Luke 11:8 –
“But I tell you this—though he won’t do it for friendship’s sake, if you keep knocking long enough, he will get up and give you whatever you need because of your shameless persistence.”
This comes right after the Lord’s Prayer and becomes one of the corner stones of prosperity preaching. Basically, a man needs bread at midnight and starts asking his friend. Now this verse is interesting in a way, since the friend does not take no for an answer. I would have a tough time knocking at a friend’s door for anything at midnight. At the same time we have 24 hour gas stations and groceries so really we would never need to do this.
Jesus follows this with an explanation that you should never give up on God. Keep asking and eventually God likes persistence and He will follow through. Now this is where the prosperity preaching starts to get exciting. Since the scripture says keep asking and you will eventually receive. Now what does that mean? You keep asking for the Lottery and eventually you’ll win? Honestly how many people in the world are asking for a windfall like this? There are not enough lotteries in the world to cover these numbers!
Now take this a few verses later and Jesus compares God giving gifts like a father, where he would not give a snake if his son asked for a fish. One could argue we are asking for a snake when asking for the lottery winnings. I mean think about it … the love of money is the “root” of all evil, so why should God give us poison? Also, how many of us have friends or family who are sick or lost that we have prayed over for years and nothing happens? They end up dying from their illness and our persistent prayers of healing appeared ignored.
Now that I have crushed hope in prayers being answered, does that mean stop? No way! This verse is true on many levels. Even the prosperity preachers can fall on this passage with a great level of confidence, since there are many stories that prove this as fact. I think the end of Bruce Almighty actually clarifies our discussion with God, his prayer goes from save the world to a heartfelt unselfish prayer. Maybe that is what God means be persistent, so we can search out what God is wanting? If we go back to the basis of this “theology” it actually stems from a man wanting to help his guest and not himself! And if we tie it back to the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus asks “your will be done” and not “our will be done!” So pray persistent, but learn each and every day why you need persistence, so you can get that pray spot on.