Luke 18:5-16

⁵yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will defend her, so that her endless coming doesn't wear me out!’ ”

⁶Then the Lord said: “Hear what the unjust judge said.

⁷And will not God get justice for His elect who are crying out to Him day and night, indeed being patient with them?

⁸I tell you that He will get justice for them quickly. However, when the Son of the Man comes, will He actually find the faith on the earth?”

⁹Then He told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised the rest:

¹⁰“Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.

¹¹The Pharisee stood and started praying to himself like this: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like all the rest—robbers, unjust, adulterers—or even like this tax collector.

¹²I fast twice a week; I tithe all that I get.’

¹³The tax collector, staying a good ways off, did not even venture to look up to heaven, but started beating on his chest, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner!’

¹⁴I say to you that this one went back home justified rather than that one; because everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

¹⁵Then they even started bringing their babies to Him, that He might touch them; but when the disciples saw it, they rebuked them.

¹⁶But Jesus summoned them and said: “Allow the little children to come to me, and do not hinder them; because the Kingdom of God is of such.