Genesis 4:1-15/Ephesians 2:1-10/St Luke 18:9-14
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen,
It is easy to hate the Pharisee. He’s an offensive character. His values don’t fit well with middle America. He’s a conceited bigot. The irony is that its easy to look down on him even as he looked down on the tax collector and get caught up in that sick spiral where you think you’re better than he is because you don’t think that you’re better than other people like he does. Except that you do. You think you’re better than him. That is our sin. We don’t think we are better than the tax collector. We think we’re better than the Pharisee.
First off, the Pharisees, as a group, tend to get a bad rep. Sure some were involved with the plot to murder Jesus. But they generally were not conniving, evil, vindictive men who gathered in dark corners, greedily stroking their beards, trying to bilk widows out of their last mites. By and large the Pharisees were pretty upstanding citizens. They were of the remnant of Israelites that had come our of captivity in Babylon, trying to retain their Hebrew religion in a pagan land. They had a modicum of faith left to them when so much of Israel had become pagan secularists.
The Pharisees were, in a sense, the upper echelon of Israel. They were separatists. You had all the regular believers - they once, maybe twice a year on Yom Kippur and perhaps Pentecost; they tithed of their incomes and went to Temple on major feasts.
Separated from them you had the Pharisees. They fasted twice a week! They gave tithes of everything they had, money, goods, food. Even down to the spices in their cupboards! They went to Temple regularly. Many of them knew the Torah by heart. They rigorously interpreted the covenant Law and were extremely pious men. Truth is, we could all stand to stop dogging on them so much and maybe be a bit more like them.
Because by comparison, the tax collector was the dregs of society. He receives less than honorable mention in the Pharisee’s prayer: I thank you that I am not like the rest of men: extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like that tax collector over there! He’s not the bottom rung, he’s below that. The Pharisees were considered heroes. The tax collectors were traitors. They were Israelites who sold themselves out to the Roman governors, working for the very regime that was oppressing their people. They collected money from their friends, neighbors, townsfolk on behalf of the enemy. And they earned their cut by taking more than required, usually at the point of a sword. The modern equivalent is not an IRS agent. Its a mobster. The tax collector wasn’t Tony Soprano, but he was a goodfella.
You see, this parable is hardly a parable at all. It is incredibly straightforward. And like most of Jesus’ parables, shocking in its extremities.
Two men went to church for worship. One guy was well dressed, clean, upstanding, middle class guy. He had a good job, was a descent father, never cheated on his wife, put some money in the plate and helped on church clean-up day. The other guy was a drug-slinging, child pornographer, tattooed up both arms, stinking of booze. Right. Polar opposites. Jesus goes to extremes to get his point across.
And the point is not: “Appearances can be deceiving.” Or “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” Its not even, “You can’t understand a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes.” The point Jesus is making is this: Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven. Good works. Fasting. Tithing. Its not enough. These things don’t get you into heaven.
From start to finish this parable is about one thing: justification. How one is made right with God. The problem with the Pharisee is not his prayer. You pray the same things as he. Don’t believe me? Visit Riley Children’s Hospital some time and you’ll see. We do pray in thanksgiving that our Lord has spared us the crosses of others. We are not like the child soldiers of Somalia or the veiled women of Afghanistan. We are not being murdered by Muslims in Egypt. We go home and hug our kids a little tighter after another horrific Planned Parenthood video. By comparison our burdens a relatively minor. Everyone suffers. Everyone bears crosses. Its not to say yours aren’t hard. They are. I know. But nothing has befallen you that is not common to man.
But this isn’t what’s wrong with the Pharisee. His problem is not his words, but his heart. He trusted in himself and despised others. He prays not to God, but with himself, and points out the tax collectors because he wants to be compared. He thinks it’ll make him look good. But it doesn’t. It only shows his sins. Maybe not greed and thievery and sexual immorality. All desires of the body; passions of the flesh. But contempt, the desire of the mind.
