Luke 18:2

Ver. 2-8. We have here the parable, and the interpretation thereof, both, Luke 18:1, in the proparabole, or the words immediately going before it, and also in an epiparabole, or some words following it, which sufficiently explain our Saviour's scope and intention in it, viz. To assure his people, that though the Lord show a great deal of patience towards wicked men, who are the enemies of his people, and doth not presently answer their cries for a deliverance of them out of their hand; yet if they go on crying to him, he will most certainly at length deliver them. To this purpose he tells them a matter of fact, which either had happened, or might happen in the world. There was in a city a judge, which feared not God, & c.: from hence he concludes, arguing from the lesser to the greater, and indeed there is an emphasis in every part of the comparison.

1. This was an unjust judge; God is a righteous Judge.

2. He did this for a stranger; God's people are his own elect. Then he assures them, that God would avenge them speedily. We may from this discourse of our Saviour observe several things.

1. That all the wrongs and injuries which the people of God suffer in this life should make them fervent and frequent in prayer to God for redressing them.

2. That notwithstanding their prayers, God may bear with their enemies long, for so much time as they shall think a long time.

3. If God's people do not faint, but continue night and day crying to him, God will hear them, and avenge them of their adversaries. The power that importunity hath upon sinful men, may confirm us in this thing, and ought to engage us to pray without ceasing and fainting. Nevertheless when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? When Christ shall come to judgment, he will find very few whose hearts have not fainted; there will be multitudes who are fallen away, through the power that temptations have upon the frailty of human nature. By faith here seems to be understood the true and proper effects of faith, growing out of it as the fruit out of the root. This premonition of our Saviour also served for an excellent caution to his disciples, that they would watch, and take care that they might be none of that part of the stars of heaven, which by the dragon's tail should be cast down to the earth.