Sermon for October 16, 2022 – 19th Sunday after Pentecost
Jeremiah 31:27-34; Psalm 119:97-104; 2 Timothy 3:14-4:5; Luke 18:1-8
Our journey to Jerusalem in the gospel of Luke is almost at an end. Jesus has only a little more time with his friends and followers. All along this journey south from the safety and comfort of Nazareth and Capernaum Jesus has repeatedly tried to reorient the disciples’ understanding of God. He has attempted to break them free from the hollow traditions and spiritual practices that have created divisions instead of creating community. He has tried to demonstrate to his followers that God’s economy, the way God works in and around us, does not mirror our human economy. Jesus has tried to wipe away everything they know about the world, to break down their faith to the very foundation, so that they might see the world completely anew through the eyes of God. This is not an easy process by any means, which is why the disciples ask so many questions, misunderstand Jesus, and continuously stumble or come up short along the way. Our gospel story today continues Jesus’ teachings with another parable.
Jesus begins by telling his disciples that the parable he is about to tell is about praying “always” and not losing heart. The parable itself, however, focuses on a widow dealing with a judge in a corrupt justice system. Luke twice tells us that the judge in this tale is someone who neither fears God nor respects people, and Jesus himself characterizes the judge as “unjust.” So, if the great commandments are to love God above all else and to love neighbor as self... the judge does neither. And apparently, he doesn’t care. His attitude is of cynical disregard. He doesn’t “fear” God or “respect” his neighbor. He just doesn’t care.
Regardless, the widow repeatedly comes to the judge in pursuit of justice. She tells him to “grant me justice against my opponent,” or literally, “against the one who has treated me unjustly.” Despite her plea, though, the judge does nothing. He refuses to act because he is not willing, and so he does not respond to her cries for action…at first.
For those of us familiar with the laws of Moses in Jewish Scripture, the judge’s lack of action is especially appalling. In Deuteronomy and Leviticus, widows are counted among the most destitute of society, alongside other vulnerable groups such as the poor, orphans, and resident aliens. Because of the precarious social and economic position of such groups, biblical texts also make provision for them, helping to ensure that they do not fall victim to exploitation.
Yet, while the widow’s social location certainly numbers her among Luke’s concern for the “lowly”, the widow in this parable resists the exploitation to which she is being subjected. Like other widows before her, the widow in Luke 18 takes matters into her own hands.
And it is here that we need to take a pause, because something has been lost in translation, so to speak. The widow’s persistence and call for justice is such that the judge characterizes her actions as those of a boxer. It is difficult to discern this boxing image in the NRSV, which translates the judge’s words as follows: “because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.” In the original Greek, though, the judge says: “because this widow causes trouble for me, I will give her justice, so that she may not, in the end, give me a black eye by her coming.” By using a specific verb, which literally means “to give a black eye,” Luke situates the judge’s language within the arena of boxing metaphors. However, when English translations do not capture the meaning of this verb, they soften the tenacity of the widow’s actions, as well as her perceived status as a “trouble-maker” to the system.
Such translations also obscure the humor that Luke infuses into this scene. We are probably meant to laugh at this topsy-turvy picture of a lowly widow pummeling a headstrong arbiter of justice. But the humor in this scene is not one of comic relief. The humor in this scene instead pokes fun at the powers-that-be, lampooning and upending the unjust system stacked against widows, orphans, immigrants, and the like. Like our political cartoons today, Jesus’ parable encourages us to laugh at those who wield their power unethically. We laugh, though, in order to challenge such figures, and ultimately, to offer a different way.
After delivering this short parable, Jesus offers a few concluding comments that touch on the character of God and the nature of faith. He uses the judge’s words as a jumping off point to speak about God’s own deliverance of justice, which God dispenses to those “Who cry out to him day and night.” But while Jesus compares God to the judge with this transition, the real point of comparison is one of contrast. God is in fact not like this reluctantly responsive judge. God does not need to be badgered into listening, and when God does respond, God does so willingly. If anything, God is more like the widow in her own relentless commitment to justice and desire to be in relationship with us. God doesn’t act according to human terms, but rather creates an economy that continually challenges us and mystifies us at the same time. We should be careful when we try to confine God within a box of humanity.
The widow, though, also exemplifies how followers are to be oriented toward God. Jesus returns to this emphasis on the behavior of believers with a concluding rhetorical question that recalls his opening statement about prayer and not losing heart. Here Jesus says: “I tell you, [God] will quickly grant justice to [those crying out]. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”
By ending on a question of whether he will find faith at his return, Jesus raises a number of additional questions for us. How do followers not lose heart and maintain the faith in light of the fact that Jesus is not returning as soon as many would like? How are we to act if God’s justice is not delivered according to our own timetable? How do we go on in the face of injustice if God’s ultimate justice only arrives quickly or suddenly at Jesus’ return?
In response to such questions, Luke maintains that we are to act like the widow. We are not to wait quietly for Jesus’ return and accept our fates in an oppression-ridden world. We are instead to resist injustice with the resolve and constancy of the widow. As Jesus explains elsewhere, prayer is not a passive activity but one that actively seeks God and pursues God’s will. Like the widow, we are to persevere in the faith, crying out to God day and night. This is what persistent prayer looks like.
In order to walk the Way of Love, we must remember that we cannot do this alone. We gather here together precisely because we recognize that cannot do this alone; and together, with our persistence in prayer and our persistence in seeking justice, we will continue to fuel the fires of hope that burn in our hearts as we long to see God’s kingdom on earth as it is in heaven.
