Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
Earlier this week I woke up in the morning and checked my phone
and found a text from my wife from around 4am that said,
“Going to Rebecca. She’s having a baby. Make sure Josh gets to school.”
Rebecca and Scott Sweda are our neighbors.
A year ago they bought the long-time Overly house just up the street.
Beth was actually going to stay with their 4 kids: Sam, Abby, Nate, & Shane
while mom and dad went to the hospital for baby #5.
(Baby Pic)
This is their newborn little girl. Greta Grace.
Mom and baby are doing well. Thank God.
That’s a good wake-up call for help in the night.
Anybody here ever gone or opened your door for some mid-night child care
when a neighbor or family member was heading to the hospital?
(Blank)
Then there are some calls or knocks in the night that aren’t as good.
I am the first person on the church alarm system’s call list.
When something makes the alarm go off in the middle of the night,
I get the first call from the alarm company.
And I have to get up & come even tho there’s never been a real break in,
because I know the one time I don’t come look,
that's the time we’ll really be robbed.
But last year for some time, we had a problem with the alarm system;
it kept dropping the phone line signal it used for the fire alarm.
So for months as we were trying to figure it out and fix it,
I would get calls from the alarm company,
once a week, or so,
always at 3 o’clock in the morning saying,
“we are calling to tell you there was a fault in your phone line signal.”
And I would be like,
“You know this is not a real burglary, and it’s 3am. Can’t you wait
til daytime to call and tell me?” “We’re sorry sir. Legally ...
There are good reasons for someone to wake you in the middle of the night,
and there are some that we are like, “did you have to do this now?”
Right?
(Title slide)
We are talking about the parables of Jesus.
This is the issue in one of Jesus’ parables from Luke 11.
What is reasonable & right for someone to ask in the middle of the night
is the issue in one of Jesus’ parables from Luke 11.
Look at it with me.
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
Jesus has a pair of parables about prayer.
There is one in Luke 18 very similar to this,
but with something different Jesus wants to teach us, I think.
So, right before this parable, Jesus teaches his disciples
the Lord’s Prayer: Our Father who art in heaven ...
And then immediately following that he says,
Luke 11:5-8
Then Jesus said to them, “Suppose you have a friend, and you go to him at
midnight and say, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; 6 a friend of mine
on a journey has come to me, and I have no food to offer him.’ 7 And
suppose the one inside answers, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already
locked, and my children and I are in bed. I can’t get up and give you
anything.’ 8 I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the
bread because of friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will
surely get up and give you as much as you need.
So, Jesus is teaching his disciples and us to pray.
And that’s what this parable is about – prayer.
Who does the guy doing the knocking represent?
Us. Someone who is praying, who is asking.
Who does the friend in the house who is being asked represent?
God. Kind of.
But, God doesn’t tell us to come back in the morning.
So, he’s like an example of God, but showing what God is not like.
Jesus is saying that praying to God is like
a guy knocking on the door of a friend in the middle of the night.
And so we have to ask ourselves,
What does it mean?
What are we supposed to learn from this parable?
And maybe, what is the point . of the parable?
So let me ask you this:
Tonight, I show up at your door at 3am –
They had no electricity in Jesus’ day.
Their life went more from sun up to sun down.
So, midnight to them is more like 3am to many of us now.
So, I show up at your door at 3am,
knock loud enough to wake-up all your kids and yell,
“My friend just showed up and I have nothing for him to eat.
Can you loan me some bread ... and maybe a little ham
and cheese and that spicy brown mustard ... if you got it.
Are you letting me in?
No. Most of you, no.
Some of you, I’m hearing you say curse words for the first time. :)
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
Why?
Because in your heart you really feel that it’s rude & wrong to knock
on someone’s door at 3am or midnight to ask for food.
You would say, at least, “Come back in the morning.
I’ll help you then. This is rude to knock this late.”
But, if that’s what you see when you read this parable,
if that’s what you think Jesus meant,
you’d be seeing it wrong.
Those are not the social norms, the social rules,
for the time and culture that Jesus lived and told this story in.
In their time and place life was harder.
There were no 7-11’s or Giant Eagles. There were very few inns.
In order for mutual survival, there were strong cultural rules of hospitality.
People had a strong sense that it was the right thing, the good thing,
to help each other with food and water and shelter.
Anyone who did not help, even a stranger, let alone a friend,
would not be acting honorably.
And this culture had a strong honor and shame code.
We have nothing like it.
We know what shame is, but our culture has totally rejected all notions
that society has a right to collectively impose shame
on any person for almost any behavior.
So, people are people.
And getting up at midnight to help a friend is hard anywhere.
But, in the hearts and minds of the people who heard this parable,
as Jesus intended it to be heard in this context,
they believed you always helped a friend
with whatever you could and whatever they asked within reason.
