Proper 12 C
A Parable on Prayer
St. Luke 11:1-13
24 July 2016 – Redeemer
Today’s sermon is a little different than my usual sermon and “No” it isn’t shorter. It is more of a teaching sermon. I’m going to give you quite a bit of detail about the parable in the Gospel reading from Luke 11. It might be helpful for you to have that reading in front you for parts of the sermon.
Jesus begins the parable “Which of you who has a friend will go to him at midnight and say to him, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves…” Now as we hear this we imagine walking over to our neighbor’s house in Saint Cloud, where one family lives in one dwelling on one lot. But in Jesus’ day usually three or four related families or generations lived in the same dwelling, plus you shared walls and perhaps even common entrances with your neighbors. It might be better to imagine everyone in your neighbor living in a single building of town homes with thin walls and at least a dozen people living in each unit. That’s the situation in which this story occurs.
So now consider the parable. A friend of yours arrives at midnight and you don’t have any food (because there is no Coborns or Walmart open 24 hours). So you knock on your neighbor’s door or more likely you just yell into his house. In so doing you wake up all your neighbors – they are all listening in to your conversation, because they all live right there. “Heh, neighbor, I know it’s late, but a friend of mine just arrived. I didn’t have time to bake, buy, or borrow any bread, so now I need some. Could you give me a little of yours for my guest?” That’s the first part of the parable.
As the parable continues remember this parable is really a long question, that goes something like this “Which of you who has a friend and asks him for help in the middle of the night would be refused by him because you woke him up? Whenever Jesus asks a question like that one He is expecting a strong negative answer. For instance in Matthew 6 Jesus asks, “And which of you by being anxious can add a single hour to his span of life?” The answer Jesus expects is “No one.” I could worry every day in every way for the rest of my life and that won’t add a single minute to my life.
So this is what Jesus asks in the second part of the parable. Your next door neighbor, whom you’ve awakened from a deep sleep, who has children so you know how much he values sleep — this neighbor you just woke up. You also woke up every one in the neighborhood. They’re all listening in to your conversation. They’ve heard you admit that you weren’t prepared. They’ve heard you petition your neighbor to help you care for a friend. Now they are waiting for his response. Would your neighbor, who knows everyone is listening in, whose reputation is on the line, would he say, “No! I’m not giving you any bread. I’m in bed. The kids are in bed. The door’s locked. You should’ve gone to the store.” Is that what your neighbor would say?
“No, my neighbor would never say that.” That is what Jesus expects for an answer, “No way, would my neighbor not help me.” In the culture of Jesus’ day, with everyone listening in, where hospitality is of chief importance, your neighbor wouldn’t make excuses. Even if his kids were in bed, the door locked, and he thinks that you should have planned better he would absolutely get up and give you some bread.
That’s how Jesus Himself interprets the parable. Even though your neighbor isn’t happy with you he will get up to help. Here is where this parable gets challenging. There is a word in Jesus’ explanation which only occurs here in the entire New Testament. As I read the verse, it’s not hard to find the weird word. Jesus says, “Though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his impudence he will rise and give him whatever he needs.” You probably guessed the confusing word, the ESV translates it impudence. It’s a word that means bold, daring, cheeky, and normally most interpreters take it to mean that because you were so bold and daring as to wake up your neighbor that is why your neighbor gave in. In that interpretation the impudence is yours – the asker.
But is that how prayer works? Does our Father answer us because we are bold and daring? No, that is not what Scripture says. It is not what Jesus says later in this chapter. He says we can be confident in our prayers because our Father in heaven is perfect in His love toward us – that our prayers have nothing to do with us and everything to do with our Father being our Father. So let me suggest an alternate interpretation that I got from a few old and dead theologians – R.C.H. Lenski, a Lutheran and Ken Bailey, who although he wasn’t a Lutheran, got his Ph.D. from our Concordia Seminary in Saint Louis. They suggest that the word is closer to the word “shame” and Ken Bailey suggests that the word refers to your neighbor whom you awakened. Your neighbor gives in because he doesn’t want to be shamed. He has his reputation to uphold. As I said before hospitality is everything in the Middle East. Because everyone is listening in, your neighbor is going to get up and help you because he doesn’t want to be shamed. He helps you not because of you, because of his good name.
Now let’s see how that fits into prayer. Why does your Father in heaven answer your prayers? Is it not because of Who He is and His own reputation? From the very beginning God has proclaimed that He is a merciful and loving Father to His people. He has demonstrated that most clearly in the gift of His Son for us sinners. Did we deserve the gift of His forgiveness this morning? Was our confession worded in just the right way to obtain an answer? Did we receive forgiveness because we boldly pestered the old man until He finally gave in? No, the very reason we are forgiven is because of Who God is, because He has a Name and a Reputation to uphold. He is a God of His Word. Before the foundation of the world He planned the salvation of us sinners and promised from Genesis onward that He would deliver us from our sin by the gift of His own Son, given over to death for our offenses.
So when you pray, Jesus says, “Say Father” and therein is your confidence in prayer. This is His Name, Father, and that’s who He is, your Father. All that He says and all that He does, He does for you out of Fatherly and Divine goodness and mercy without any merit or worthiness in you. He is your Father in Christ. His being your Father doesn’t have anything to do with you – if it did He wouldn’t be your Father, because by our sin you and I have been worthless sons and daughters who have basically told dear old dad to drop dead so we can run the house. That God is your Father is all His doing – He gave His Son to die for your sins. He gave you His Word. He sends you His preachers. His Spirit uses Baptism and the Word to bring you to faith and keep you in the faith. If you have or had a good father you saw a dim reflection of the Father in heaven in your dad. I sure did in mine – I cracked snowmobile hoods, broke fishing poles, tore the bumper cover of his new truck, and my dad welcomed me home, heard my pleas and answered them with love. Certainly not because I was a good son, but because, h,e though sinful, was my father and by his grace to me showed me a dim picture of our Father in heaven.
This is what Jesus teaches us in this parable. “Fathers … If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” (Luke 11:13, ESV) So pray with confidence, wake God up in the middle of the night, ask, seek, and knock, because He will deliver life, reveal the secrets of His Kingdom, and open the door of His house to you, because He is your Father, in the name of Jesus. Amen.
Pr. Bruce Timm
23 July 2016 anno Domini