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Robes and Rags
October 27, 2013
The following are true stories from Associated Press, San Jose Mercury News and UPI.
Robert Puelo, 32, was apparently being disorderly in a St. Louis market, when a clerk threatened to call police. Puelo grabbed a hotdog, shoved it in his mouth and walked out without paying for it. Police found him unconscious in front of the store. When paramedics arrived they removed the six-inch wiener from his throat, where it had choked him to death.
A man at a party popped a blasting cap into his mouth and bit down, triggering an explosion that blew off his lips, teeth and tongue, according to state police. Jerry Stromyer, 24, bit the blasting cap as a prank during a party late Tuesday night, said Police Cpl. M.D. Payne. “Another man had it in an aquarium hooked to a battery and was trying to explode it,” Payne said. “It wouldn’t go off so this guy said, “I’ll show you how to set it off.’”
An unidentified San Jose man, using a shotgun like a club to break a former girlfriend’s windshield, accidentally shot himself to death when the gun discharged, blowing a hole in his gut.
Police said a lawyer demonstrating the safety of windows in a downtown Toronto Skyscraper, crashed through a pane with his shoulder and plunged 24-floors to his death. Garry Hoy, 39, fell into the courtyard of the Toronto Dominion Bank Tower early Friday evening as he was explaining the strength of the building’s windows to visiting law students. Hoy previously had conducted demonstrations of window strength according to police reports. Peter Lawyers, managing partner of the firm Holiday-Day and Wilson, told the Toronto Sun, that Hoy was one of the best and brightest members of the 200-man firm.
Okay, one more. The Hickory Daily Record reports that Ken Barger, 47, accidentally shot himself to death in an incident in Newton, North Carolina. When awakening to the sound of a ringing telephone beside his bed, he reached for the phone but grabbed instead a Smith and Wesson .38 Special, which discharged when he drew it to his ear.
Each one of these cases involved careless people who thought they had superior knowledge or felt they could prove their superiority. True, Mr. Barger was waking when he thought his pistol was the telephone, but the others were self secure in their knowledge that destroyed them. People that are so sure of themselves and their position in society and religion can be anywhere among us and easy to find. Such attitudes are born of cancerous self esteem growing erratically through spirits, which Messiah warned about in Luke 14. That is where Jesus was invited to a banquet where a lawyer set a trap to find out where Yeshua would seat himself, but the Master knew the invitation was a trick and instructed them to sit in the low seat and let others place you in your proper position of authority or stature. A self-righteous person will gladly sit at the head table.
Our focus scripture passage is Luke 18, beginning with verse nine through 14. The parable is told by the Master of a scene at the Temple involving a Pharisee and tax collector, people who were at the opposite ends of respect in Jewish society. The Pharisee would have held a high political rank at the time this story was told. His status would have meant others would praise him and desire his favor and kind words. To speak evil of a Pharisee would be frowned upon since to some, they were good guys. Also Pharisees were the source of much religious and social conflict, disagreeing with the more elite Sadducees. Pharisees claimed authority from Moses for their interpretation of the Law. The word “claimed” is central to this story since Pharisees placed themselves in the position of authority, much as some leaders in religion today gain their standing through political maneuvering.
This self-righteousness attitude promoted a public assurance that God would certainly respond to Pharisees since they acted like God condoned their position with Him. However, self-righteousness has other words generally associated with such self-positioning, such as sententiousness, moral superiority and holier-than-thou. The Pharisee referred to in this story by Messiah was happy to show the despised tax collector that his beliefs and actions were from a much greater virtue than “that sinner” there in the corner.
Self-righteousness promotes hypocrisy, since the disease does its best to hide faults normally exhibited by imperfect humanity. Since a righteous person is made perfect in the sight of God through grace, the self-righteous cannot admit that it took grace to make him perfect.
Psychology has a different clinical word for self-righteousness, and that word is “narcissism,” which is a negative mental condition or personality disorder; something to overcome. The term comes from Greek mythology. Narcissus fell in love with his own image reflected in a pool of water. Can you understand how our modern-day promotion of self-esteem leads to self-righteousness, when the reflection a person receives from others is much greater than reality?
Other descriptions of narcissism include superiority complex, elitism, egotism, vanity and arrogant pride. We all know from life experiences that the self-righteous are convinced that they have the right to set themselves in a position of judging others, since without their demonstration of judging they fail to appear to others as righteous as they see themselves.
The master addressed these people who are full of self-injected piety when he told the story in the Sermon on the Mount of the splinter and beam. Matthew chapter seven opens with the words, “Judge not, that you may not be judged, for with the same judgment that you judge, you will be judged and with the same measure with which you measure, it will be measured to you.” If that were not clear enough, verses three through five read, “Why do you see the splinter which is in your brother’s eye and not the feel the beam which is in your own eye? Or how can you say to your brother, let me take out the splinter from your eye, and behold there is a beam in your own eye? Oh hypocrites, first take out the beam from your own eye, and then you will see clearly to get out the splinter from your brother’s eye.” Right fighters are the ones with the beams in their eyes.
These words from the Sermon on the Mount fit perfectly with this parable in Luke 18, except the very words spoken by the Pharisee wrapped his true attitude into a perfect bundle to show the depths of his soul, which was not pretty.