There are two religions in the world: one of works and one of grace; one of Law and one of Gospel. There are all other religions and then there is sacramental Christianity. What one thinks about worship, prayer, faith, baptism, good works - it all boils down to this: justification. How are you made right with God? Is it by sacrifice and works, like the Pharisee? Like Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Papism, Beth Moorism, every other -ism out there? Or is it by mercy? The sheer grace of God the Father given you through Jesus Christ His Son our Lord? Unmerited. Unearned. Undeserved.
This is what St Paul reiterates to the Christians in Ephesus. You were νεκροσ - dead, miserable corpses, lifeless flesh - in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked. But God, being superabundant in mercy, because of the mega love with which He loved you - even while you were rotting flesh - made you alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved! St Paul can’t even contain himself! By grace, through faith, which is itself a gift. Faith is a gift of God. Not the result of works. Your good works were prepared for you beforehand that you, recreated in Christ Jesus, may walk around in them.
This is the pure, un-ism-ed Gospel. You are saved by pure grace alone. Or you are not. This is the dividing line. The separation. This is what separated Abel from Cain. Job from his friends. Abraham from Abimelech. Isaac from Ishmael. Joseph from Potiphar. David from Saul. Mordecai from Haman. Daniel from Belshazzar. Joseph from Herod. The beggar Lazarus from the rich man. The Pharisee from the publican. What defines a man is not whether they are good or bad, but whether they believe in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and atoning sacrifice for all my sin.
This parable, like most of them, serves as a warning. What if we said, “Good thing for God that I’m here today. I have a lot to add to Him. He really needs me.” Or if we said, “There, I gave God my Sunday morning, that’s enough. The rest of the week is mine to spend as I want.” Or if we looked across the pew or the isle and thought, “What is she doing here?” “How come he keeps coming back.” Arrogance and pride breed contempt. Its dangerous to be impressed with what we do for God or give to the Church. Its not curiosity that killed the cat. It was pride.
Same as it was for Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, and you. Sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it. That is, do not think more highly of yourself than you ought. God doesn’t need your good works. He doesn’t eat the food the Pharisee fasts. He doesn’t spend the money the Pharisee tithes. He is not impressed with the handful of weeds you picked up on your way into church and call them flowers.
Repentance is needed. Come up to the House of the Lord and learn to believe and pray and worship as the tax collector. For this is true religion: to despair of your works and self-sacrifices, and to throw yourself on the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. This is the sacrifice He desires: a broken and contrite spirit. This He will not despise. For He is a God of mercy and of grace who loves to forgive.
And this is promise of the parable. For the tax collector went home justified. He flung himself upon God’s mercy in his desperation. He had no righteousness of his own. He was ashamed of the things that he had done. He hated the lies he told, the evil he committed against his own people and those who loved him. He wanted to do better. He wanted to start over. He need mercy. He needed a God would be propitiated toward him by virtue of another. He needed a Savior. A Redeemer.
And that’s why he was in the Temple. For at that very hour, the hour of prayer, the lamb was being slain and its blood being offered up on the altar for the sins of the people. The innocent one was dying for the guilty. The blood of the sacrifice was covering the condemnation of the Law. The wrath of God is appeased. The Lord is gracious and merciful, abounding in steadfast love.
And the One who is telling the parable is the One to whom the lamb points, Jesus Christ. Who humbled Himself to the point of death, even death upon a Cross. He is the Mercy-Seat Sacrifice of the Father on your behalf. His blood, poured out for you, covers your shame and guilt and fears and grants you His forgiveness. This is the greatness of the Father’s mercy: that Christ, the New Temple, the true Ark, and the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, has become your Savior, your Redeemer. His blood speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. It doesn’t cry from the ground, but pleads for you in heaven before the throne of God, interceding for you. His blood bespeaks you righteous.
For this is the Gospel: the Father takes Pharisees and through the Crucifixion of Christ, makes them tax collectors and then bestows on them the riches of heaven. He exalts you. He makes you sons.
Come up to the House and Table of the Lord, and receive the Once-For-All Sacrifice, the Body and Blood of the Lamb, slain for you. For by grace you have been saved. And you shall go home justified.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
In the Name + of JESUS. Amen,
It is easy to hate the Pharisee. He’s an offensive character. His values don’t fit well with middle America. He’s a conceited bigot. The irony is that its easy to look down on him even as he looked down on the tax collector and get caught up in that sick spiral where you think you’re better than he is because you don’t think that you’re better than other people like he does. Except that you do. You think you’re better than him. That is our sin. We don’t think we are better than the tax collector. We think we’re better than the Pharisee.
