It’s often said in our times, “Pray for something once and let it go. Trust that God heard you and that he will do what’s best for you. To keep on praying for the same thing is a lack of faith—you’ve got to just trust God.” It sounds reasonable. But it’s not what Jesus said.

“Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up. He said: “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 the 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.” Luke 18:1 (emphasis added)

Jesus told us (as his disciples) to keep on praying for the same thing (within Biblical boundaries of course) and to not give up until we get it. He wants us to be so engaged with him, so involved in asking him for things that when we get them, there is no doubt that our Father did it!

The Hindus of India said something similar to Mother Teresa when she began helping the poor and dying in Calcutta. Of course, they referred to karma (paying for one’s sins from another life—another version of “suffering the consequences”) yet what I hear from many Christians stems from the same root.

Jesus, on the other hand placed a high value on our helping others–to the point of assigning eternal punishment to those who don’t. (Matthew 25:31-46 I didn’t write it. You’ll have to take it up with him!) He placed no qualifications on that help, saying, “Give to the one who asks you, and do not turn away from the one who wants to borrow from you.”(Matthew 5:42)

But doesn’t the Bible say that trials and suffering build character? Yes, but the context is always that of suffering persecution for being a follower of Jesus, not the day to day difficulties of life that God’s people are to band together to alleviate (Acts 2:44,45; 2 Corinthians 8:13-15) When Paul could avoid even the “beneficial” kind of suffering, he did. (Acts 9:25)

The “elder brother” in Jesus’ parable of the runaway son would have liked to have seen his little brother “learn a lesson” from God (represented in the parable by his father) after his bad behavior. (Luke 15:30). I suppose he thought it would be more appropriate to have him sleep in the barn in his rags. Instead, to what must have been the elder son’s utter astonishment, his father didn’t punish his runaway son, but celebrated his return, welcoming him with open arms!