Scripture Readings:

     1.      Luke 18:1:  “Then Jesus told His disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and never give up.”

2.      Luke 18:2-8:  “In a certain town there was a judge who neither feared God nor cared about men.  And there was a widow in that town who kept coming to him with a plea, ‘Grant me justice against my adversary.’  For some time he refused.  But finally he said to himself, ‘Even though I don’t fear God or care about men, yet because this widow keeps bothering me. I will see that she gets justice, so that she won’t eventually wear me out with her coming!’  And the Lord said, ‘listen to what the unjust judge says.  And will not God bring about justice for his chosen ones, who cry out to Him day and night?  Will He keep putting them off?  I tell you, He will see that they get justice, and quickly.’”

3.      Luke 11:5-8:  “Suppose one of you has a friend, and he goes to him at midnight and says, ‘Friend, lend me three loaves of bread, because a friend of mine on a journey has come to me, and I have nothing to set before him.’  From inside he answers and says, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been shut and my children are in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.’  I tell you, even though he will not get up and giver him anything because he is his friend, yet because of his persistence he will get up and give him as much as he needs.  So, I say to you, ask, and it shall be given to you, seek, and you shall find, ask, and it shall be given to you, seek, and you shall find, knock, and it shall be opened to you.  For everyone who asks, receives; he who seeks, finds; and to him who knocks, it shall be opened.”

 Discussion Points:

      -  The key is not to knock on the door once and then stop, but rather we are to keep knocking.

       -  Jesus used the stories of the widow seeking justice and the friend seeking bread to clearly illustrate that we are to be persistent in our prayers.

       -  It is important to note that if the widow seeking justice and the friend seeking bread had not been persistent, their requests would probably not have been answered.

       -  There is an old wise-tale that stated, “if you ask for something more than once, then you are not trusting God.”  This old saying conflicts the very teachings of Jesus as seen in the two stories provided above.

       -   Should this also be applied in our prayers for forgiveness.  The general belief is that it should not.  This is because when we ask for forgiveness for a particular sin, there is nothing left to pray about – because the sin has been forgiven.

Point of Lesson:  As instructed by Jesus, we should be persistent in our prayers.  This means that we should continue to pray until we get an answer.

Past Prayer That Worked:  In our 10th lesson, we will cover a "Past Prayer That Worked" from the Bible that illustrates this rule. This past prayer is Hannah’s prayer for a child and is found in 1 Samuel 1:1-19.  This week, review the Hannah’s prayer for a child and see if you can how this forgotten rule was applied.