First off, the Pharisees, as a group, tend to get a bad rep. Sure some were involved with the plot to murder Jesus. But they generally were not conniving, evil, vindictive men who gathered in dark corners, greedily stroking their beards, trying to bilk widows out of their last mites. By and large the Pharisees were pretty upstanding citizens. They were of the remnant of Israelites that had come our of captivity in Babylon, trying to retain their Hebrew religion in a pagan land. They had a modicum of faith left to them when so much of Israel had become pagan secularists.
The Pharisees were, in a sense, the upper echelon of Israel. They were separatists. You had all the regular believers - they once, maybe twice a year on Yom Kippur and perhaps Pentecost; they tithed of their incomes and went to Temple on major feasts.
Separated from them you had the Pharisees. They fasted twice a week! They gave tithes of everything they had, money, goods, food. Even down to the spices in their cupboards! They went to Temple regularly. Many of them knew the Torah by heart. They rigorously interpreted the covenant Law and were extremely pious men. Truth is, we could all stand to stop dogging on them so much and maybe be a bit more like them.
Because by comparison, the tax collector was the dregs of society. He receives less than honorable mention in the Pharisee’s prayer: I thank you that I am not like the rest of men: extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like that tax collector over there! He’s not the bottom rung, he’s below that. The Pharisees were considered heroes. The tax collectors were traitors. They were Israelites who sold themselves out to the Roman governors, working for the very regime that was oppressing their people. They collected money from their friends, neighbors, townsfolk on behalf of the enemy. And they earned their cut by taking more than required, usually at the point of a sword. The modern equivalent is not an IRS agent. Its a mobster. The tax collector wasn’t Tony Soprano, but he was a goodfella.
You see, this parable is hardly a parable at all. It is incredibly straightforward. And like most of Jesus’ parables, shocking in its extremities.
Two men went to church for worship. One guy was well dressed, clean, upstanding, middle class guy. He had a good job, was a descent father, never cheated on his wife, put some money in the plate and helped on church clean-up day. The other guy was a drug-slinging, child pornographer, tattooed up both arms, stinking of booze. Right. Polar opposites. Jesus goes to extremes to get his point across.
And the point is not: “Appearances can be deceiving.” Or “Don’t judge a book by its cover.” Its not even, “You can’t understand a man until you’ve walked a mile in his shoes.” The point Jesus is making is this: Not everyone who says to Me, “Lord, Lord,” will enter the kingdom of heaven. Good works. Fasting. Tithing. Its not enough. These things don’t get you into heaven.
From start to finish this parable is about one thing: justification. How one is made right with God. The problem with the Pharisee is not his prayer. You pray the same things as he. Don’t believe me? Visit Riley Children’s Hospital some time and you’ll see. We do pray in thanksgiving that our Lord has spared us the crosses of others. We are not like the child soldiers of Somalia or the veiled women of Afghanistan. We are not being murdered by Muslims in Egypt. We go home and hug our kids a little tighter after another horrific Planned Parenthood video. By comparison our burdens a relatively minor. Everyone suffers. Everyone bears crosses. Its not to say yours aren’t hard. They are. I know. But nothing has befallen you that is not common to man.
But this isn’t what’s wrong with the Pharisee. His problem is not his words, but his heart. He trusted in himself and despised others. He prays not to God, but with himself, and points out the tax collectors because he wants to be compared. He thinks it’ll make him look good. But it doesn’t. It only shows his sins. Maybe not greed and thievery and sexual immorality. All desires of the body; passions of the flesh. But contempt, the desire of the mind.
There are two religions in the world: one of works and one of grace; one of Law and one of Gospel. There are all other religions and then there is sacramental Christianity. What one thinks about worship, prayer, faith, baptism, good works - it all boils down to this: justification. How are you made right with God? Is it by sacrifice and works, like the Pharisee? Like Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Papism, Beth Moorism, every other -ism out there? Or is it by mercy? The sheer grace of God the Father given you through Jesus Christ His Son our Lord? Unmerited. Unearned. Undeserved.
