Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction: One of the greatest privileges, yet also one of the most neglected and misunderstood gifts we have, is the gift of prayer.

Certainly prayer means a lot of different things to a lot of different people.

For some it is an empty ritual they repeat in a religious ceremony.

For others it is a time to remind God how awesome they think they are and how bad everyone else is.

For others prayer is simply a laundry list of items they want God to do and things they want God to fix.

For others prayer is their lifeline.

It is a time to talk to their Heavenly Father, to spend time at His feet praising Him and thanking Him for His goodness, mercy and grace.

It is an opportunity to ask, seek and knock.

For most of us prayer is a combination of several things.

Jesus taught us a lot about prayer in His Word and He teaches us a lot in this 18th chapter of Luke. . .

Scripture Introduction: In today’s message we will examine two parables about prayer.

Through these parables we will be reminded of this important and vital truth: “We should pray with confidence that God will respond, but our confidence should be in God’s mercy, not in our own goodness.”

As we look at the first parable together notice . . .

The Persistent Prayer of a Child Looking for Justice

Explanation:

This chapter begins telling us WHY Jesus told the parable of the persistent widow.

His intention was to teach those in the crowd that they should “ALWAYS pray and not to LOSE HEART.”

The term “lose heart” can also be translated “become discouraged.”

Do you ever get discouraged?

I do!

Jesus told this parable about prayer to remind us of some things that will help us not to “lose heart.”

The phrase “lost heart” is similar to phrase Paul used in 2 Thessalonians 3:13 & Galatians 6:9 --”Do not grow weary.”

So the goal of the parable that Jesus told is so that His followers will not lose heart, or not grow weary, but ALWAYS pray!

He then proceeds to tell the parable about an unrighteous judge who did not fear God or respect people.

This unrighteous judge had a problem.

A persistent woman constantly asked him to do something about an adversary.

We assume that she had been mistreated or taken advantage of and she wanted justice!

He refused to do anything about it, but because of this woman’s PERSISTENCE he finally decided to give in.

He said, “She’s going to beat me down (literally give me a black eye)” by her continual coming to me over and over and over again.

She finally WORE him down and he decided to give her justice.

Then, beginning in verse 6, Jesus contrasts the story of the PERSISTENT widow and the UNRIGHTEOUS judge, with the persistent children of God who bring their requests to the RIGHTEOUS Judge of the universe!

It’s a VERY different story!

While the unrighteous judge wanted the widow to leave him alone, the RIGHTEOUS JUDGE invites His children to come to Him!

While the unrighteous judge didn’t really care about the widow, the RIGHTEOUS JUDGE lovingly cares for His children!

Application

There is a lot we can learn from this parable:

The PERSISTENT WIDOW was a woman of FAITH.

The Faithlife Study Bible says:

The widow’s persistence reflected faith that her request would be granted someday.

Jesus calls on His followers to demonstrate this same kind of faith as they wait for His return.

Secondly, our Heavenly Father is a RIGHTEOUS JUDGE who is FAR DIFFERENT than the UNRIGHTEOUS JUDGE the widow appealed to.

The Bible Guide says:

Jesus says that God isn’t like that judge.

He isn’t reluctant, lazy or indifferent to our requests.

He loves to hear from his people, and to answer their prayers.

Herein is the problem from our perspective…God does not always answer our prayers with a “YES.”

Sometimes He answers with a “NO” and sometimes His answer is “WAIT.”

While His answer will come “speedily” in the big scheme of things, His answer may not always be on our TIMETABLE.

We must be like this PERSISTENT WIDOW who had faith that an “UNRIGHTEOUS JUDGE would do the right thing,” our faith ought to be encouraged to know that a “RIGHTEOUS JUDGE will surely do the right thing!” Keep asking and keep trusting, no matter how long it may take and no matter what the answer may be!

Let Romans 8:28 and the following verses be the “soundtrack of your life!”

We learn something else about prayer from this chapter as well.

We see the prayer of two very different men.

In Luke 18:9-12 we see...

The Empty Prayer of a Full Man Looking for Nothing

Explanation: Before Luke shares the parable he once again provides a bit of commentary regarding who this parable was directed to.

It was directed to those “who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt.”

In other words this parable was directed to those who did not feel as if they needed God’s grace and mercy because they were “good in their own eyes.”

Not only did they have a high view of themselves, but they had a low view of others that did not measure up to their standard.

The Bible says they treated them with contempt.

They despised and rejected those whom they did not consider as righteous as they were.

Jesus proceeds to tell a parable about two men who went to the temple to pray.

We are simply told that one of the men was a Pharisee and the other man was a tax collector.

A Pharisee was considered to be a very strict, religious person who was all about “rule-keeping.”

A tax collector, in this day and time, was a man who was absolutely despised by the Jewish people and the Pharisees in particular.

Tax Collectors worked for the Roman Government and were considered to be the enemy of the Jews.

Not only that, tax collectors of this day and time were known to extort those they were collecting taxes from to line their own pockets.

I refer to the Pharisee’s prayer as “The Empty Prayer of a Full Man Looking for Nothing.”

He begins his prayer by “thanking God” that he isn’t like other men.

“God I’m so happy I’m not guilty of extortion!

God look at me, I’m not unjust like other people are! God I’m not an adulterer!

God I should get some extra brownie points because I am NOTHING like this tax collector over here!

I mean God look at all the good things I do . . .

I FAST TWICE A WEEK! God aren’t you impressed with my resume?

God not only do I fast twice a week, but I give TITHES of all that I possess!”

This prayer was as spiritually empty as he was!

He was full, but he was full of himself!

He wasn’t full of God’s righteousness!

He wasn’t full of humility.

He wasn’t full of God’s love, or mercy or grace!

He was full of his own accomplishments and pride and never asked God for one thing.

He simply came to God advertising his qualities and attributes, thinking to himself that somehow God would be impressed.

Illustration: I like what William Barclay says in his commentary on this passage:

True prayer comes from setting our lives beside the life of God.

No doubt all that the Pharisee said was true.

He did fast; he did meticulously give tithes; he was not like other people; still less was he like that tax-collector.

But the question is not, ‘Am I as good as my neighbour?’

The question is, ‘Am I as good as God?’ Once I made a journey by train to England.

As we passed through the Yorkshire moors I saw a little whitewashed cottage and it seemed to me to shine with an almost radiant whiteness.

Some days later I made the journey back to Scotland.

The snow had fallen and was lying deep all around.

We came again to the little white cottage, but this time its whiteness seemed drab and soiled and almost grey in comparison with the pure whiteness of the driven snow.

It all depends what we compare ourselves with.

And when we set our lives beside the life of Jesus and beside the holiness of God, all that is left to say is, ‘God be merciful to me—the sinner.’

2 Corinthians 10:12 very specifically warns us against the very thing this Pharisee did:

Application: We dare not approach God with the mindset that we are better than ANYONE else on the faith of His earth!

There are some who would say that you should never say anything negative about yourself but I think the Apostle Paul would disagree!

He said in Romans 7:24-25:

He also said he was the “foremost of sinners”...

Dear friend when we come to God in prayer we should lay our lives beside the lovely Lord Jesus and realize how far short we fall from His glory and praise God for the mercy and grace that not only allows us to live in this world that God has created, but has secured for us a place in God’s Kingdom by providing Jesus as the sacrifice that would forgive us and cleanse us from all of our own unrighteousness.

If you come to God full of yourself, full of your goodness, full of your accomplishments you will leave EMPTY!