Too Busy Not to Pray

We are beginning a series this week on prayer. I chose this in part because it is Lent and this is a good time to think about spiritual practices, and I chose it because I think we need help in this area. I am going to be using a book by Bill Hybels called Too Busy Not to Pray. I think it is a good tool for all of us to grow in prayer. It is solid, biblical, and accessible. Pick it up and read it on your own if you are able.

Hybels looks at this parable from the Gospels. The story involves a judge and widow who has a complaint. William Barclay tells that Jewish court at that time almost always had three judges overseeing a case – a judge for the defendant, a judge for the plaintiff, and a judge independently appointed by Herod or the Romans. This third judge is our judge. Apparently these third judges had a notorious reputation – they had the nickname of robber judges because they were susceptible to the bribe. It was well-known that these appointed judges were crooked.

Jesus uses this common perception when he tells the story of a certain judge. In case we miss the point Jesus comes right out and calls him “an unjust Judge.” More than that Jesus tells us that this judge didn’t believe in God and he didn’t care much for his fellow human beings either. The judge is this story is a secular atheist. He is the bench neither for love of God or love of man. He is on the bench for love of money.

Money is the thing that moves him. Nothing else will.

The widow in this story is obviously a sympathetic figure. She has no husband, and in that time and culture, therefore, she has no job, no income, no inheritance or means of support. Unless she has a brother or brother-in-law to care for her, or adult children, she is in trouble. The story tells us that she is a victim of an injustice. We don’t know what – perhaps she has been cheated out of money or property by a neighbor or even a family member. Whatever the case, she probably cannot afford to lose.


This widow has certain things in her favor, in a normal situation. As I said, she is worthy of our sympathy. But we also know that sympathy doesn’t count for much in Judge Dread’s courtroom. If she had a normal judge, she might be fine. But she doesn’t have a normal judge, she has this judge. This judge has no fear of God and no affection for others. He is not just immoral, he is amoral. The only thing that will influence this judge – cash – she is in short supply.

But this is her only shot. So she takes her matter to the judge and when he predictably says no, she doesn’t give up. She keeps asking him, day after day. He give the same predictable answer, but she won’t accept it. She bothers him at court, she bothers him at home. She makes him an offer he can’t refuse – grant my request, your honor, and I will quit bugging you.

Now the nature of a parable is always that it conveys one main truth. A parable is not an allegory where every person and detail stands for something else outside the story. A parable has a main point. The point of this one is not that God is like this unjust judge – too many people make that mistake. The parable, rather, contrasts this God with this judge. God is very different from this unjust judge, so different that it beggars description. But we will try.

So much in life depends on our preconceptions and expectations. Are we hopeful and grateful or are we jaded and cynical? The difference can be shown in something called the Diary of a Dog and the Diary of a Cat. Just looking at two pictures can show us a difference.

But here is an excerpt from the diary of a dog:

8am Dog food! My favorite thing!
9:30am A walk in the park! My favorite thing!
12pm Milk bones! My favorite thing!
2pm Wagged my tail! My favorite thing!
4pm Played in the yard! My favorite thing!
7pm Watched TV with the people! My favorite thing!
11pm Sleeping on the bed! My favorite thing!


Here is an excerpt from the diary of a cat:

Day 983 of my captivity: My captors continue to taunt me with bizarre little dangling objects. They dine lavishly on fresh meat while the other inmates and I are fed hash or some sort of dry nuggets. Today I decapitated a mouse and dropped its headless body at their feet. I had hoped this would strike fear into their hearts. Today I was almost successful in an attempt to topple one of my tormentors by weaving in and around his feet as he was walking. I must try this again tomorrow, but at the top of the stairs.


So much in our faith and especially in our efforts at prayer depend upon what we already think about God and life. So what are your expectations of God? What is your picture of God?

Do you picture God as an Unjust Judge – someone you must bug, and cajole, and maybe he bribe in order to get what you need from him?

Do you picture God as a Police Officer running a “speed trap,” trying to catch you breaking the rules.

Or is your picture of God one of a disinterested and aloof CEO, only caring about his empire and his profit margins, way too busy to care about or even know about you and your problems?

The truth is if we pray at all sometimes we will be disappointed in the apparent results of our prayers. We will not always get the answer we’re looking for. It is bound to happen. Jesus anticipated this when he prefaced this parable:

“Jesus told them this parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.” Luke 18.1

Don’t lose heart when you don’t see immediate results to your prayers. Don’t lose heart when things don’t go your way. Don’t think that because you have to wait at all means that God doesn’t care about you. Don’t think that when bad things happen to you that God took a vacation or stopped answering the phone.

When I was still in high school there was a very popular book called When Bad Things Happen to Good People. The book was written by Rabbi Harold Kushner, a man of faith. Kushner was trying to come to grips with a difficult question – why do bad things happen to good people? Why don’t we get the answers to prayer that we want and need?


Good questions – the answers Kushner gave? No so much. Kushner concluded that God may want to help us, but he can’t. God is limited. He is good, pretty much, and he is powerful, but not as powerful as we would like to think God is.

To which one wag has responded, “If God is really like Kushner describes, then someone more competent ought to apply for the job.”

I believe that the picture of God the Bible reveals to us is a God both supremely good and supremely competent and powerful.

“Why do you say “my way is hid from the Lord and my right is disregarded by my God’? Have you not known? Have you not heard? The Lord is everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or get tired, and his understanding knows no limits.” Isaiah 40.27-28

This is the picture and the expectations that God wants us to have of him when we pray.

When Seth was almost four years old he wanted a toy called Socker Boppers for his birthday. To his credit he didn’t ask for anything else, just Socker Boppers. That’s all he talked about. At that time Seth was still using a binky and a blanket to go to sleep at night. I remember the night before his fourth birthday Seth and I had a talk and I offered this proposal: “If you give up your binky and your blankie tonight for good, you can have Socker Boppers for your birthday.”

Seth thought about it for a minute and he agreed – for about sixty seconds. And then he asked, “Can’t I still keep my binky and have Socker Boppers?” But that was my answer and he agreed, though it wasn’t easy for him to give up his binky. But we went to sleep with a smile on his face, mutter sweet prayers of “socker boppers, socker boppers, socker boppers. . .”

Now if I , a flawed, limited, semi-ignorant earthly father can sometimes be loving and wise and eager to help my son, how much more will a good and powerful God help his children that he so readily wants to help?

As a parent I have to say no sometimes, it’s my job to say no. But it’s my joy to say yes to my kids. I love to say yes! God is the same and so much more.

I hope you will at least begin forming that expectation and that picture of our heavenly Father and hope this picture encourages you to go to him in prayer often and eagerly.

I’ll let Hybels have the last word here:

“God is interested in your prayers because he is interested in you. . .He is willing – anxious even – to hear from you. Moreover, he is willing to act on your behalf.”