“Dear Lord Jesus, You who intercede on high for us, move upon our hearts as well to intercede with faith, hope and love for peoples and nations! May captives in the kingdom of darkness escape and enter Your kingdom of light.”
Jesus told two parables about prayer in Luke 18:1-14.
“That men always ought to pray and not lose heart.” [1]
In the first parable, Jesus magnifies the example of a widow who is pleading for a response from an unresponsive judge. She needs deliverance from an adversary. He is her only hope of rescue. The judge finally grants her petitions out of weariness from hearing her relentless pleading…
“Because this widow troubles me I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.” [2]
“Then the Lord said, ‘Hear what the unjust judge said. And shall God not avenge His own elect who cry out day and night to Him, though He bears long with them? I tell you that He will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will He really find faith on the earth?’” [3]
Jesus, our Heavenly Intercessor, is telling us to keep crying out day and night. Fervent intercessors receive rapid responses.
In the second parable...
“Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself, ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.’” [4]
He asks God for nothing. How foolish! He is praying to the most powerful being in all the world and brings no petition. He prays “thus with himself.” Does he think himself God? If so, his religion is humanistic. He has a superiority complex. He sees himself above others. He does not pray for himself or others. To Him, all is settled. He is calm, cool, and collected! He has a false sense that he is right before God and that he needs nothing. He does not realize that his prayer is a foul stench to God Almighty, Maker and Sustainer of the Universe.
“The tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’” [5]
This man rightly realizes his condition before God. He is a sinner. Sin is a foul stench in the nostrils of God. Every person is a sinner and falls short of glory of God. [6] “There is none righteous no not one.” [7] Only the blood sacrifice of the perfect Son of God applied to one’s life can remove the stains of sin. [8] There is no hope for a sinner to make himself right before God except by pleading for the mercy of a Holy God to be applied to his or her life. Without repentance there is no reaping. We need to realize how desperately we need God’s intervention, if we want God to answer our prayers.
“I tell you this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.” [9]
“Dear Lord Jesus, thank You for urging us to pray. Thank You for assuring us that the Father hears humble prayers. Thank You for reminding us to maintain a low perspective of ourselves and a high perspective of You. Now, help us to pray as though our lives and the lives of those around us depend on divine intervention… because they do! In Your Name, we pray. Amen!”
[1] Luke 18:1
[2] Luke 18:5
[3] Luke 18:6-8
[4] Luke 18:10-12
[5] Luke 18:13
[6] Romans 3:22-23
[7] Romans 3:10
[8] Romans 5:6-8
[9] Luke 18:14
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