“Mouths wide open—learning dependence on God!”
The stormy weather we had through the week blew this nest out of a tree right under our pergola. It reminded me of when I was a kid. We had a huge gumtree in the back yard covered with ivy and it was a popular nesting place for pigeons. Each time that there was stormy weather, there would inevitably be a nest with a baby pigeon or two on the ground.
Most didn’t survive but I remember one time there was one which was still alive. Dad looked after it in the tool shed. He put it in a cardboard box filled with ripped up sheets of paper and mushed up some bread in water to drop into its mouth. The baby bird cheeped incessantly, waiting to be fed, and I’ll never forget how it managed to flip its head back to open its mouth wide like a funnel.
A baby bird cannot feed itself. It is dependent on the parent to feed it. A baby bird opens its mouth in anticipation, in trust, that it will be fed and its hunger satisfied, because their very life depends on it. This is the picture given in today’s Psalm, Psalm 81. It is a picture of God desiring to give his abundant blessing to his people…yet they did not come to him for it.
Psalm 81 recounts God’s faithfulness to his promises to his ancient people in the past—how he had saved them for life with him—but is also a reminder of where things had gone wrong in their relationship with him. When God’s people were in slavery in Egypt, they were completely helpless and powerless. God had to lead his people to this point so that they could see the end of their ability in themselves, and instead learn to depend on him, like baby birds, opening their mouths wide in anticipation of being fed. He had redeemed them from a land with a foreign language to them; the land of Egypt where they had been enslaved: “I relieved your shoulder of the burden; your hands were freed from the basket.” They were freed from gathering straw to make bricks under the harsh labour of Pharoah’s army. In distress they called, and God delivered them. He brought them up out of the land of Egypt, and said “Open wide your mouth, and I will fill it.”
Yet the irony was that even though baby birds know when they should open their mouths wide in trust for their parents to feed them, God’s Old Testament people did not. They did not open their mouths wide for their Father in heaven to feed them. They did not heed his voice. They sought fulfilment in many other places. They turned away from the living God who would graciously share his life and blessing with his people, to lifeless blocks of wood that cannot give life or blessing. They trusted in the idols of their neighbours for prosperity and fertility. They trusted in foreign rulers to gain victory for them rather than God. They trusted in mediums and false prophets for their guidance. So God said:
“But my people did not listen to my voice;
Israel would not submit to me.
So I gave them over to their stubborn hearts,
to follow their own counsels.
Oh, that my people would listen to me,
that Israel would walk in my ways! (Psalm 81:11-13).
God gave them over to their own stubborn hearts. He let them have what they wanted so much. That’s how God brings judgment. Rather than destroy us, he lets us follow our own counsel and therein lets us be our own undoing of ourselves, that we might learn by the errors of our ways and return to him in repentant trust and obedience.
As our Refresh bible study course has unfolded, we have learned more than right answers from a catechism, but we have heard how God has been at work throughout the history of his people from the time of Creation to the early church, always taking the initiative to come to us to share with us his own holy life and blessing. He has worked through extraordinary ways to teach his people to not lean on our own understanding, but rely completely on God, as undeserving beggars, and, when things make no sense to our logic or reason, to trust his word to us.
The Catechism points us back to the word, and to the Word made flesh, our Lord Jesus Christ, who continues his ministry in his church today as the unseen Bishop and overseer of our souls; the unseen Pastor who comes to his people through word and sacrament to do what is impossible for us to do by our own strength: create and nurture faith, that we might not just know about him, but know him personally, and that by believing we might have life in his name.
Like God’s people of old we too are to be like baby birds, with mouths wide open, waiting for God to provide for us. We are to learn this posture of dependence, one of waiting, and listening. We are not to lean on our own understanding but constantly return to the revelation of God’s wisdom in his word. We are to not look to satisfy our hunger and thirst for our deep spiritual needs in anyone or anything else, but cling to Christ and commit our lives to his hands. The heavens and the earth, and all that is in them, even our own lives, and the church, are all his, so rather than spending our days making our own plans, we are to seek God’s will, for our plans we invest so much into will never be better than his.
