Will There Be Found Any Faith..."In This Age?"

Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night?
Will he be slow to answer them? 
I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily. 
But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth? Luke 18:1-8

This Text is part of the gospel reading for the 20th. Sunday, year "C". Through the image of a parable, Jesus gives us another lesson on prayer, “… to pray always without becoming weary.” The question is never, will God hear my prayer, rather, when ( speedily ) and how ( justly ).

I think it would be true to say, that everyone has given up on prayer a some time or other; either because it seems to be lost in time, or we fail to recognize and understand how it has been answered. In Mtt. 6:8, in the instruction on the "Our Father", Jesus reminds that the Father knows what we need, even before we ask. We start off in prayer with what we think is our need and how soon we need it. This is good to to get prayer going. It is here that "faith" becomes all important. Faith dismisses the question of will God hear and answer my prayer, and turns it to a question of discernment, how is my prayer being answer?

These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life. This is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.… 1 John 5:13-15

"If we ask ... according to his will ..." This is the justice we are seeking. The word justice means to be in line with what is true and right. To justify is to make two separate parts line up precisely, so that they fit together perfectly.

Now this understanding of prayer might lead some to ask, why make petition in prayer to God at all? Since God already knows what is to be done, why pray? Here of course we are not talking about "praying to win the lottery, or the hockey game. 

We pray, not to change God's mind, rather to change our's. We bring our small and limited grasp of the situation to prayer, so that it might be fulfilled, that is, filled up, expanded in ways far beyond what we would have imagined. When the man, who was born blind, reached out to Jesus to make him able to see, Jesus opened his eyes, not simply for him to have physical sight, but to see more deeply into the mystery of God's plan for his blindness, for his healing and for his new purpose in life.

As Jesus passed by, He saw a man blind from birth. And His disciples asked Him, "Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he would be born blind?" Jesus answered, "It was neither that this man sinned, nor his parents; but it was so that the works of God might be displayed in him.… John 9:1

Clearly, the disciples were incorrect in assuming this man's blindness was punishment for sin. Blindness can be a result of the imperfection of the natural order. Modern medicine has discovered ways to intervene in such conditions and in some cases restore sight. No doubt grace can be a part of such a process. People of faith recognize this and praise God for such giftedness in man. But if praying for healing does not experience the recovery of sight, does this mean the prayers are rejected?  No, something greater is at work and we must continue in prayer to discover what. No prayer, made in faith will be rejected. Knowing this, first brings peace to our hearts in our situation. Now this "prayer of faith", sets out to lead us ever deeper into the mystery of God's greater plan for us, and how this situation will bring glory to God and fulfillment far beyond all our imagining. 

The Christian Life rest on the foundation of prayer.
Prayer rests on the foundation of Faith.
When the Lord comes to answer our prayer, 
how will we know,
how will we see him, 
unless through the "eyes of faith"?
The Prayer of Faith will not fall silent.