01.27. Pray on Brother, Pray On!
Pray On Brother, Pray On!
There used to be a custom practiced in many parts of the hills called, "shivering." When someone got married, in the middle of the wedding night, friends of the bride and groom would go the their house and awake them expecting a meal to be served to them. The bride would be rode around in a wheelbarrow and the groom thrown in the creek. The way they escaped the creek and the wheelbarrow was to cook for the gang.
Have you ever felt that your prayers were not being heard? Have you ever felt that the windows of heaven were shut? Have you ever been so deep in despair that you did not know even how your were going to pray? Well to day we will see that Jesus would say to us, pray on brother, pray on.
There are but a few parables that are devoted to teaching about prayer. The parable here, known as the parable of the friends at midnight, and a parable that has been called its twin, concerning the teaching of the two, if found in Luke 18. The other one is about a woman who is persistent toward a judge until he relents and gives her what she wants. We will focus on the parable of the friends at midnight today.
I- The Foundation of the Parable: Luke 11:1-4
This parable that Jesus gives concerning the friends at midnight is prefaced with an event that gives foundation to the parable. The greatest foundation of this parable was in the fact that Jesus was a praying man. Here we are told that, "…it came to pass, that, as he was praying in a certain place, when he ceased, one of his disciples said unto him, Lord, teach us to pray, as John also taught his disciples." Luke 11:1 The disciples had seen Jesus at pray and were taught by His example the importance of prayer. They also were aware that John the Baptist had taught his disciple to pray. They realizing that Jesus had power in His prayers that they did not have, ask Him to teach them to pray.
The first thing we must realize is that Jesus taught us to pray by example and that He made it a priority as well we should also.
Jesus had spent the night praying before He called the disciples. Luke 6:12-13 "And it came to pass in those days, that he went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God. 13 And when it was day, he called unto him his disciples: and of them he chose twelve, whom also he named apostles…" He will spend other night entirely in prayer to the Father. The human strength of Jesus was derived from time in prayer with the Father.
In response to the request to teach them to pray Jesus gives us what has been long called the Lord’s Prayer of the Model Prayer. We will leave the dissecting of this for a later time.
II- The Parable: Luke 11:5-8
In this parable there are three characters. The friend who comes to visit, the friend he comes to visit and the friend next door.
A- The friend who comes to visit: The friend who comes to visit had taken his journey and arrived at his friend’s house well after dark around midnight. We can speculate that he was traveling late to avoid the midday heat but we are not told. The custom of the day was to entertain people who were in need such as this. We hear a lot about southern hospitality being so marvelous. When was the last time you lodged a friend passing through?
We might not have such customs in our land today but some still do. When I was in Brazil I had been told that many of the homes we went into would offer us the opportunity to take a shower. We were there in the winter and the temperature was in the 80’s. However in the summer it reaches into the 100 plus range. It is perfectly acceptable to take a shower in a stranger’s home. As a matter of fact our interpreter, Nellie, would do this almost every day in a home she had never been in before.
B- The friend he comes to visit: Please do not think that this second man was not prepared. It is after all midnight and the bread that he had provided for his family that day had been eaten. Tomorrow morning another days supply would be provided. He had been prepared for the normal needs of his family.
However there was a great social structure that would cause embarrassment to the host if he did not provide for the guest who arrived late. What we have is one big crisis brewing and the friend probably knowing he did not have prepared to feed the friend searches his mind as to what to do. Then he remembers his friend who was close by perhaps next door and he excuses himself and goes to his door.
C- The friend next door: I call this man the friend next door on the basis that the man knew him well enough to wake him at midnight with a need.
I recall when my next door neighbor awoke me Matthew 3:00 one morning when her nut brother was trying to leave her house to go home in a snowstorm. Sheila, our next door neighbor said, "go knock on the door he is awake." I went but with less joy than the man did even here. The friend next door is awakened. This is not a most opportune time for a request. He tells him, "Trouble me not: the door is now shut, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot rise and give thee." Luke 11:7 . He would not get up and answer the door. However the friend was persistent in his demand for the bread. Finally the friend has to rise and give him the bread to just shut him up before he awakes not only his house but the neighborhood.
"Though he will not rise and give him, because he is his friend, yet because of his importunity he will rise and give him as many as he needeth." The word importunity is only used here and no place else in the Bible. The NIV translates it, "because of the mans boldness" but in the Greek is means shamelessness.
III- The Implications: Luke 11:9-13
Jesus gives us the implications of the parable seamlessly in the narrative. He says that it concerning persistence in praying. There is a three fold promise in these verses. "… Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened." Luke 11:9-10 How many prayers has God answered that we failed to return to Him with thanksgiving. Prayers take many forms. We have prayers of confession for our wrong, intercession on behalf of others, cries of despair when we have no where else to turn. All prayers are really cries out of our human frailty to God almighty. Jesus teaches us to pray on brother, pray on. We need to realize that a delayed answer may be for our good not for our detriment. After all this is the same lie that Satan told Eve when he convinced her that God was holding out on her.
IV- Conclusions and Applications:
First, note the contrast between God who never slumbers nor sleeps and the friend who was asleep and didn’t want to rise. I feel the one knocking at the door of the friend is a greater picture of God wanting to give to us than the one who is locked in asleep. After all the word of God says, "Behold, he that keepeth Israel shall neither slumber nor sleep." Psalms 121:4 The friend gave grudgingly to get rid of the man at his door. In contrast God wants His children to have what they need. God is not holding out on us but is supplying our needs according to his riches in glory. Jesus uses the concern of our natural fathers to illustrate this truth. "If a son shall ask bread of any of you that is a father, will he give him a stone? or if he ask a fish, will he for a fish give him a serpent? 12 Or if he shall ask an egg, will he offer him a scorpion? 13 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children: how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?"
We might ask why God is interested in our persisting in prayer. Might I suggest a few reasons in conclusion? First, when we persist, it shows our sincerity. How many times have we prayed about something that we were not really concerned about enough to pray again?
Second it helps us to see our dependence on God. After all when it come down to it, He is all we have.
Finally it helps us exercise our faith. When we pray on brother we are working our spiritual muscles.