Luke 18: Facing Injustice, Keep Praying

Introduction

About eight years ago, Armel, one of the Church's leaders, was young, single, childless, and without a home. A friend took him in for two months. One day, the friend's wife left on a business trip to Spain and left their one-and-a-half-year-old daughter at home. Two young men who barely knew how to take care of themselves had to change diapers and work out the right temperature for the bottle.

Every time the doorbell rang, the little girl cried out: "Mommy, mommy!" And every time, they had to answer her: "No, it's not mommy yet." A month later, the mother came back, the doorbell rang, and this time the answer was different: "Yes, it's mommy, you can run." The little girl spent the whole afternoon in her arms. Armel even filmed the scene, so strongly did he feel the weight of sadness lift from the child's heart.

Why tell this story? Because we can desperately wait for a change in our lives, for good news that is slow to come. Luke 18:1-8 is here to encourage us to keep waiting and praying. The message fits in one sentence: in the face of injustice, keep praying, because God is the only perfect judge and Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is coming back soon.

Message Outline

1. A World Crying Out Against Injustice

"We live in a difficult world," a world where injustice is rampant. In France, the news is marked by the strike of high school students and teachers asking for better study conditions, as firefighters did before them.
Elsewhere, Christians are persecuted to the point of death. Armel subscribes to the newsletter of Open Doors, a Christian NGO serving persecuted Christians. There he read the story of a Nigerian pastor whose wife was killed, and who was kidnapped with his three children by religious extremists, simply because they believe in Jesus.
Our world demands a justice that will come and restore all things. This text, among other subjects, addresses the question of justice.

2. Prayer and Faith: The Key to the Parable

Jesus himself gives the meaning of the parable in verse 1: we must "always pray and not give up." A parable is an illustrated teaching, a fictional story that makes a point.
Jesus is speaking to his disciples (Luke 17:22), those who follow him faithfully. In Luke's account, he is on his way to Jerusalem (Luke 9:51), where he will die to save his people from sin, man's rebellion against God.
The kingdom of God is already among us, even if it is not always visible and meets with much opposition. But verse 8 announces the return of the Son of Man: Jesus has come, and he will return to establish his kingdom for good.
Verse 1 and verse 8 must be connected: "When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?" Jesus draws a strong link between prayer and faith.
What kind of faith? Not a question of quantity. When the disciples ask "Increase our faith" (Luke 17:5-10), Jesus speaks of a servant who obeys his master. The question is whether I have faith or not.
Nor is it a faith that only serves to solve our problems. Of the ten lepers healed (Luke 17:11-19), only one comes back to Jesus and enters into a relationship with him. The faith Jesus speaks of is the faith that saves, the one that connects us to the Savior and shows itself in concrete actions.

3. An Unjust Judge and a Widow Who Never Gives Up

The judge was supposed to enforce the law, protect the weak, and punish the wicked. But he "neither feared God nor cared what people thought" (verse 2). He does not do his job and loves no one, except perhaps himself.
The widow lives in great insecurity, like all widows of that time. She has only one recourse, the city's judge. She does not care whether he loves her or not: she has only one idea, to obtain justice.
Armel imagines her in the courtyard of the court, morning, noon, and evening, pleading her case. Every refusal motivates her to come back. "Rain or shine," she is there.
Her only strength is her persistence. And it is this insistence that finally wears the judge down: "because this widow keeps bothering me, I will see that she gets justice, so that she won't eventually come and attack me" (verse 5).

4. When God Seems Not to Answer

We have all experienced some form of injustice. The persecution of Christians in some countries has gone on for a long time with little change, despite the ceaseless prayers of brothers and sisters.
In some African countries, leaders have been plundering state coffers since independence while the people suffer. In France, the debate over the proper use of the state budget comes up again and again.
At work, you can go years without a promotion even though you do your job well and you pray. You can feel that the world is crying out for justice and that no one is answering on the other end of the line.
"We can feel that Christians are crying out to God and that God does not hear. He is silent. What are we going to do with this silence?"