And so as people born again by water and the Spirit we are to do in God’s strength what looks like foolishness to human eyes: we are to daily drown the sinful nature and not work for wisdom, satisfaction, approval, or any of our physical, emotional and spiritual needs in the things of this life, but we are to live in new life; life by the Spirit, by which we simply look away from ourselves, and look to God, waiting on him, like baby birds in the nest, with mouths wide open, expectantly looking to God to come through with his promises for us.
Our Father in heaven is always ready to hear our cries to him. That is the message of Jesus in today’s Gospel reading. Jesus tells this parable to his disciples so they will not give up praying, in their life and ministry in the world with all its temptations and perils. They will be persecuted and attacked, and they will know the same brokenness and suffering in their own lives as those to whom they minister in his name. They will know the pressures and anxieties of having only enough from one day to the next. It might be easy to think that God had forgotten them, but God was teaching them to rely on him from day to day. So Jesus teaches his disciples this parable to encourage them to keep on praying in the midst of the trials they would face.
A widow was being treated unfairly and was desperately in need of justice. Widows in ancient times didn’t have the services people do today to help them. As this widow has no advocate she can only keep on coming to the judge—but the judge is corrupt. He is completely disinterested in justice, neither fearing God, nor caring about anyone else. He is only interested in himself and didn’t want to be bothered by someone whom the society of the day considered so insignificant.
What’s this widow to do!? She is desperate! The only option she has is to keep on coming to this corrupt judge. She pleads to him: `Grant me justice against my adversary.’ Eventually, the corrupt judge grants her request. He doesn’t do this because he cares about her—but because he’s fed up with her; sick and tired of her continual bother. He finally caves in to her, and gives her what she wants, so he can get her off of his back!
In my first years as a pastor, I met an elderly lady in hospital who was chronically ill. Her husband was also ill, with dementia. He did not even know who his wife was or recognise her when he saw her. He couldn’t stay at home without his wife at home to look after him. Their family lived interstate and couldn’t be close by to help them. But the hospital couldn’t keep them together in the same room, and there wasn’t even enough room for them to be in the same hospital, so they lived in two separate hospitals in two different towns.
This lady prayed desperately to God for his help and guidance for months. There seemed to be no answer. The lady was convinced that because of some sin she had committed in the past that God refused to hear her and was punishing her. She said to me: “It’s no use pastor, God doesn’t hear me anymore he refuses to listen.”
Perhaps you know someone who thinks like that too. How could we respond in such a situation?
It took months to break through with God’s truth and bring peace for this lady, and it was this parable that did it. If an unjust judge will grant this poor widow in the parable an answer to what she is pleading for, how much more will our Father in Heaven hear us!
It is in Christ that today’s parable and Psalm 81 are both fulfilled. Jesus freed us from an even greater slavery than God’s people in Egypt: He freed us from sin, death and the power of the devil, not with silver or gold, but his own holy and precious blood. And so Jesus knows what it is like to feel abandoned by God. Even though Jesus was innocent, he was forsaken on the Cross and indeed is the only One who has been forsaken by his Father, when he cried out “My God my God, why have you forsaken me?”
It is because of the Cross we know that Jesus was abandoned by his Father in Heaven so that we never would be. It is because of Jesus that we can be sure our Father in heaven is pleased to hear our prayers in Jesus’ name, for by Christ crucified that we are reconciled to God. How much more, then, than a dodgy magistrate is God concerned about justice! How much more than a corrupt, selfish judge will God want to hear us and help us!
When the circumstances in our lives are painful and burdensome, and our prayers seem unanswered, we might feel that God is deaf to us and he is far away from us. Yet if the unjust judge in the parable had have immediately granted the widow’s request, she wouldn’t have needed to keep returning to him. Perhaps that might be why our prayers are not answered in the timeframe we would like them to be, so that we keep on going to God, crying out day and night. Because continually going to God is more important than the outcomes for which we ask. Prayer is the daily posture of recognising our human limits and submitting ourselves under the rule of our Heavenly King.
Life is stormy. That is why God came to earth in the Person of Christ, that we might have life, and have it abundantly. The Cross shows us that God does not act out of self-interest but out of concern for others. God doesn’t get fed up with us; he isn’t sick and tired of our continual coming, he doesn’t get annoyed or bothered with us. We don’t have to wear God down so that he finally capitulates and gives in to what we ask him for because he wants us off his back. He is merciful and compassionate, always ready to listen.
