Abraham:Prayer of Bargaining

Genesis 18:20-33

Then the Lord said, ‘How great is the outcry against Sodom and Gomorrah and how very grave their sin! I must go down and see whether they have done altogether according to the outcry that has come to me; and if not, I will know.’

So the men turned from there, and went towards Sodom, while Abraham remained standing before the Lord. Then Abraham came near and said, ‘Will you indeed sweep away the righteous with the wicked? Suppose there are fifty righteous within the city; will you then sweep away the place and not forgive it for the fifty righteous who are in it? Far be it from you to do such a thing, to slay the righteous with the wicked, so that the righteous fare as the wicked! Far be that from you! Shall not the Judge of all the earth do what is just?’ And the Lord said, ‘If I find at Sodom fifty righteous in the city, I will forgive the whole place for their sake.’

Abraham answered, ‘Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord, I who am but dust and ashes. Suppose five of the fifty righteous are lacking? Will you destroy the whole city for lack of five?’ And he said, ‘I will not destroy it if I find forty-five there.’ Again he spoke to him, ‘Suppose forty are found there.’ He answered, ‘For the sake of forty I will not do it.’ Then he said, ‘Oh do not let the Lord be angry if I speak. Suppose thirty are found there.’ He answered, ‘I will not do it, if I find thirty there.’ He said, ‘Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord. Suppose twenty are found there.’ He answered, ‘For the sake of twenty I will not destroy it.’ Then he said, ‘Oh do not let the Lord be angry if I speak just once more. Suppose ten are found there.’ He answered, ‘For the sake of ten I will not destroy it.’ And the Lord went his way, when he had finished speaking to Abraham; and Abraham returned to his place.

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How annoying is Abraham? What a nuisance. What a pest. What a nag. Am I right?

And haven’t we all been there? Begging. Pleading. Nagging. Bargaining with God for the things we want and need and long for in life?

We wanted to start our first bit in this series with Abraham, because his prayer is – along with this Gospel bit from Jesus – like a primer of sorts for how we do – or could do – prayer as faithful people in the world.

Because, for me, the most instructive, inspiring thing about Abraham tonight is that he embodies the things that, I believe, are marks of a faithful pray-er:

First, Abraham knows – and is known by – the God to whom he prays. There’s no way this is the first time he’s been in conversation with his maker. In the story of Abraham, he is righteous from the get-go. [SLIDE 1] His faithful, righteousness is what set him apart in the first place – several chapters earlier – called to leave his homeland, his family, all he had ever known, and to travel – at God’s direction – to be a blessing for the world. Abraham’s faithful, righteous ways are the reason God chose him, to begin with, to be the father of a great nation. They had struck deals with each other before – Abraham and God. They had made covenants, held promises, counted the stars together, traveled long distances. These two – Abraham and the Divine – knew each other; they were very well-acquainted; they were intimately familiar, one with the other.

Secondly, Abraham is humble. Not only has he done God’s bidding in so many ways until we meet up with him tonight, in all the ways I’ve already described, but we get a glimpse of his humility in his praying today. For one, he declares himself nothing more than dust and ashes. (He would have gladly covered his shoulders with sackcloth for the occasion, I suspect.) And before his petitions, over and over again, he asks permission, with deference to God’s power: “Let me take it upon myself to speak to the Lord…” “If you’ll allow me…” “If I may…”

And lastly – for my money, anyway – Abraham is as bold as he is righteous and humble. Perhaps he’s bold because he is so righteous and humble. Because he has such a faithful, familiar relationship with his God and because he’s so genuinely humble in the presence of his Lord, Abraham is not shy about shooting his shot; about asking for his heart’s desire; about putting the screws to the God of all creation, like he does. “But what if there are 50 … what about 45 … okay 40 … okay 30, 20, 10 …” “Far be it from you, God, to do such a thing…” That takes some nerve and persistence, don’t you think?

So, again, when I think about the posture and perspective with which we enter into the prayers of our ancestors tonight and in the days to come – and as we wonder about the way we pray, ourselves – I think Abraham is a model worth emulating:

 Let’s engage a faithful regular relationship – let us practice and pray often;

 Let us approach God with deference and humility;

 And then let us be bold; let us say what we mean, what we need, let us be honest and clear about what
we long for – trusting that God already knows anyway.

Which brings me to Jesus – and that bit from Luke’s Gospel. The disciples have just asked Jesus to teach them how to pray and, after some petitions that have since been turned into the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus does all of that “Ask, Search, Knock” stuff.

“Ask and it will be given to you. Search and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened for you.”

And that’s hard because who would believe it? “Ask, search, knock?” It sounds so easy, too simple, impossible and unlikely, really, that God would bother with any of what any one of us has to say. And we can all cite examples, I’m sure, that prove Jesus wrong: times when questions didn’t have answers; times when we never found what we were looking for; times when doors – not only wouldn’t open – but times when doors were slammed in our face.