If you didn’t, it was disgraceful to your name and family.
All reasonable life sustaining requests for help, food, shelter –
good people, honorable people would give
in every way they possibly could.
So, if those are the social rules, when Jesus tells the story,
how would that change who the “bad guy” is in the story?
Whose behavior would Jesus’ listening audience have a problem with?
-The friend knocking at the door at midnight,
asking for bread for a friend who was desperate for something to eat?
-Or the man who says, “Go away, I’m in bed?
They would have a problem with the man who said “go away, I’m in bed!”
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
The guy who knocks is doing nothing wrong!
He is doing the right thing to help his long traveling friend.
He is asking a righteous request according to culture.
The guy who doesn’t get up, he is doing the shameful thing.
But the guy does get up to get the bread for his friend.
Why? Why?
That’s the $64,000 question.
Jesus says,
Luke 11:8
I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the bread because of
friendship, yet because of your shameless audacity he will surely get up
and give you as much as you need.
Why does he give the bread?
Because of his shameless audacity.
Different past English translations have translated that differently.
-Many, like the NASB, say persistence.
Because of your persistence he will surely get up.
-The KJV says importunity, which means persistence.
-The NIV 1984 had boldness.
Because of your boldness he will get up.
But the original word Luke wrote in ancient Greek didn’t have anything to
do with persistence, or repetition, and it wasn’t their word for boldness.
-That’s why in 2011, when the publishers of the NIV Bible went over the
translation to fine tune anything that recent scholarship might say could
be better translated differently, they changed it to shameless audacity.
That is closer to what the original word meant.
That’s a cool expression, isn’t it? Shameless audacity.
Audacity means the nerve, the courage, the chutzpah
to be able to be able to do something most people wouldn’t do.
But it kind of has a negative connotation, a negative shade in the meaning.
Especially when you add the word shameless onto it.
I think someone saying with shock:
“Huh! What audacity!”
I saw someone who wrote that chutzpah is
the quality of a man who after he has murdered his father and mother,
has the nerve to throw himself on the mercy of the court because he’s an orphan.
That could be shameless audacity.
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
But, shameless audacity seems like the modern American way.
It’s what the person in the airport does when they don’t get on the
flight expected or when the flights are late.
Or what someone at a restaurant does when there food or service
wasn’t quite perfect.
They throw around a little shameless audacity and
maybe that will get them what they want.
We have this unspoken cultural rule,
Whoever complains the loudest gets what they want.
Is that what God is telling us prayer is like?
Shameless audacity could preach though!
You could say Jesus wants us to beat down the doors of heaven w/our prayers.
Get all shameless. (in southern preacher growly voice...)
Get audacious with what you ask for.
Jesus wants you to ask for your big house!
Jesus wants you to ask for you BMW!
Have some shameless audacity when you ask for your promotion!
Have some shameless audacity when you ask God for your million $$.
Is that what this parable is teaching?
It can’t be, because the man asks for a reasonable humble 3 loaves of
bread for a friend.
The shamelessness has to mean something else.
That’s what I think; it is something else.
The original Greek word Luke wrote was anaidos – shameless.
Anaidos means shameless in ancient Greek.
The word aidos meant shame
Put an An at the beginning and it makes it negative like our un.
Happy-unhappy. Aidos-anaidos. Shame-shameless.
There is no word really for audacity here.
It’s just added to make the English make sense.
It’s simply the word shameless or shamelessness.
Stay with me, there is a pay-off here.
As I tried to find something that helped me know what Jesus was
encouraging us to do in prayer by this word, I looked to a resource
called Synonyms of the New Testament, Richard C. Trench.
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
It’s considered a classic resource for studying word meanings in the
New Testament.
In it Trench compares two NT Greek words, synonyms, for shame.
One is aidos and the other is aiskune.
Listen to what he says about them:
αἰδώς is the shame, or sense of honor, which hinders one from doing an
unworthy act; αἰσχύνη is the disgrace, outward or inward, which follows
on having done it.
Synonyms of the New Testament, Richard C. Trench.
The one word for shame is the honor code inside that prevents you from
doing something wrong – that’s aidos.
The other is the shame you feel after doing something wrong –
that’s aiskune.
So, the word Jesus used an-aidos, un-shame, shameless
means something like being unhindered from doing a worthy act. 2x.
One more.
Trench also writes
αἰδώς is the nobler word, and implies the nobler motive: in it is involved an
innate moral repugnance to the doing of the dishonorable act
Synonyms of the New Testament, Richard C. Trench.
Aidos is a nobler motive.
A sense of honor and shame in a way that guides good action.
Jesus picks and uses this word for shameless.
Even though aiskune is far more common in the NT.
I think Jesus is saying that the man who asked for bread
had a noble motive,
of which he felt unhindered and free to do an honorable act.