The Teacher set the scene this way, “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.”
The tax collector has been described here many times. These guys would bid on how much money they could take from the occupied people and give to the Romans. The highest bid got the job, while understanding that anything they could collect over the bid was theirs to keep. These tax collectors were not Romans, but brothers among the population who willingly ripped off their own people to benefit the Romans and themselves. The fact that a person would even take such a job meant he would submit to open and expressed hatred by his own. You can see how remarkable it was that Jesus would select Matthew as a disciple, since he was a tax collector in Capernaum. Still, what better example of redemption could there be that one so hated would or even could follow Christ.
In the parable in Luke 18, we know that both men went up to the Temple to pray. The Pharisee was there because he believed he was where he belonged, and the tax collector because he didn’t belong, but desired forgiveness for his actions against his own people. With this information, you can see why the Pharisee prayed what he did, which was, “Oh God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of men, extortioners, grafters, adulterers, and not like this tax collector.” He nailed it. This is what tax collectors did. Extortion was their trade and what they couldn’t extort, they used graft. If money couldn’t be collected, they resorted to taking anything they could, including committing adultery.”
Can you see the level of judging happening here? In effect, the Pharisee was gossiping, naming the sins of the man in the corner to make himself look good in the eyes of God. He SO stepped on another person’s guilt in an attempt to convince God of his goodness and appear righteous. Then, he started in on the list to convince the tax collector how he was scum. But wait, wouldn’t the tax collector already recognize his position since his critic was a Pharisee, dressed in his religious robes standing in the Temple? Still, the list of bragging started, “I fast twice a week, I give tithes on everything I earn.” Obviously, the tax collector didn’t do these things. He was rubbing it in, telling this man how horrible he was while exposing those faults to God! Talk about having a beam in his eye!
This is when Messiah started with His analysis of the situation. Verse 13 reads, “But the tax collector stood afar off, and he would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but smote his breast, saying, Oh God, be merciful to me a sinner.” Where’s the criticism of the Pharisee? Why didn’t the tax collector start in with a list of wrong-doings by the Pharisee? He could have told God that unlike this Pharisee, he was not self-righteous and his position of authority over others was because he had to earn a living. The list of the Pharisee’s sins could have included judging others and gossip, accusations and condemnation of God’s children. But had he done that, he would have stooped as low as the Pharisee, joining his self-righteous charade.
One of these men needed an attitude adjustment and the other needed forgiveness and grace. Which one do you think God favored? The Teacher said, “I say to you that this man [the tax collector] went down to his house more righteous than the Pharisee.” Was he saying that acknowledging one’s true position is more important than self-righteousness? Could he mean that confession is more important than hiding faults from God? Did the Master mean that criticizing another by listing their faults before God and man is an exercise in evil?
The declaration was made by Messiah that the tax collector was more righteous than the Pharisee, yet we don’t see the Pharisee placing his robe on the tax collector; self-righteousness never honors another.
We have a world absorbed with ego and self-esteem promotion so we will all feel good about ourselves. However, we don’t see God endorsing the Pharisee even with his fasting, tithing and declaration that he’s better than the tax collector.
With everything laid out in this parable, the summary comes to the statement by Jesus, “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled; and everyone who humbles himself will be exalted.” Was this not the very character of the one who is the Son of God?
Psychology is quite correct when we learn from it that we can’t change what we don’t acknowledge. Let’s accept the words from the famous Dr. Phil when he asks a person with a failed relationship due to their actions, “How’s that working for you?” Can we as humanity come to the realization that our righteousness is as filthy rags in the eyes of God and all the puffing up we might do is futile? Consider this parable of the Pharisee and tax collector this way; the greatest hypocrisy always belongs to the one who attempts to regulate his brother. Asking God to approve of you while putting down your brother never has, and never will work with God or man. Both will object either silently or verbally.
An old hymn comes to mind you might remember. The title is, “Humble Thyself.” A quick survey of hymn books and research shows this song was put to music in 1909 and widely distributed, however this hymn is published in only 13 hymnals today. The song was widely used until the early ‘70’s when it virtually disappeared. This was the same time when the concept of self esteem became a darling of pop psychology. A New Jersey preacher and clothing merchant, Johnson Oatman, wrote the song with a first verse that reads; “If thou wouldst have the dear Savior from heaven, walk by thy side from the morn till the evening, there is a rule that each day you must follow: Humble thyself to walk with God.”
From the website, Sermon Illustrations, comes a story ideal for this lesson. Booker T. Washington, the renowned black educator was an outstanding example that finding truly humble people is rare. Shortly after he took over the presidency of Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, he was walking in an exclusive section of town when he was stopped by a wealthy white woman. Not knowing the famous Mr. Washington by sight, she asked if he would like to earn a few dollars by chopping wood for her. Because he had no pressing business at the moment, Professor Washington smiled, rolled up his sleeves, and proceeded to do the humble chore she had requested. When he was finished, he carried the logs into the house and stacked them by the fireplace. A little girl recognized him and later revealed his identity to the lady.
The next morning the embarrassed woman went to see Mr. Washington in his office at the Institute and apologized profusely.
