The Gospel for November 19, 2004 (Elizabeth of Hungary)
Luke 18:1-8
Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my opponent.’ For a while he refused; but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’ ” And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” -- The New Jerusalem Bible. Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1995, c1985
A Study
Today's lectionary features Psalm 102, which is surely an example of those who cry to him day and night; it is the kind of psalm which goes on and on and on, and which, despite its lyrical and poetic beauty, drives me up the wall about three or four minutes in.
The widow was the kind of woman who came back every day to demand justice of this judge, a man who had no regard for justice, God, or the people over whom he judged. But the inconvenience this woman presented to him was enough to make him hear her; she drove him up the wall with her persistence and her repeated cries for judgment, like those of Psalm 102.
The parable conveys Luke's writers' opinion that God acts swiftly and richly in response to our repeated cries, but that we are faith-poor even in the face of God's faith in us shown to Israel by sending Jesus.
A Reflection
I have given up completely on trying to understand, rationally, parables like this that don't add up. The Roman occupation of Judea may indeed have been "justice" for the wicked people against whom Jesus rails all the time, the "brood of vipers."
But was it justice for the poor, whom Jesus lifts before us all the time as deserving of justice and mercy, but do not receive it? Are we to believe that they did not beg God for justice?
There's more to this than what's on the surface.
We have to put the story in God's time, which means into a dimension that we do not comprehend. Jesus fully expects us to take on faith the promises that He makes in God's name, and then to prepare for them by being faith-full in our dimension until He comes again. Only a mustard-seed's worth of faith is required, he says.
What Jesus tells us is not intended to be a scientific or logical argument, with a big Q.E.D. stamp at the end; instead, it is an invitation to faith, hope, and belief, holding out His promise of eternal life to us in the next stage of the Kingdom of God.
====PostScript====
Tonight at EFM seminar, we were discussing some of the various forms of text analysis (criticism). One of our group made a comment about Newton and the Age of Enlightenment. It suddenly came to me that we are working in a Newtonian world, in which we take Jesus' comment about God's quickly answering our prayers in Newton's concept of time and space.
Einstein showed us that Newton was good as far as Newton went, but there are far more accurate, encompassing, and close-to-truth mechanisms for understanding space-time. Jesus was talking about God in God's terms, far past Einstein's grasp. We are still stuck with Newton and his simple apple falling from the tree. No wonder we have trouble understanding!
The Collect
Almighty God, by your grace your servant Elizabeth of Hungary recognized and honored Jesus in the poor of this world: Grant that we, following her example, may with love and gladness serve those in any need or trouble, in the name and for the sake of Jesus Christ, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever.
5:02:49 PM 
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