That’s why I think Jesus must have been up to something else.

After all, very rarely is Jesus so certain about anything as he seems to be here. All throughout his ministry he answers questions with questions. He teaches in parables, not lectures. He leaves so much up in the air about the very nature of his identity, even, all the way up to the very end when he’s about to be crucified. Yet, we read this passage about prayer and want so badly for this one to be black and white or cut and dried.

But, maybe Jesus was up to something else, entirely, when he invited us to pray. And I have to believe it didn’t have so much to do with any one of us getting whatever we want at any given moment. I happen to believe Jesus is trying to teach us – little children that we can be too much of the time – about what we need to live differently as people of faith in this world.

I believe Jesus invites us to pray, not so that we’ll get whatever it is we want or simply that we’ll change the things and the stuff and the circumstances in our day to day lives. I believe Jesus invites us to pray so that we will be changed – from the inside out – when we learn to encounter the things and the stuff and the circumstances in our day-to-day lives with hearts and minds centered on God’s place and power in the midst of it all.

And I think that’s what the gift of regular, humble, bold praying – like Abraham and practiced – still offers to us as believers.

Samuel Shoemaker is a long-dead Episcopal priest, who gets credit for saying something like, “Prayer may not change things for you, but it sure changes you for things.”

“Prayer may not change things for you, but it sure changes you for things.”

See, the other thing you might notice about Abraham’s prayer tonight – and the truth about the rest of that story – is that it his prayer didn’t have anything to do with him. And God didn’t answer it exactly as Abraham seemed to expect, either. That’s not the moral of this story – Sodom and Gomorrah were decimated, in the end, remember.

See, maybe, with all of that back and forth with God, Abraham was negotiating grace just for the sake of it. Maybe, with all of that bargaining, Abraham was testing the capacity of God’s compassion. Maybe, in all of that math and number-crunching, Abraham was trying to measure the mercy of his maker.

But the truth seems to be, some have said, that Abraham was doing all of that praying with hopes that God would spare the life of his nephew Lot and his family. Abraham’s persistent longing wasn’t for his own blessing and benefit. It was all for the protection, blessing, and benefit of someone he knew and loved – even if they had been estranged and separated, as the story goes.

And if that’s the power and purpose and result of our praying – if our prayer doesn’t always change things for us, but changes the way we care about and consider things for others and the world around us – that’s a gift and a blessing that can’t be measured.

“Prayer may not change things for you, but it sure changes you for things.”

So let us pray. Let us ask, search, and knock. Let us be faithful, humble, and bold. Let us be selfish if we dare, but let us be prepared for God to make us selfless, just the same. Let us be greedy, if we must. But let us be open and prepared for God to turn that greed into generosity. Let us be persistent and unyielding in our requests, but don’t be so sure – or surprised – if God turns that into trust and patience, in the end.

I believe prayer changes things, as even the cheesiest bumper sticker suggests, no matter how or when or what we’re praying for. But I believe that, when we pray like Abraham – with faith, humility, and bold expectation, on behalf of others – the first thing prayer will change – by God’s grace – is us.

Amen

God the Persistent Widow

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Luke 18:1-8

Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.

He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my accuser.’ For a while he refused, but later he said to himself,

‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’”

And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night?

Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them.

And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

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“We don’t take no for an answer.” That was the motto of Sisters of Mercy JoAnn Persch and Pat Murphy — the two women I affectionately call my nuns. I’ve talked about these holy troublemakers before, you may remember, but with today’s story of a persistent widow, I can’t help returning to the two most persistent people I’ve ever met.

In 2007, on a cold, rainy Friday — the day buses rolled out of the Broadview Deportation Center bound for the airport — the sisters stood on the sidewalk and prayed. They prayed for the men being deported and the families left behind, for the judges who signed the orders, the ICE agents who carried them out, and the lawmakers who wrote the policies. Then they went home.

But the next Friday, they came back. And the next. Rain or shine, they kept showing up. When they asked to go inside and accompany the families as they said goodbye, the answer was no. When they asked again, the answer was still no.

Finally, the top ICE official in Chicago — who knew them by name at this point — said, “You can’t come in here. But you might try McHenry County Jail. They could use some pastoral care.” So they called. Again the answer was no.

So they lobbied, wrote letters, met with legislators — and got a new law passed that allowed spiritual care in detention centers. Eventually they were even permitted to board the buses and offer a final blessing as they pulled away.

Sister Pat used to tell me:

“You see, Cogan, we get told no all the time. People, especially those in power, underestimate us because of how old we are and what we look like. But we don’t get discouraged. We work peacefully and persistently. We do what needs doing. And we don’t take no for an answer.”

The sisters remind me that we’ve had the wrong image of widows all along: in Scripture and in this parable. When we hear the word widow, all the old stereotypes rush in: a poor, frail, vulnerable woman begging for help. But that’s not the picture the Bible paints, and it’s not the woman Jesus describes today.