(blank slide)
That’s how he was shame . less.
He was without shame in his honorable act.
The man gets up, because he knows this request is right.
He knows the honor and shame code and he cannot fail to keep it.
I believe, emphatically, that this is the picture
Jesus is trying to give us about prayer in this parable.
Prayer is not, the man who will stand at a door and knock at midnight.
Because he is bold.
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
And because he doesn’t care what people think.
There is shame in doing it, but he has shameless audacity
and he doesn’t care what people think.
That’s not what Jesus is saying about prayer.
Prayer is like the woman or man who says,
I will stand here and knock at midnight.
And I am without shame, because there is no shame in knocking
and asking my neighbor for help.
It is right for me to knock.
I have no shame to approach my friends door even at this hour,
because I have pure motives and honorable intentions.
And, I know my friend has honor,
and the one I ask must get up and give me what I ask.
Let’s put God in that and us and prayer.
Prayer is like the woman or man who says,
I will pray and ask God for what I need.
And I am without shame, because there is no shame in asking
my God for help.
It is right for me to ask.
I have no shame to approach God’s door even at this hour,
because I have pure motives and honorable intentions.
And, I know my God has honor,
and the one I ask wants to get up and give me what I ask.
Remember how we said that Jesus’ parables almost always have a twist,
some unexpected change or unusual twist?
I think in this story the twist is in the word shameless.
Because when Jesus said the man refused to get out of bed to help his friend,
Jesus’ audience would have been thinking,
“He doesn’t get up? Disgrace! Shame!
What shame he brings on himself.”
And just then Jesus twists the idea of shame unexpectedly.
And says, but because of the shamelessness – anaidos,
of the one who asks,
because there is no shame in his asking,
it is a noble act and the one who is asked knows that,
the other will get up and give him what he asks.
For us, I think this means when it comes to prayer,
here is how you should feel about approaching God to ask for something:
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
Be shameless.
It is right to ask God.
It is a righteous thing to do.
You can approach God without fear or guilt or doubt.
You are welcome.
You are invited.
You are encouraged.
He is your friend and he is a much better friend than this man was.
It is right for you to ask God for healing,
as right as it is for a hungry man to ask for bread.
It is right for you ask God for help with purity and temptation,
as right as it is for a neighbor to ask a neighbor to help care for kids.
It is right for you to ask ...
Well, let’s let Jesus finish the idea.
Listen again.
Luke 11:5-8
Then Jesus said to them, “Suppose you have a friend, and you go to him at
midnight and say, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread; 6 a friend of mine
on a journey has come to me, and I have no food to offer him.’ 7 And
suppose the one inside answers, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is already
locked, and my children and I are in bed. I can’t get up and give you
anything.’ 8 I tell you, even though he will not get up and give you the
bread because of friendship, yet because of your shamelessness he will
surely get up and give you as much as you need.
Then look at how Jesus continues.
Very next sentence. Same subject.
Luke 11:9-13
“So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find;
knock and the door will be opened to you. 10 For everyone who asks
receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will
be opened.
Don’t be afraid to ask.
It is right for you to ask.
Don’t be afraid to knock.
There is no shame in knocking.
Don’t be afraid to seek.
God wants you to seek and he will help you find.
He continues
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
“Which of you fathers [or mothers], if your son asks for a fish, will give
him a snake instead? 12 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?
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If you then, though you are evil, [we are all sinners] know how to give
good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven
give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”
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If this is how we are,
that we can answer our children’s requests with good gifts –
How much more will God give us what we ask for when we ask him.
How much more will God open doors when we knock.
How much more will God help us to find when we seek.
Especially when it is right for us to ask.
He is . Our Father who art in heaven.
Especially when it is right for us to ask.
For we are his children!
Especially when it is right for us to ask.
He has given us access to his throne by the grace of Jesus Christ!
And when it right for us to ask.
Because we have a righteousness that comes by faith in Jesus
that enables us to stand righteously before him!
And it is right for us to ask.
Because He told us to ask for anything in his Name,
and he will do it!
And it is right for us to ask.
Because He tells us to ask and to be without shame when we do.
Leave here today w/ the encouragement that you are welcome to pray God.
Pray with a sense of the privilege that has been gifted to you.
You have been granted the right to pray to the Lord God Almighty.
Leave here today in the freedom that your prayer is
desired by God, and seen as noble and unhindered.
Leave here today with renewed confidence in Our Father’s intention
to give you all the good you would knock for, and ask, and seek.
Amen.
Let’s close with the prayer Jesus taught his disciples in this same lesson,
The Lord’s Prayer.
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Sermon, 2014-10-26, Parables to Pray
Our Father who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come.
Thy will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread,
and forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us,
and lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory,
for ever and ever.
Amen.
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