Comments or outline:
This morning we have a story about two Jewish men who go into the Temple in Jerusalem to pray. Luke lets us know right away in the opening line of this story just who Jesus is telling this parable to. “And so he told this parable to certain ones who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and viewed others with contempt.”
We wonder who these “certain ones” were? I have a tendency to believe Jesus was addressing the everyday common folks like you and I who had gathered around to hear him speak. We must remember that Jesus was on his way to Jerusalem at this time and he was using every opportunity he had to teach, preach and heal before his ministry would come to an abrupt end.
As we read this story, we can envision Jesus walking down the road on his way to Jerusalem and stopping along the way to talk to the crowd of people who were following this religious radical whom everyone had heard so much about. Jesus would have sat down with all the disciples gathered around him and begin speaking to the crowd. Perhaps there would be several Pharisees and religious leaders scattered throughout the crowd. Also among the crowd would be tax collectors, sinners and the outcast’s of society.
As Jesus begins to tell his story, he picks out two distinctly different characters to illustrate his point ~ the Pharisee and the tax collector. The Pharisees represented the perfect Jewish religious model. They were the “religious right.” The tax collectors represented a totally different model. They represented the worse model of a sinner. Both the Jews and the Romans despised them because of the way they exhorted money from people.
Jesus tell us that both of the men enter the Temple and begin to pray. We can picture the Pharisee in his long flowing robe standing there with his arms raised high and looking up towards heaven as he begins to pray. He begins by thanking God, but not for all that he has, but for all that he is. He says, “I thank you that I am not like the other men ~ robbers, evildoers, adulterers, or even this tax collector.” Then, he goes on to tell God how good he is. “I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.” Isn’t he the goody two shoes.
Then, Jesus describes the prayer of the tax collector. The tax collector stands off in the distance with his head bowed down in humility. His prayer is quite different. He doesn’t even think he is worthy enough to look up to heaven. He pounds on his chest and says, “God have mercy on me, a sinner.” Jesus closes the story by telling the crowd that the tax collector with all of his sin went home justified before God, rather than the Pharisee. He also tells the crowd, “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”
This whole parable turns everything upside down for the hearers of the story. But isn’t that what Jesus mostly did in his ministry. Jesus constantly turned things upside down. He was what we would consider today a radical. He challenged the conventional way of thinking. He upset the apple cart of the religious right and those people didn’t like it when their apples went rolling all around on the ground.
At the end of this story, those who had gathered around Jesus are left thinking, Who are the wicked and who are the just of this world then ? If the tax collector, who was clearly a sinner walked away justified before God, and the Pharisee who went to the Temple every day to pray, fasted twice a week and gave a tenth of everything he had, walked away unjustified, then “What’s up with that ?!” The surprise curveball that Jesus throws in this parable lies the reversal of those who have hope and those who do not have hope.
When looking at this parable we run the risk of placing our focus in the wrong area. We tend to want to look at the sins of the tax collector and overlook the issues with the Pharisee. To focus solely on the sins of the tax collector, we run the risk of missing the whole point of this parable. We miss what is right before our eyes.
I remember a story that illustrates this point. There was a man named Pedro who lived near the Mexican border. One day Pedro walked up to the border station with a wheelbarrow full of sand. The border guard suspected Pedro was trying to smuggle something illegal into the country so he carefully sifted through the sand. When he didn’t find anything, he let Pedro pass.
The next day Pedro showed up at the border with another wheelbarrow full of sand. This time the border guard made Pedro empty the sand out of the wheelbarrow and then he sifted through it. He turned the wheelbarrow over, inspected every inch of it but found nothing so he let Pedro pass again.
This went on day in and day out for three years straight. The guard said to Pedro, “ I know what you’re thinking Pedro, you think that you will wear me down and one day I won’t check the wheelbarrow and then you’ll sneak something in. Well that’s not going to happen. I’m going to keep on checking you every time you come through here and one day I’ll catch you and then it will be over for you.