5. God Is Not Like This Judge

"Let's be clear, God is not like the unjust judge." He loves people, he loves his creation. He is a just judge and he delights in listening to those who belong to him.
The disciples are like the widow, fragile in a world in rebellion against God, but they are the "chosen ones" (verse 7): they belong to the kingdom for good and cannot be snatched from it.
If a judge who loves no one listens to a widow he does not know, how much more will God the Father listen to the cries of his children. Jesus makes the same point in Matthew 7:11: if you, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven.
Time does not belong to us. "A thousand years in your sight are like yesterday" (Psalm 90:4). God is master of time and circumstances. It is not for us to lose heart and say: "I've been praying for ten years, fifteen years, twenty years."
In Egypt, the Israelites groaned under slavery for a long time. Their cries rose to God, who heard, remembered his covenant with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and looked on their situation (Exodus 2:23-25). "Perhaps not at the moment we expected, but he has always stepped in."

6. Jesus Is Coming Back: A Warning and an Invitation

The text is full of time words: always pray (verse 1), for a while (verse 4), continually (verse 5), day and night (verse 7), quickly (verse 8). We live between the first and second coming of Jesus, a time when faith is put to the test.
Another temptation: taking justice into our own hands. "I pray, God does not answer, I'll manage on my own." Armel quotes Friedrich Nietzsche: "God is dead, and we have killed him. [...] Must we not ourselves become gods?" Western thought is saturated with this: we live as if we no longer expected a Savior.
According to the American preacher Paul Washer, verse 8 is one of the saddest sentences in the Bible. It resounds like a warning: Jesus will return, and his Church must be radiant, neither asleep nor discouraged. On that day, we will know who truly belongs to God.
It is also an invitation: it is never too late to enter into a relationship with Jesus. If you have been discouraged by the dark side of the Church, Jesus is still calling you to come back to him. His kingdom is a kingdom of justice.

7. Let Faith Shape Your Prayer

In the face of God's silence, identify with the widow. God does not lie, he is faithful. He promised to take away the sin of the world through his Son, and Jesus came, died, and rose again. There is not one promise of God that has not been fulfilled.
"Your faith determines your prayer." Praying is not easy: it takes motivation, energy, discipline. We can fall into mechanical formulas learned by heart, or into a monologue where we just unload everything.
Armel has been reciting the Lord's Prayer since he was ten. "Your kingdom come, your will be done": do we truly thirst for the kingdom? Do we truly want his will and not ours? Do we truly expect our daily bread from him?
A prayer life focused only on solving our problems (a husband, a job, children) is not sustainable: either we lose heart, or we roll up our sleeves to fix everything ourselves.
Our worries are real, but they must be carried in the light of Jesus' return: "Lord, step in now, or come back and put an end to this unjust world. And if you do not, give me the strength to hold on until your return."
Armel encourages everyone to pray alone, as a family, in Church, and in house groups, without ceasing, in total dependence on God.

Key Takeaways

Jesus told this parable to show that we must always pray and not give up, even in the face of injustice.
God is not like the unjust judge: he loves his children, he is the only perfect judge, and he listens to his chosen ones who cry out to him day and night.
God's silence is not indifference. He is master of time and he has always stepped in, even if not at the expected moment.
The faith Jesus speaks of is a faith that saves and connects us to him. It is this faith that shapes our prayer.
Jesus is coming back soon to put an end to injustice: his return is both a warning and an invitation.

Personal Application

What situation of injustice have you been carrying in prayer for a long time, and have you been tempted to give up?
How do you react to God's silence: by persevering like the widow, or by trying to take justice into your own hands?
When you pray the Lord's Prayer, do you truly believe what you are asking: his kingdom, his will, your daily bread?
Is your prayer limited to the list of your problems, or do you place them in the light of Jesus' return?
If Jesus came back today, would he find in you a living faith and a real relationship with him?

Verses Cited

Frequently Asked Questions

What does the parable of the widow and the unjust judge mean?

Jesus himself gives the meaning in verse 1: we must always pray and not give up. For Armel, God is not like this judge. If a judge who loves no one finally gives justice to a widow he does not know, how much more will God the Father listen to the cries of his chosen ones.

Why does God sometimes seem silent in the face of injustice?

Time does not belong to us: a thousand years in his sight are like yesterday (Psalm 90:4). Armel recalls the example of Israel in Egypt: God heard his people's groaning and remembered his covenant. He did not always step in when expected, but he has always stepped in.

What connection does Jesus make between prayer and faith in Luke 18?

Verse 1 speaks of prayer, verse 8 of faith: "When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on the earth?" For Armel, this is not about an amount of faith but about a faith that saves and connects us to the Savior. It is this faith that makes us keep praying, with the return of Jesus in view.