Amy C Walters

The Parable of the Persistent Widow | Luke 18:1-8

Throughout Luke 18, there are stories of people who are undervalued and quieted by society. But each time, Jesus welcomes them. In the first parable, an unrighteous judge finally grants justice to a widow to get her to stop bothering him. Our God, far from being annoyed at our persistence in asking for help, actually invites it, and will give us justice.

This parable goes by two different names: the Parable of the Persistent Widow or the Unjust Judge. Luke tells us right off the bat that Jesus tells this parable to the effect that we should always pray and never lose heart. You gotta love it when he lays out right at the beginning what the point is! 

The first character that we meet in this parable is the judge. We’re told that he doesn’t fear God or care about people. Even the judge acknowledges that about himself and says it again in verse 4. And Jesus refers to him as an unjust or unrighteous judge. So when we encounter injustice and unrighteousness in the world, it’s likely that these characteristics of not fearing God and not caring about people are at the heart of this attitude. 

The next character that we meet is the widow. Now, widows in that culture were very vulnerable. They had no protection. They had no advocate. They were pretty helpless. And as is so often the case with the vulnerable, this widow has been preyed upon by someone. She has an adversary. 

We’re not told what the injustice she faces is, but we are told what she does about it. She keeps going to that judge and demanding justice. “Give me justice against my adversary.” 

I love how this widow doesn’t give up, even in the face of her own helpless situation or the rudeness of the judge to keep putting her off. She doesn’t give up in the face of how long it took or even how much effort it was to keep going back to him. It didn’t matter what obstacle she came across, the widow was persistent.

Eventually, the judge caves in. He says to himself, “Though I neither fear God nor care about people, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will give her justice so that she will not beat me down with her continual coming.” The judge is so annoyed at this widow that he finally gives her justice.

This parable is weird, because one of the main characters, the judge, is a horrible person. And in parables, we’re usually looking for how it corresponds to real life and who the characters represent. Here it seems that the unjust judge represents God. But how could that be when he is such an awful character? 

This parable, however, is not pointing to similarities between God and the judge, but instead highlighting the differences. It’s saying that even if this unjust judge can finally relent and give justice, how much more so will our God, who is righteous, who is just, enact justice for his people? God loves justice, and he will pursue it. 

Our God, far from being annoyed at our persistence in asking for help, actually invites it. Jesus tells this parable to give us an example of persistence that we should follow.

It’s interesting, if you look throughout Luke 18, you’re going to see all these people whom society has written off as not valuable enough, not important enough, not spiritual enough. This parable is about a widow. In the next parable, there’s a tax collector who prays to God and is justified. Right after that is a story of young children being brought to Jesus.  The disciples try to send them away but Jesus welcomes them. At the end of Luke 18, we encounter a blind beggar who calls out to Jesus for help. People try to silence him but Jesus invites the man to him. 

In each of these stories, when society is saying, “Be quiet, go away,” God is saying, “Come to me. I want to hear from you.” And that is our key truth for today: God wants to hear from you. Right here, he is inviting you to call on him day and night, to ask him for help, to bring your request to him, and to keep coming with it. 

Even though Luke tells us right at the beginning that this parable teaches persistence in prayer, we struggle with the application of it. We lack endurance. We give up so quickly when we’re not seeing results from our prayers. We get discouraged.

We get distracted. We’re pulled by all the different things going on in our lives, and we stop praying about one thing, and move on to the next. 

Or we try to fix things ourselves. We say, “I’m going to deal with this, I’m not going to bother God with it.” But Jesus is saying right here that God is a just judge who will act swiftly to give you justice. Are you taking advantage of his invitation to come to him?