APPROACHING GOD, APPROACHING LIFE
Luke 18
“Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to him day and night? Will he keep putting them off? I tell you, he will see that they get justice, and quickly.”
It is possible to be a little pedantic when reading this verse to argue that if God sees that we get justice quickly we wouldn’t need to be persistent. That, however, would be missing the forest for the trees. Jesus was making the point that God is a far greater just God than any judge, much less an unjust judge and if persistence may make a difference even to an unjust judge, how much more persistence moves God himself.
In these verses in chapter 18, Jesus took the trouble to teach the people around him about God and how they should approach God.
Firstly, we should be persistent. Persistence reveals two things: Firstly hope which is founded on faith. We believe God cares, God is just and God is true to his promises. This is faith. We trust that he is who he says he is and therefore we continue to hope, which causes us to persist. Secondly, it expresses what we feel about the matter. We persist because it is important to us. Christian mothers have been known to pray for their children to come to Christ for years. Persistence teaches us to care, to commit and to persevere about matters that are truly important to us.
All of us have been, or are, in situations that we cannot control the outcome. In fact, the outcome seems bleak. Yet Jesus teaches us to act in hope rather than resign in despair and this is because in our worldview, God reigns supreme.
Furthermore, Jesus himself tells us in John 16, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” Even in death the Christian does not despair because we will then be with him.
Secondly, we should not allow ourselves to be arrogant and, consequently, look down on others. The bible clearly tells us that God abhors arrogance and pride. Even worse is when we look down and despise others whom we judge to be not at our level.
This can be a difficult matter for us to control especially when these others are clearly poor characters and perhaps morally dubious. We are taught to love righteousness and goodness and abhor evil and we forget that in God’s sight our righteousness are like filthy rags. None of us are morally and spiritually superior to others. Our standing before God is only by his grace and mercy.
Thirdly, we should never allow programmes and processes, not even rituals and protocols, to be more important than people. God is not in love with our pomp and grandeur and our attempts to make important people important and, in this case, children to be insignificant, do not sit well with him.
Finally, as an additional observation tagged on to this episode involving children, Jesus said “Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”
People have shared their own ideas about what it means to be a child: humble, trusting, and innocent. To these, I wish to add my own observation: a child is curious and interested in the world around him. His slate is clean and he does not impose his own ideas and prejudices to what he is learning.
I think that when we receive the kingdom of God as a child we do so without self-interest; rather, we see God for who he is and respond to him without prejudice. We never knew him and now Jesus has revealed him to us. We do not try to be clever and fit God into our mould and shape him so as to be consonant with our life and world.
“Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these. Truly I tell you, anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.”