIV)
Hannah vowed to the Lord that if He would give her a son, she would devote him to the Lord to serve God.
While Hannah and her family were in Shiloh worshipping, she was in intense prayer asking God to give her a son. Her lips were moving but her voice wasn’t heard.
Do you know what Eli, the priest said to her, “Hannah, get rid of the wine and why do you keep getting drunk?”
She explained to him she wasn’t drunk and hadn’t been drinking wine or beer, but her heart was in anguish, and she was pouring her soul out to the Lord in prayer.
Hannah was praying and not giving up! Eli asked the Lord to let her go in peace and answer her prayer.
The family went home the next day and once home Elkanah lay with Hanna, in other words they were intimate and had sexual relations. The Lord remembered her and in time she had a baby boy.
Guess who that baby boy was. Samuel. He was trained by Eli and was a prophet of God. He was a pivotal leader in the time between the judges and the kings of Israel. In fact, Samuel anointed the first two kings of Israel, Saul and David.
Hannah prayed and didn’t give up! It paid off.
I met Ralph in 1978. I went to see him in the hospital late in my time as an associate pastor in a church in Lawndale, Calif. Hs friend asked me to pay him a visit and see if I could share the gospel with him.
Ralph was in cardiac arrest when I got to the hospital. The doctors were able to get Ralph back and I was able to visit with him the next day. Ralph told me when he was in cardiac arrest, he saw the Lord who told him he was going to send him back and give him a second chance. I didn’t dispute his story!
I was able to lead him to the Lord and baptize him.
While I was visiting with Ralph, he told me about his wife who had died a couple of years earlier. He talked about her praying that he would come to the Lord for decades.
She would tell him she didn’t want him to miss out on heaven because that was where she was going. During her life he didn’t decide for Christ.
A couple of years after she went to heaven Ralph did come to Christ. God answered her prayer because she prayed and didn’t give up. God answered her prayer in His time!
Not long after coming to Christ Ralph was back in the hospital with heart problems. I had just a couple of weeks left in my ministry with that church when I went to see Ralph when he was going home from the hospital with his daughter.
After visiting and praying with Ralph, I went to my car while the nurse and Ralph’s daughter were taking him to the car. I was pulling out of my parking place to leave and could see Ralph in his wheelchair about to get into his daughter’s car.
Suddenly, he slumped in the wheelchair! He was gone. Ralph joined his wife and the Lord in Heaven. Why? A wife who prayed and wouldn’t give up!
What prayer is on your heart? Pray on it and don’t give up!
My grandmother
Bishop lived with us from the time I was 12 years old when my grandpa Bishop died. Grandma knew that as a teen I wasn’t walking with the Lord and was being a knucklehead and a hellion!
I walked into her room for some reason at the age of 18 and she was on her knees by her bed, obviously in prayer. I said, “sorry for interrupting you grandma.”
She fought off her intense arthritis and made it too her feet, pointed her finger at me and said, “I’m praying for your boy!” Somehow, I believed her. At 18 most people who knew me were more worried about me landing in jail, not a pulpit!
Close to her death about 6 years later I went to see her in a rest home. I told her I was getting married to Becky and we were going to move to Fullerton, Calif., to go to Bible College so I could be a preacher!
As I recall, she said, “I’ll believe that when I see it!” She saw if from Heaven! She was a person who prayed and didn’t give up.
At the end of Jesus’ parable about praying and not giving up He says this, “However when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” (Luke 18:8B NIV)
Praying and not giving up is a passionate expression of faith! Never back off from praying and not giving up.