Year C, Proper 24

“Pray and Do Not Lose Heart”Main point: God is the perfect judge who hears us when we call out to him.INTRODUCTIONJesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.We live in a time when it may be easy to lose heart…Our elderly are being neglected in long-term care facilities that rely heavily on underfunded medicaid and medicare.Our children, the most helpless and innocent among us, routinely run active-shooter drills in their schools because of the pandemic of disturbed people mixed with instruments of death.Our government is entangled with foreign governments in Ukraine, Iran, and Israel in war-waging with our tax dollars while the death toll in these conflicts climbs higher and higher.If you're in the older generations, perhaps you're wondering what kind of a future you're leaving to your grandchildren and great-grandchildren.The promises of prosperity made to the latest generations of Americans are now in question. The message of “go to college, find a career, work hard and things will be alright” doesn’t ring as trustworthy to more and more people under 40, under 30, under 20.Perhaps the most obvious cause for us to lose heart are the conditions we face every day…Families, churches, and neighbors are divided by layers of political divisions. We’re in deep and it seems to be getting deeper. One writer put it this way: The political divisions in our country could rightly be called a “cold, holy war”. Our culture is dominated by a cold holy war where each side is waging a righteous crusade against the other. We’re dug in. Our righteous cause is rooted in personal identity and fueled by fear…and the more polarized we are, the more pulverized we become.One of my professors last week was commenting that the divisions and chaos we face today are so deeply affecting our young people that sociologists are starting to call it’s impact a generational trauma similar to the war generations and the way COVID will have a generational impact on our collective memory.So we say with the psalmist, “How long, O Lord? Will you forget us forever?”If ever there was a time where we need a lesson to pray always and not lose heart, it is today.Plausible ObjectionYou may be saying to yourself, “Bryce, sheesh, what a downer! I didn’t come to church to hear all about the terrible things I hear from the news all week. I’d rather block that out for a while and sing a couple of songs. Why are you bringing it all up again?”My answer: I’m bringing it up today because 1) we are best when we’re processing our real life in light of our Christian faith and not succumbing to escapism. Jesus meets us in our brokenness from the inside out more often than he plucks us out of our circumstances.2) the test itself brings it up. The text describes our condition. Our backs are up against the wall. God knows it. And God speaks to us here. Now. and today.3) and perhaps most important of all - our text has good news for us when our backs are up against the wall. God doesn’t leave us alone to squirm. God is a perfect Judge. And this is good news.