Think of Tamar, who risked everything to secure justice when others denied it to her.

Or Ruth, who crossed borders and broke norms to provide for herself and Naomi. The widow of Zarephath, who spoke truth to the prophet and demanded that God make good on divine promises. The widow of Nain, whose grief moved Jesus to act and whose life was restored along with her son’s.

As one scholar put it, Biblical widows aren’t weak. “They move mountains; they’re expected to be poor, but prove savvy stewards; expected to be exploited, they take advantage where they find it.” Truth be told, most churches today run not because of pastors but because of faithful women, on the front lines and behind the scenes, who keep showing up, praying, organizing, and holding it all together.

Most of us have heard this parable preached the same way: if even an unjust judge will finally give in to a widow’s cry, how much more will God hear and answer when we cry out? In that reading, God is the opposite of the judge — fair, responsive, merciful. And that’s a good and faithful way to read it.

But lately I’ve wondered: what if the story turns the other way? What if God isn’t the opposite of the unjust judge, but rather the persistent, justice-demanding widow herself? What if we are the ones sitting in the judge’s seat, reluctant, distracted, slow to listen, until finally, through prayer, through people, through grace, we give in?

Because that’s how I’ve come to recognize God’s work in Scripture and in my own life. God calls, nudges, insists, pushes people to do what God wants done — until we finally yield.

Think of Abraham and Moses, Jonah and Jeremiah, Paul and even Pharaoh. God persists, sometimes pesters, always prevails.

In this moment, I think we look a lot more like the judge. With all the division and distrust around us, it’s easy to say, I’ve lost all respect for those people. I’ve lost respect for those who vote differently than me. For those protesting and for those who don’t.

For Democrats. For Republicans.For anyone who dares to enjoy the Super Bowl halftime show.

We laugh, but it’s true. Like the judge, we’ve grown tired and cynical. We’ve lost trust — not only in one another, but sometimes in God’s work and timing in the world. And I don’t say that to shame anyone. I understand it. Things feel difficult, dangerous, and disheartening. War still rages in Ukraine. A ceasefire hangs by a thread in Gaza. Inequality deepens across the globe.

And closer to home, many of us are still waiting: for healing that doesn’t come, for a relationship to mend, for a prayer to be answered but only seems to echo in the abyss.

After enough of that, you start praying less, not because you’ve stopped believing, but because you’re tired of being disappointed. Eventually, no prayer feels safer than another unanswered one. And before long, like the judge, you stop looking for God altogether. You decide it’s up to you to figure it out.

Maybe that’s how the judge became who he was — not heartless, but hardened. Not evil, just exhausted.

But the story doesn’t end there, because, like my nuns, God doesn’t give up that easily.

When we least expect it, God, like the widow, starts pursuing us. And that’s what happens in prayer. Often we think prayer is us pursuing God. But what if it’s the opposite.

What if prayer isn’t just our words reaching to heaven; it’s God reaching toward us. In the quiet moments of our days, in the stillness when we try to rest, God is there: tugging at our hearts, stirring us awake, urging us not to give up hope, to forgive and seek forgiveness, to hold on to the relationships that matter, to see the dignity and humanity in every person.

As the great Danish theologian Søren Kierkegaard once said, “Prayer does not change God, but it changes the one who offers it.”

The judge finally relents, but not out of compassion. The text says he does it “so she won’t bother me.” That’s the polite, cleaned-up translation. A truer rendering of the Greek is something like, “so she doesn’t give me a black eye,” or, as one commentator puts it, “so she doesn’t slap me in the face.” Now that’s a granny with some grit!

And before we get too quick to dismiss that image, the idea that God might wrestle or wear us down, remember Jacob. He wrestled with God all night long until daybreak, refusing to let go until he received a blessing. He didn’t walk away untouched; he limped for the rest of his life.

Because that’s what real encounters with God do, they leave a mark.

Richard Foster once wrote, “Our prayer efforts are a genuine give-and-take, a true dialogue with God, and a true struggle.”

Prayer, at its deepest, isn’t about soothing words or easy answers. It’s a holy struggle; one that leaves us changed: sometimes limping, sometimes bruised, but always blessed and better because of it.

Pat Murphy passed away this past July at the young age of ninety-six. At her bedside, the last thing JoAnn said to her was, “Pat, remember, we don’t take no for an answer. When you get to heaven, you go to God, and you don’t take no for an answer. We need help down here — help for our immigrants, help for our country.”

Prayer is the process by which God makes us less like the judge and more like Sister Pat:

one whose whole life is a prayer, offering respect for all people, trusting that God is at work in the world and through her, and demanding justice and peace in a world that needs so much of both.

So, in the words of Jesus, pray always. Don’t lose heart. And, in the words of the Nuns, don’t take no for an answer.

If we do that, God will indeed find faith: the faith of a widow.

Amen.