There is an old story about a tailor who visits his rabbi and says, “I have a problem with my prayers”.
If someone comes to me and says, ‘Mendel, you’re a wonderful tailor,’ that makes me feel good. I feel appreciated. I can go on feeling good for a whole week, even longer on the strength of one compliment like that.
But if people came to me every day, one after another, hour after hour, and kept saying to me ‘Mendel, you’re a wonderful tailor,’ over and over again it would drive me crazy. This is what bothers me about prayer.
Is God so insecure that He needs us praising him every day? Three times a day, morning, noon, and night? It seems to me it would drive Him crazy.”
The rabbi smiled and said, “Mendel, you’re absolutely right. You have no idea how hard it is for God to listen to all of our praises, hour after hour, day after day. But God knows how important it is for us to utter that praise, so in His great love for us, He tolerates all of our prayers.” (From Who Needs God? written by Harold Kushner )
In telling the parable of the Persistent Widow, Jesus is teaching the disciples to pray with persistence.
Submitted by Fr. Joseph Dovari