The Sinner’s Prayer

Preached by Michael Cheuk
October 28, 2007, Twenty-second Sunday in Pentecost
Luke 18:9-14

This parable by Jesus comes right after the Parable of the Persistent Widow and the Unjust Judge that I preached on last Sunday. It’s often called the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. Now, I’m just curious, how many of you are familiar with this parable? For those of us who’ve been in church for a while, we’ve been taught that the Pharisee was bad and the tax collector good in this parable. All of that is true, but we lose the scandalous impact of this parable if we just jumped to this conclusion without going through what Jesus’ original hearers might have felt while listening to the parable.

In Jesus’ day, the Pharisees were highly respected lay people who took their faith very seriously. They believed that their religion extended beyond Temple worship, and they applied Jewish law to their everyday activities in order to show that all of life belonged to God. They practiced a “priesthood of all believers” form of Judaism whereby religious rituals were not monopolized by an inherited priesthood, but open to all adult Jews. They were “moderates” and not “literalists” in their interpretation of Scripture, and they were committed to social justice. The Pharisees were made up of poor and regular everyday people, and not from the cultural and economic elite. The Pharisees were the only branch of Judaism that survived the Roman persecution at the end of the first century so that all contemporary forms of Judaism trace their roots back to the Pharisees.[1] The Pharisees were the “good guys,” and I would hazard a guess that most congregations today would love to have Pharisaic folks as church members because they are the socially respectable types who have strong morals and marriages, who are seen as leaders in the community, and more importantly, they are people who will teach Sunday School, serve as deacons and on committees, and tithe in their local churches.

Persistent Prayer

Preached by Michael Cheuk
October 21, 2007, Twenty-first Sunday in Pentecost
Luke 18:1-8

Here’s a scenario that takes place in my household at least two to three times a week. I’m on the computer checking email, and Wes comes into the study and asks: “Hey Dad, do you want to play catch with the football with me?” I reply: “Give me five minutes, Wes. I need to reply to some emails.” “OK,” says Wes. Thirty seconds later, Wes comes in, “Hey Dad, I’m ready for you to throw the football with me.” I reply: “Yeah, yeah. I’ll be there in a minute.” “OK,” says Wes. Thirty seconds later, Wes comes in tossing a football. “Uh, Dad . . . football?” I reply: “I told you, just give me a minute, will ya?” “OK,” says Wes. A minute later, Wes comes in wearing his toy Seattle Seahawks football helmet, “OK, Dad, you’re ready to play football?” I reply: “Good grief, give me a break! Just a couple more minutes!” “OK,” says Wes. A couple of minutes later, Wes comes in, all dressed in his Seattle Seahawks jersey and pants, together with toy shoulder pads and helmet on, and he says, “Come on Dad! I’m READY to play football!” At this point, who could say “No” to the little guy? So we go out and play.

In this morning’s Gospel lesson, Jesus told a peculiar, quirky story to his disciples usually called the Parable of the Persistent Widow and the Unjust Judge. And like the parable of the Persistent Son and the Distracted Dad that I just shared, at first glance, Jesus’ parable teaches us the value of being persistent in our intercessory prayers, persistent in our requests to God. And the usual application is that when things are not going well in our lives or in the lives of people we love, we should persist in our prayers and God will hear and answer our prayers.

But as I dug deeper into this passage, I’ve come to the conclusion that this passage is about prayer, but one particular kind of prayer. This passage is about persistent prayer for justice, persistent prayer asking God to right the wrongs that people do against each other.