Genesis 32:22-31
2 Timothy 3:14-4:5
Luke 18:1-8
Some years ago I saw a cartoon, probably in a magazine, which has stuck in my mind. Picture it in your minds. The scene was a doctor’s consulting room, and either side of the consulting desk were two figures. On one side a large studious middle-aged professional-looking man in a suit and glasses, and on the other a petite young woman, fashionably dressed and nicely made-up. And the caption read:
Patient: Doctor, I’m worried about my weight.
Doctor: Don’t worry, it’s quite normal to put on a few pounds for men of your age.
I laughed because it had caught me out. I’d already subconsciously assigned the roles: the man in the suit and glasses must be the doctor, the young woman must be the patient over-anxious about her weight. I’d imposed my somewhat sexist and ageist assumptions on the story, and consequently misread it.
We need to bear that in mind when we read parables, because parables like that cartoon have an in-built tendency to catch us out. The assumptions we bring to our reading of them can trip us up, and expose where we need to think again. Someone once said it’s not so much that we read parables but that parables read us.
So, bearing that in mind, how are we to read today’s parable of the widow and the unjust judge?
This is, we are told, a parable about the need to pray and not lose heart. So we might imagine that the widow who persists in going to the judge to seek justice is a model for us praying to God. But the problem with that is that the judge in the story is unjust. He is a distant figure who doesn't care about the widow, and only gives in to her in the end because he finds her bothersome, and fears that in the end she will wear him out. Or an alternative translation of the Greek is that he fears she will give him a black eye - images of handbags at dawn!
I wonder if that isn’t how we often think of God. A distant figure, remote, uncaring, who needs to be persuaded to like us, cajoled into granting us favours. But, lest we think that, Jesus contrasts the behaviour of the unjust judge with that of God, who, he says, will grant justice to his chosen ones, and quickly. So, then, how are we to read these two figures of the unjust judge and the widow? To understand it we need to understand its context - where it comes in Luke’s story of Jesus. Who is Jesus speaking to, and why? What does this follow on from?
Well if we look in chapter 17 of Luke we see that, just before Jesus tells this parable, he has been telling the pharisees and the disciples about the coming of the Kingdom of God and the rejection of the Son of Man. The Son of Man, Jesus says, will be revealed like a flash of lightning when the Kingdom of God is made manifest. But first he must endure much suffering and be rejected by this generation, that is, by the pharisees and religious authorities. And he talks about his final vindication, like the lightning flash that lights up the sky from one side to the other.
It is after saying these things that he tells this parable of the widow and the unjust judge. So perhaps this gives us a different perspective on this story.
Widows at the time of Jesus were vulnerable figures, with no father or husband to protect them or earn a living they were dependent on other people and could not defend themselves against injustice.
And Jesus himself is on his way to Jerusalem where he will be placed in a similar position of vulnerability. He will be a prisoner, unable to defend himself, sentenced to death by unjust judges.
But Jesus says that God, unlike the unjust judge, will give justice to his chosen ones - who are they? Well, “Chosen one” is a title, and it belong to Jesus. At the Transfiguration, at the start of the journey to Jerusalem, Jesus was revealed in glory, like a flash of lightning, and a voice from the cloud said “this is my Son, my Chosen, listen to him!”
So Jesus is the vulnerable figure, rejected by unjust judges, but he is also the Chosen one who will be vindicated by God. The Resurrection was like a flash of lightning illuminating the consciousness of the disciples, showing them where God’s justice really was happening, in Jesus. Showing them that he truly was God’s Chosen one, the Messiah and Lord.
So this message has particular significance for the disciples at this moment. Jesus is on his way to Jerusalem to be betrayed and rejected, and it will seem as though everything has gone wrong. But they must still pray continually and not give up. At the heart of their prayer they need to hold the faith that God is working his justice in Jesus, even when it seems as though everything has been hopelessly lost. And they must not be like the unjust judge who did not care, or like “this generation” which rejected Jesus because he did not fit their demands of what the Messiah should be like.
And this is true for us also. The heart of our prayer, as Jesus teaches us, is, “Thy will be done”. And that may not correspond with our list of things that we want God to do for us, even if we think they are good. But the will of God is always for our highest good. In the will of God alone is our peace and our justice. Our wrestling with God in prayer can be our struggle to find ourselves in the place of God's will for us.
And at the heart of our prayer, praying “Thy will be done”, is Jesus. For he himself prays that prayer continually to the Father. And when we pray, we are joining with him in his eternal prayer. So our prayer needs to be a continual attention to Christ the Lord, for he is present in our hearts by faith, and through him God is doing his will and working his justice.
What is God’s justice? It is God putting everything to rights, everything as it should be: bringing judgement, vindicating the victims, forgiving sins, bringing about peace and reconciliation between humanity and God and between human beings. And we see this in three ways.
Firstly, it is Jesus himself: he is the Law in person. Moses brought the ten commandments on stone tablets down from the Holy Mountain, but Jesus comes down from heaven and is himself the Law, God’s will and justice perfectly lived out in a human life.
Secondly, God’s justice is his judgement revealed in Jesus. Those who act unjustly, who reject Jesus in himself or in any of his brothers and sisters, the victims of the world, are revealed for what they truly are when the one they rejected is vindicated by God. The lightning flash of the Resurrection reveals our sin, but brings it into God’s light so that we can repent and be healed.
Thirdly, God’s justice is our justification: the free pardon of our sins, and the gift of God’s eternal life, which is given in Jesus.
To pray continually is to be continually attentive to Christ, keeping our hearts turned towards him whatever the circumstances of life. It is to discover the true secret of our life, Christ present in our hearts through faith, and to say with St Paul in Galatians, “it is no longer I who live, but it is Christ who lives in me”. It is to align our will with the will of God who works his justice through Christ in us, and through us in the world.
This is not a bad preparation for our Month of Prayer which begins next week. This will give us an opportunity to attend to Christ, to focus once more on his life in us, to listen deeply to what he may want to say to us. It will be an opportunity once more to hear and follow his call, both as individual disciples and as the Church in this place. But it is also a reminder that we are called to pray, not just for a month, but always, centred on Christ, attentive to his presence in our lives that we might be transformed by his justice.
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