Something Needs To ChangeParaugs

In Luke 11 Jesus tells a parable in which a man is hosting a friend in his home, but he doesn’t have any food to give his hungry guest. So the host goes to the house of another friend at midnight and bangs on his door in order to ask for some bread. Given that families in Palestine at this time often slept in the same room, this incident would have likely woken up the entire house. Nevertheless, after some pleading, this man’s insensitive request was granted. 

So what is Jesus teaching us in this parable? If you want something from God, just keep banging on the door and asking him for something. Eventually, he’ll get annoyed enough to get up and do something for you not because he loves you but because you’ve bothered him to death. Is that the point?

No, I think we find the point in that word impudent. The man in this parable is so bold that he will go to his friend at midnight just for a piece of bread. This guy doesn’t get that you don’t wake up your buddy and his entire family at midnight unless you have a really good reason. But he’s so bold, so shameless, so pesky that he thinks, I know my neighbor has what my friend needs, so I’m going to ask him for it, and that, Jesus says, is how we should pray.

As I sit there on the mountainside in the middle of the Himalayas, reading this story, the wonder of prayer hits me in a whole new way. Here I am, looking out at God’s glory on display in creation around me, and I realize it does seem bold for me, one person among more than seven billion people on the planet, to come to the one true God over all and Creator of all and say, “I know you have a lot on your plate running a universe right now, but I need you to listen to me. I have some things I need to ask you for, and I need your attention.”

In this parable, Jesus is saying, “Be as bold, shameless, and impudent as you want.”

Indeed, God has invited me, and you, to come to him anytime with anything, particularly (according to this story) on behalf of people who are in need.