Strength Of The Word

Our promise is that for the week, we shall be led to a widow woman in her weakness, fully noting how God is for us also in our weak times. We begin with a woman who is a widow in one of the parables which Jesus told. This parable is found in Luke 18: 1 – 8. For our receiving this week however, we shall be led through verse five.

Yet because this widow troubles me I will avenge her, lest by her continual coming she weary me.  Luke 18: 5.

In this parable, as Jesus teaches on importune prayer, these words of His, teach us much about the silent, weak, unrecognized power of the spirit of a widow, who is resilient, persistent, vigilant and diligent in her receiving. Albeit,  has not our Lord shown us and given us sound wisdom on how God’s Power is seen in the weak? Has He not shown how God uses the simple, the helpless and the foolish things of this world to confound the wise?

Who is a widow? We know that a widow is a person whose husband is deceased. More so, in long ago days, although it still obtains, perhaps to a lesser extent, the fact of widowhood was grave. Widowhood meant:  –

• Her husband is dead, therefore she is without the spouse she once had.

• Her household was without a head, ruler, or patriarch to provide and take care of his own.

• Her family was without a father to love and direct them.

The widow was usually left very poor, bereft in most cases and in need of much help. God is aware of all this and is specially tender, loving and caring of them and all who as they are. Catch it here! Don’t miss it! Don’t, let it go by unnoted! Yes it is the phrase, all who are as they are. This is telling us that although one may not be a widow in the clinical sense of the word, many a man and woman share the same, emotional, constraining and spiritual poverty. This offering is for all who, in utter humility and dire simplicity, can and will identify with such poverty in whichever form, be it spiritual, emotional, mental or physical.

Loving Father, whose enduring concern for Your needy children is undiminished, thank You for undying hope. Sustain us and lift our drooping heads higher and higher in faith and trust, as we receive more and more of Your teaching grace. Amen!

Here is an unarguable statement. God has a special place in his heart for widows. There is no distinction here, for widows are all placed together as one, in the eyes of Father God. What do you make of this? You shall not afflict any widow or fatherless child. If you afflict them in any way, and they cry at all to Me, I will surely hear their cry; and My wrath will become hot, and I will kill you with the sword; your wives shall be widows, and your children fatherless. Exodus 22: 22 – 24. What I see here, is how very much God is covering, watching, seeking and ensuring the care of widows and orphans.

James keeps widows high in our service to God. Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world. James 1: 27

The singular point being made with all this, is that widows are specially looked upon, and dearly held in deep favour and grace by God. Intentionally, He has given us the responsibility of ensuring that they do not go in want or need.

The word for us all who are as widows, poor and in dire need, you are not forgotten by God. He knows you and knows your weak and helpless situation and has already made His provisions for your help.

Believe! Believe on the basis of the Scriptures even, for God’s spoken and given Word is immutable. Confess and proclaim, like the psalmist.

Remember the word to Your servant, upon which You have caused me to hope. This is my comfort in my affliction, for You word has given me life. Psalm 119:50