This is what St Paul reiterates to the Christians in Ephesus. You were νεκροσ - dead, miserable corpses, lifeless flesh - in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked. But God, being superabundant in mercy, because of the mega love with which He loved you - even while you were rotting flesh - made you alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved! St Paul can’t even contain himself! By grace, through faith, which is itself a gift. Faith is a gift of God. Not the result of works. Your good works were prepared for you beforehand that you, recreated in Christ Jesus, may walk around in them.
This is the pure, un-ism-ed Gospel. You are saved by pure grace alone. Or you are not. This is the dividing line. The separation. This is what separated Abel from Cain. Job from his friends. Abraham from Abimelech. Isaac from Ishmael. Joseph from Potiphar. David from Saul. Mordecai from Haman. Daniel from Belshazzar. Joseph from Herod. The beggar Lazarus from the rich man. The Pharisee from the publican. What defines a man is not whether they are good or bad, but whether they believe in Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the Living God, and atoning sacrifice for all my sin.
This parable, like most of them, serves as a warning. What if we said, “Good thing for God that I’m here today. I have a lot to add to Him. He really needs me.” Or if we said, “There, I gave God my Sunday morning, that’s enough. The rest of the week is mine to spend as I want.” Or if we looked across the pew or the isle and thought, “What is she doing here?” “How come he keeps coming back.” Arrogance and pride breed contempt. Its dangerous to be impressed with what we do for God or give to the Church. Its not curiosity that killed the cat. It was pride.
Same as it was for Adam and Eve, Cain and Abel, and you. Sin is crouching at the door. Its desire is for you, but you must rule over it. That is, do not think more highly of yourself than you ought. God doesn’t need your good works. He doesn’t eat the food the Pharisee fasts. He doesn’t spend the money the Pharisee tithes. He is not impressed with the handful of weeds you picked up on your way into church and call them flowers.
Repentance is needed. Come up to the House of the Lord and learn to believe and pray and worship as the tax collector. For this is true religion: to despair of your works and self-sacrifices, and to throw yourself on the mercy of God in Christ Jesus. This is the sacrifice He desires: a broken and contrite spirit. This He will not despise. For He is a God of mercy and of grace who loves to forgive.
And this is promise of the parable. For the tax collector went home justified. He flung himself upon God’s mercy in his desperation. He had no righteousness of his own. He was ashamed of the things that he had done. He hated the lies he told, the evil he committed against his own people and those who loved him. He wanted to do better. He wanted to start over. He need mercy. He needed a God would be propitiated toward him by virtue of another. He needed a Savior. A Redeemer.
And that’s why he was in the Temple. For at that very hour, the hour of prayer, the lamb was being slain and its blood being offered up on the altar for the sins of the people. The innocent one was dying for the guilty. The blood of the sacrifice was covering the condemnation of the Law. The wrath of God is appeased. The Lord is gracious and merciful, abounding in steadfast love.
And the One who is telling the parable is the One to whom the lamb points, Jesus Christ. Who humbled Himself to the point of death, even death upon a Cross. He is the Mercy-Seat Sacrifice of the Father on your behalf. His blood, poured out for you, covers your shame and guilt and fears and grants you His forgiveness. This is the greatness of the Father’s mercy: that Christ, the New Temple, the true Ark, and the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world, has become your Savior, your Redeemer. His blood speaks a better word than the blood of Abel. It doesn’t cry from the ground, but pleads for you in heaven before the throne of God, interceding for you. His blood bespeaks you righteous.
For this is the Gospel: the Father takes Pharisees and through the Crucifixion of Christ, makes them tax collectors and then bestows on them the riches of heaven. He exalts you. He makes you sons.
Come up to the House and Table of the Lord, and receive the Once-For-All Sacrifice, the Body and Blood of the Lamb, slain for you. For by grace you have been saved. And you shall go home justified.
In the Name of the Father and + of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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