Persisting In Prayers
God isn't reluctant to answer our constant prayers even though He may delay them
Crying out day and night. In the parable of Luke 18, the widow sought the judge constantly for relief, and he was worn out from her regular visits. She was in need of help from an oppression.
One lesson here seems particularly pointed to the praying for our spiritual needs, not temporal needs. This is, as Matthew Henry points out, “to teach us constancy and perseverance in our requests for some spiritual mercies that we are in pursuit of, relating either to ourselves or to the church of God.”
Jesus teaches us about the widow and the judge that we might learn to pray for relief from an adversary, which isn’t really about getting that certain job or loan, or praying for healing or for a difficulty with a wayward child. Those prayers are well and good, but here, as Henry writes, “When we are praying for strength against our spiritual enemies (our lusts and corruptions, which are our worst enemies) we must continue instant in prayer, must pray and not faint, for we shall not seek God's face in vain.”
That puts our prayers in a seemingly altogether different plane, from one of preference and wants, to one of spiritual wholeness and holiness. And not just for ourselves, but all of God’s people, and Henry writes, “So we must likewise in our prayers for the deliverance of the people of God out of the hands of their persecutors and oppressors.”
And to do so day and night is to do so with earnestness and steadfastness, “for our importunity is pleasing to God; the prayer of the upright is his delight, and therefore, we may hope, shall avail much, if it be an effectual fervent prayer.”
The adversary is likewise in the world around us. Bible teacher Andrew MacLaren writes: “'In the world ye shall have tribulation,' and the truer His servants are to Him, and the more their hearts are with Christ in God, the more they will feel out of touch with the world, and the more it will instinctively be their 'adversary.'"
Therefore, we pray night and day from the Word of God, which is His revealed will for His people. The promises and prayers found throughout the Scriptures are our prayer book and guide. The widow probably asked the same thing at each encounter with the judge. We pray from the whole of Scripture, and do so regularly, consistently, and steadfastly.
These prayers cannot be worn out, or be overused, and will not fail. For a short list of these prayers see here, here, and here. Our Lord has been answering them from the beginning and will continue to answer them. How? Speedily! Why? Because He promises to, says Jesus, I tell you that He will avenge them speedily. - Luke 18:8 NKJV
Therefore, we pray them and keep on praying them, until He answers or until He comes again.
Our persistence is not to overcome God’s reluctance in helping us, as did the widow, against our adversary. God loves it when we pray for help, but we mistakenly think we have to keep asking the same things as she did. But this, teaches David Guzik, “misses the point of the parable entirely. Jesus did not say that men always ought to pray and not lose heart because God is reluctant, but because He isn’t, and that is our encouragement to prayer.”
When we pray with consistency, Guzik says this “brings a transforming element into our lives, building into us the character of God Himself.” This is how we develop a heart that cares about what God cares about, they way He cares about them.
Too many prayers are like boy’s runaway knocks, given, and then the giver is away before the door can be opened. — Spurgeon
But how to persevere in long delay?
We read from Andrew Murray: “To enable us, when the answer to our prayer does not come at once, to combine quiet patience and joyful confidence in our persevering prayer, we must specially try to understand the two words in which our Lord sets forth the character and conduct, not of the unjust judge, but of our God and Father towards those whom He allows to cry day and night to Him: He is long-suffering over them; He will avenge them speedily.'"
For His answer is all prepared, and our Lord is ready, willing, and able to give us what we ask, and He won’t withhold or delay a moment longer than is necessary.
But if this is true, why does it often take so long with the answer to prayer? And why must God's children so many time, during difficult, suffering and conflict, cry day and night? Answer, says Murray, “He is ‘long-suffering over them.'"
As a gardener waits between planting and gathering, to let sun and rain bring the growth, so too, do we Believers wait during the gradual time of spiritual growth, walking the path of development. Says Murray, “And it is the Father, in whose hands are the times and seasons, who alone knows the moment when the soul or the Church is ripened to that fullness of faith in which it can really take and keep the blessing.”
The insight into this truth leads the believer to cultivate the corresponding dispositions: patience and faith, waiting and having, are the secret of his perseverance. —Murray
And so we pray and wait, and wait and pray. For praying does help, and praying steadfastly brings help. And do so with unshakable faith, that in due season we shall reap the harvest.
LORD, Teach Us To Pray
Prayer from Andrew Murray, With Christ in the School of Prayer, 26th Lesson, The Power of Persevering Prayer
Until Thursday, grace and peace…