When things are going well in our Christian life, it can be very easy to forget all about God. But when things are not going well, God has a way of using these situations to teach us that our lives are not ours to control, and that we need to depend on him, who makes a way where there would otherwise be no way.
Children of God, do not lose heart no matter how hard life becomes, but keep on praying to the end—for he has chosen you to be his own. In the times that God seems distant, remember that Jesus suffered and died for you so that you would never be forsaken or abandoned by God; never unheard by him. How much more than a corrupt judge will our just, gracious, compassionate and loving God hear you, and bring about what is just and right according to his will! God has come to you to give you true life, full life, life forever, that no one else, and nothing else can. So no matter what you are faced with in life, come to him, with mouths wide open that he might fill them. Come to him, and keep calling out to him, knowing that he is always pleased to listen to you for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
Pastor Tim Ebbs
St Paul’s Lutheran Church, Glenelg
Ordinary Time, 2025
Application points: how could this parable help you respond to someone who feels like God would never want to hear us?
Note: this is not intended to be an exhaustive list or a perfect step-by-step instruction of how to get results, but just ideas and suggestions as a guide only that needs to be adapted to each context
Pray for an opportunity to share your faith and tell this parable with someone who needs to hear it!
Study this parable and know it. You won’t be able to help someone else engage with the Good News of this parable if you don’t know it and how it applies to you yourself!
Work on building positive relationships with those around you—those you are friends with, your neighbours, work colleagues, the retail attendant who you recognize serves you regularly. Ask them how they are. Be intentional about showing care and concern for them. This kind of relationship building takes years, but it is worth it!
Keep praying!
Look for openings to share the practical aspects of your faith when the opportunity presents itself—for example, when those you talk with ask if you have a busy week, tell them what you’ll be doing in your volunteering capacity at St Paul’s. If they ask if you’re doing anything on the weekend, tell them that you’ll be going to church, and explain where St Paul’s (or whatever your local congregation) is.
Invite them to come with you to one of the activities of the congregation. Note: one of the main reasons people feel uncomfortable in coming to worship on Sundays is that it is a completely foreign environment to them, in which they know no one else. We would feel the same about going to a new facility on our own for the first time without anyone with us!
Of course, invite them to come with you to worship, but inviting them to come to one of the activities of the congregation (e.g Music nite, Latte Ladies, Wednesday community meal) might be a more appropriate first step of connecting with a church for them, where the goal is to meet some more people from the congregation without the added pressure of navigating through an entire worship service.
If they share a difficult situation in their life with you, welcome this! Be patient and non-judgmental with them. Give them permission to share further with you, if they are comfortable doing so.
If the person bears some kind of great guilt and/or shame, it is crucial that you validate what they feel! To not do so would make you just another person in their life they feel they cannot trust. They may likely assert that they feel God would never listen to them (this would most likely come to the surface somewhere between points 6-8 above). They may feel ‘unclean’ because of the great shame they try to hide. They may likely express deep hurt and anger. At this point, seek to reflect back to them what they feel! (“I’m so sorry to hear what has happened and that you feel like that…”). Avoid moralizing (“You should forgive and forget…you shouldn’t feel that way…you just need to…”).
Many people in these circumstances have a mental image of the church only heaping more condemnation and judgment upon them, and the thought of coming is unbearable.
Ask if you may share the hope you have—that we have a God who delights in hearing our prayers.
- Jesus told a story about that once—about a widow who was seeking justice against her adversary. Her only hope was to keep going to the judge in the town, but he was corrupt. He neither feared God or cared about people.
- Finally, the judge granted the widow what she asked for, because she was wearing him out with her continual coming to him, and he wanted her off of his back!
- This is a story about God and you too.
- God is not like the unjust judge in the parable, so how much more will God grant us what we ask of him.
- God did not spare his own Son Jesus, but gave his own life up for us all on the Cross. Jesus was crucified, and his shed blood is the price to reconcile us to God so that we have a place in his kingdom. Our Father in heaven is always ready to listen to our prayers, because that is exactly why he sent his Son, to bring us into a personal relationship with him.
