How Jesus Approached the Proud and the Humble (Luke 7:36-50)
The Lord Jesus was the Master of approaching people at the point of their need and their level of receptivity. He knew how to move from a person’s felt need to their perceived need to their human need as a gateway to their spiritual need. Let us discover some principles of persuasion from how Jesus successfully approached the proud Pharisee and a harlot, broken and contrite in spirit. May the Lord grant us wisdom to improve our persuasive abilities by studying and following the steps of Jesus.
Illustration: George Gordon Liddy, Watergate conspirator recently released from prison: “I have found within myself all I need and all I ever shall need. I am a man of great faith, but my faith is in George Gordon Liddy. I have never failed me.”
The Christian Century, Sept. 28, 1977, p. 836
Quotes:
It is pride which has been the chief cause of misery in every nation and every family since the world began. - C. S. Lewis
God pickles the proud and preserves the foolish. - Anon
Did you hear about the clever salesman who closed hundreds of sales with this line: “Let me show you something several of your neighbors said you couldn’t afford.” - Anon
Pride is the dandelion of the soul. Its root goes deep; only a little left behind sprouts again. Its seeds lodge in the tiniest encouraging cracks. And it flourishes in good soil: The danger of pride is that it feeds on goodness. - David Rhodes
God wisely designed the human body so that we can neither pat our own backs nor kick ourselves too easily. - Guideposts
There is perhaps no one of our natural passions so hard to subdue as pride. Beat it down, stifle it, mortify it as much as one pleases, it is still alive. Even if I could conceive that I had completely overcome it, I should probably be proud of my humility. - Benjamin Franklin, from his autobiography
Pride is the only disease that makes everyone sick but the one who has it. - Anon
“Be not proud of race, face, place, or grace.” - C. H. Spurgeon
Christ’s Approach To the Proud (Luke 7:36-50)
1. One day Jesus accepted the invitation of a proud Pharisee, Simon, to have dinner in his home. Jesus never discriminated against anyone for any reason. Jesus willingly faced difficult circumstances for the sake of His mission - to seek and to save those who were lost.
Illustration: Health in the Soul
The focus of health in the soul is humility, while the root of inward corruption is pride. In the spiritual life, nothing stands still. If we are not constantly growing downward into humility, we shall be steadily swelling up and running to seed under the influence of pride.
J. I. Packer in Rediscovering Holiness, Christianity Today, November 9, 1992, p. 37
2. Simon, the Pharisee coldly welcomes Jesus to convince all of his friends that he is no special friend of this young upstart religious teacher. Jesus put up with many social snubs and insults for the sake of the Father
3. After the evening with Jesus we understand that Simon did not change his mind about Jesus. Simon remained as he was - curious, but still placing his faith in the traditions of men rather than on person of Jesus Christ and His truth. Simon was willing to talk about the sins of others, but not his own. Still, Jesus succeeded in accomplishing the will of His Father, but giving the people a chance for repentance and faith .
Illustration: Former heavy-weight boxer James (Quick) Tillis is a cowboy from Oklahoma who fought out of Chicago in the early 1980s. He still remembers his first day in the Windy City after his arrival from Tulsa. “I got off the bus with two cardboard suitcases under by arms in downtown Chicago and stopped in front of the Sears Tower. I put my suitcases down, and I looked up at the Tower and I said to myself, ‘I’m going to conquer Chicago.’ “When I looked down, the suitcases were gone.”
Today in the Word, September 10, 1992
4. Simon and his Pharisaical friends mocked Jesus for associating with sinners, tax-collectors and prostitutes. They could not understand why any religious man would give teaching to the reprobate. Jesus knew that His greatest response would come from those who knew they needed His help, not the proud.
Illustration: Overspent on Sugar
In her memoir of a truly dysfunctional family, The Liar’s Club, Mary Karr tells of a Texas uncle who remained married to his wife but did not speak to her for forty years after a fight over how much money she spent on sugar. One day he took out a lumber saw and sawed their house exactly in half. He nailed up planks to cover the raw sides and moved one of the halves behind a copse of scruffy pines trees on the same acre of ground. There the two, husband and wife, lived out the rest of their days in separate half-houses.
Phillip Yancey, What’s So Amazing About Grace, Zondervan, 1977, pp. 97-8
5. Jesus asked Simon, "Which of the forgiven debtors would love his benefactor most. Simon answered, "The one whom he forgave the more." Jesus knew that this would leave a lasting impression in the mind of the Pharisee having spoken the truth with his own lips even though it did not penetrated to his heart.
6. Simon clearly saw the hardness of his own heart in failing to forgive the woman caught in adultery. Jesus puts him in a position where he is indicted by his own words.
7. Jesus pulls off the Pharisee’s hypocritical mask when He says, "Do you see this woman? I came into your house. You did not give me any water for my feet, but she wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. You did not give me a kiss, but this woman has not stopped kissing my feet… Therefore, I tell you, her many sins have been forgiven - for she loved much. But he who has been forgiven loves little."
Christ’s Approach to the Broken and Contrite in Spirit
1. Jesus welcomed the attempt of the harlot to seek forgiveness and reconciliation with God. Christ is willing to accept anyone at anytime in any situation if they are sincere about repentance and faith in Him.
2. Jesus knew that the woman was willing to trust only in His mercies and not in her own goodness like the Pharisees. Many people are subtly depending on their own merits to please God forgetting that it is by grace we are saved through faith and not of ourselves. Salvation is a free gift of God - not by works.
3. Jesus admired the audacity of the woman to enter the home of a Pharisee to seek forgiveness from Him. He applauds all of those who diligently seek Him by faith. He is not like people who use their social-cultural and religious barriers to keep seekers away.
4. Jesus commends the woman for using her most costly possession - the perfume - to anoint his feet. Jesus refuses to give into the pressures of the Pharisees to condemn the woman for wasting the costly perfume. Jesus looks at the woman’s motives behind her gift. Men still look at outward appearances, but God looks at the heart. The woman worshipped Jesus out of love, but without a full understanding of Him. Still, Jesus used her feeble attempt to teach everyone a lesson that God’s blessings come with humble worship.
5. Jesus uses the woman as a case study to teach everyone that all people can receive forgiveness regardless of their background if they will humble themselves and seek reconciliation with God through Christ.
6. Jesus impresses on everyone that it was the woman’s love for Him that made the chief difference in her eternal destiny compared with the Pharisees. Jesus highlighted the woman’s love as coming from all her heart, soul, strength and mind, without holding anything back, that allowed her to receive such blessings.
7. Jesus pointed out that the woman’s breaking of the alabaster bottle of perfume was symbolic of her desire to break with her past. She was willing to do anything to please the Lord even if it meant public ridicule.
8. Jesus showed how the woman’s desire to express praise, thanksgiving and honor to the Lord enabled her to accomplish God’s highest priority for everyone’s life - giving glory to the Almighty Creator!!!
Conclusion: Ronald Reagan, recalling an occasion when he was governor of California and made a speech in Mexico City:
“After I had finished speaking, I sat down to rather unenthusiastic applause, and I was a little embarrassed. The speaker who followed me spoke in Spanish—which I didn’t understand—and he was being applauded about every paragraph. To hide my embarrassment, I started clapping before everyone else and longer than anyone else until our ambassador leaned over and said, ‘I wouldn’t do that if I were you. He’s interpreting your speech.’”
Quoted by Gerald Gardner in All the Presidents’ Witts (Morrow), in Reader’s Digest.
