The Pharisee And The Tax Collector

And he was a sinner. Tax collectors were a hated lot in Jesus’ day. And for good reason. They were Jews, to be sure, but they were Jews who had sold out to the occupation Roman government. They were traitors who got rich off their neighbors by exacting from them exorbitant amounts of money—much more than they owed. Your tax bill might be x amount, but the tax collector, backed up by a military escort, would charge you twice that amount and pocket the excess. These guys were scoundrels.

But even scoundrels can be convicted of sin, and this man was. His sin against God and neighbor weighed on him like an unmanageable load. David says in Psalm 40, “My iniquities have overtaken me, and I cannot see; they are more than the hairs of my head; my heart fails me” (v. 12). That’s where this man was—crushed under the load of his sin.

But now don’t miss this part. As miserable as the tax collector was—as ashamed as he was and full of self-contempt—his was an enviable position! What? What’s enviable about it? I’ll tell you what’s enviable about it. It’s the sinner’s first step toward God.

You see, the tax collector stood, as we said, “afar off” in the temple, but he was closer to God than the Pharisee ever dreamed of being. Both of these men were sinners—only one didn’t know it and the other did. And missing that one little point is just like failing to tag one of the bases as you round the diamond toward home plate. Even if you score, it doesn’t count.

And that’s the thing about the Pharisee’s prayer. It didn’t count. In fact, some translations say that, when he prayed, he “prayed to himself.” He didn’t pray to God. When a person soaks in his own righteousness, that’s all he’s really doing when he prays. He prays to himself. God certainly isn’t listening.

The tax collector’s sins may have been worse than the sins of the Pharisee, but in God’s eyes he was not a worse sinner. All sin—any sin—will land you in hell. James 2:10 says, “For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it.” The Pharisee was actually in more danger, spiritually speaking, than the tax collector.

The difference between them is, the tax collector was heart-broken over his sin. While one man was inflated with pride—soaking in his own righteousness—the other man was humbled to the dust—seeking a righteousness not his own.

So, what is this righteousness that is not our own. It is just that. It is not our righteousness that we present to God if we want to be right with him. No. It must be the righteousness of Another. It must be the righteousness of Christ. Paul writes about this in Philippians, chapter 3. He tells us how religious he was. He was, after all, a Pharisee, and he was a good one, just like the Pharisee in Jesus’ parable. Paul even says that, “as to righteousness under the law,” he was blameless. Blameless! You couldn’t catch him in a fault.

But you know what? As good as he was, he wasn’t good enough. Not for God. And, if he wasn’t, no one is. I’m not. You’re not. Even Mother Theresa was not—and how are you going to top that? Now, listen to what Paul goes on to say in Philippians, chapter 3. He says he wants to be “found in [Christ] not having”—listen to this part very closely—“not having a righteousness of my own that comes from [keeping] the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith.”