One day Pedro stopped coming. Several months later the border guard was in Mexico and saw Pedro getting out of a brand new car dressed in a beautifully tailored suit. The border guard ran up to Pedro and asked him how it came to be that he was doing so well. Pedro said, “While you were searching through the sand for illegal contraband, I brought 1825 brand new wheelbarrows into the country and sold them at a handsome profit !”
Sometimes we miss the obvious ! This is the case of the Pharisee and the tax collector. Everyone thought that the Pharisee was righteous. After all, he prayed in the Temple every day, he fasted twice a week and gave a tenth of everything he had. Yet, it was the tax collector, the sinner among them, who walked away justified before God, not the Pharisee.
The problem with the Pharisee was that he was too self righteous. He saw everyone’s sin but his own. He really didn’t go to the Temple to pray to God, he went to remind God of how good he was and how bad everyone else was. “I’m not like those other people God. I’m not like those swindlers, those adulterers and the unjust. O no, I’m much better than that tax collector over there.”
I am wondering if there is just a little bit of the Pharisee in us sometimes. Do we look upon others like the Pharisee and say, “Boy ! I’m glad I’m not like so and so. They drink, they smoke, they don’t even go to church regularly.” You know there’s a piece of our human nature that makes us like that. When we see someone who has problems, or hear of something bad happening to someone else, there’s a part of us that says good. I’m glad that’s happening to them instead of me. We feel relieved that they are suffering instead of us.
I once heard Lou Holtz, the famous coach of the Notre Dame football team speak at a business luncheon I attended. Lou said, “Don’t tell other people your problems because 90 % of them don’t care, and the other 10% are glad you have them !
The Pharisee in this story built himself up by tearing others down. He compared himself with the tax collector to make himself look good. He judged the tax collector to raise his own self worth. How many times do we do the same thing ? How many times have we looked at others and said, “I’m not as bad of a person as they are.” Do we look at others and say I come to church every Sunday, I tithe to the church, I work on the church committees, I donate my time and so on and so on. Now look at Joe and Mary over there. They only come to church on Christmas and Easter. They never give anything to the church. I’ve heard that they go out on the town too often. What sinners they are ! What a relief that we’re not bad people like Joe and Mary.
We can also compare this parable to a current event that we are all familiar with. Imagine President Clinton kneeling at the Foundry United Methodist Church in Washington D.C. , confessing his sins and someone like Pat Boone testifying that he’s glad that he’s not like our President whose sins have rocked the morality of our nation. Then, the word comes declaring President Clinton righteous rather than Pat Boone. Like those who heard Jesus tell this parable, we walk away scratching our heads.
In the final analysis, we must understand that this parable frees us from having to judge others. It also frees us from having to achieve righteousness before God. We must remember that it is not all of the good things we do that makes us righteous before God. It is not our tithing, (although I am sure the stewardship committee will probably want to have a few words with me later), it is not our work on church committees, (I guess the Administrative Council will want to meet with me right after the Stewardship committee) and it is not our prayers or fasting that make us right before God.
No, God accepts us just as we are, warts and all when we admit that we have sin and that we have no defense for our sin. We must recognize that we are saved by God’s grace, and God’s grace alone. There’s nothing else that can do that for us.
Our faith should not be that we are better than others, but instead that we believe we are all sinners just like the tax collector and that we are all saved by what Christ did for us on the cross. We must bow down to receive what the cross has to offer us, eternal life. When we are willing to sink into God’s loving mystery and trust God with all openness and humility, we will then receive all that He has to offer us in the fullness of life. Let us go forth this morning doing everything possible in our power to lift up our brothers and sisters in Christ, remembering the words of Jesus, “ everyone who exalts himself with be humbled, but those who humble themselves shall be exalted.” Let us be among the humbled and in so doing also be among those who inherit the eternal reward of everlasting life. AMEN!
