Proper
23C 2013
Father Adam Trambley
October 27, 2013, St. John’sSharon
Today
we hear another parable where Jesus lifts up somebody who really doesn’t fit
our criteria for a good role model. In
the past few weeks we have heard about the dishonest manager who stayed focused
in a crisis but isn’t getting hired as a church accountant anytime soon. Then last week we heard about the unjust
judge who wasn’t going to do the right thing until some old lady called and
woke his wife up in the middle of the night.
This morning Jesus uses a tax collector, who happens to be aware of just
how sinful he is, to highlight the shortcomings of the good religious people
who considered themselves more righteous than others.
Now
these parables are only in Luke’s gospel.
The readings we hear in church are on a three-year cycle. In
At the
outset of the parable, we are told what to look for. Some people around Jesus have decided that
they are righteous through their own actions and look down on other
people. In fact, going around and
listening to Jesus provide all these great parables and teachings would have
been one of the reasons they considered themselves better than others. “I know I am righteous,” we can hear them
say, “because I am spending my time listening to this interesting teacher today,
even though he doesn’t teach quite as well as I do, as opposed to going to the
Galilee State University football game then the Cana Brew Pub for dinner.” So Jesus tells a story to show them exactly
how wrong their attitudes make them.
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A
Pharisee, with all the condescension he notices around him, goes up to pray in
the temple. Notice how everything except
for his sense of self-righteousness is highly commendable. He goes up to the Temple to pray. They say some high percentage of life is
showing up, and going to the Temple is a good thing. He fasts twice a week, taking on a
significant personal discipline, presumably as a way of praying for himself and
his people. He tithes everything
according to the very strict way the Pharisees tithed at the time, even from
their herb gardens. Please note, as we
will be preparing to send out pledge cards next month, that Jesus is not
opposed to tithing. Jesus just is
opposed to tithing or fasting or going to church to pray or doing anything else
with a sense of entitlement and puffed up pride.
At
least half of what is said about this Pharisee describes his bad attitude. He is standing by himself, and the original
has a word play that standing by himself could also mean praying to
himself. He certainly is talking more to
himself than God. He gives thanks that
he is not like other people, and then goes on to describe in detail which
people he is not like, including someone else in church with him. Now we can give genuine thanks to God for
putting us in the positive situations we are in, where we don’t have to walk
the streets or sell drugs or steal food to feed our families. Even “there but for the grace of God” is not inappropriate,
especially if we are truly recognizing God’s grace, and our prayer helps us
deepen our sense of compassion and love for others. But this dude is not praying that way. He is just reminding God of how much better
he is than other people, and thanking God, as a representative of the universe’s
custodial workforce, for ensuring that the world continues to revolve around
him.
Remember
what Paul says about love? If I give
everything I have, but don’t have love, it doesn’t matter. Or even if I hand over my whole body and I
feel noble about what I’ve done, there is no benefit without love. Sounds like the Pharisee. With the Pharisee there is no love, no mercy
and no real prayer.
So
Jesus contrasts the Pharisee with a tax collector. Almost everything about the tax collector is
wrong. He is in a dishonest profession
that cheats God’s people and collects money for their oppressors. He probably doesn’t tithe, and is unlikely to
have his family’s name engraved on his kneeler.
Nor does he declare that he’s giving up tax collecting, and then ask the
Pharisee to help him find a commendable Israelite job. But he gets the most important thing
right. He recognizes that he is a sinner
and asks God for mercy. He knows he’s in
over his head and he can’t get out by himself.
He is powerless over his sins, and turns his life over to God.
Powerful
stuff. Now Jesus says that tax collector
went home justified. He was made
righteous in a way that is going to stick.
But nowhere does Jesus say that everything is changing immediately, and
probably never in a way that the Pharisee would notice. The tax collector may not be changing
jobs. He may not ever become a pillar of
the church. He may never tithe or fast
or observe the Sabbath or even wash his hands before every meal. He may keep all his same friends because he
thinks that religious people are stuck-up hypocrites, and he wouldn’t be
entirely incorrect. He may have nothing
about him that would make you think you want to introduce him to your children,
except that he recognized himself as a sinner and asked God for mercy, which is
actually the most important thing.
Without even raising his eyes to heaven to try to look at God, he has
come to know God. He is leaving with
God’s presence surrounding him.
What
this justification will mean for the tax collector is hard to say. To say only that he will go to heaven when he
dies doesn’t do justice to the power of God’s mercy and grace. Somehow he is going to be living into the
Kingdom of God in new ways from that day in the temple forward. He may feel God’s peace with him more fully
more often. He may find ways to love the
people around him more deeply, whether his family, his friends, his co-workers,
or his, shall we say, tax clients. He
may find his usual temptations less compelling, with God’s heavenly angels
keeping the most dangerous things away and leading him into better activities. He may find himself drawn to God more and more,
asking for mercy more frequently and receiving it more often, until he turns
into a light for others whose lives were also a mess. Nothing in his life may seem religious or
pious, but if God has justified him, then before long his whole being will be a
beacon of God’s love and mercy and grace.
Whether he ever goes into the Temple again, or if he only occasionally
goes into the Temple basement for 12-step meetings, he’s going to allow those
around him to experience the presence of God.
All because he snuck into the back of church one day, beat his breast,
said, “God be merciful to me, a sinner!” and meant what he said.
So here
are three thoughts to take home today.
First,
if we go home praying, “Lord, I thank thee that I am not like this Pharisee” we
have still missed the mark. Pharisees
are tempting targets, but we aren’t meant to feel self-righteous in comparison
to them any more than we are to run to the lowest place at a banquet to show
that we are the most Christian.
Second,
our first and most important prayer is always the recognition that we can’t
make it on our own and that we require God’s help, in particular his grace and
mercy through the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Everything else flows our initial prayer, “God,
be merciful to me, a sinner.”
Finally,
giving thanks to God for everything we have and all our circumstances and all
our good works is truly a right and noble thing. That thanksgiving starts and ends, however,
with God. During our thanksgiving we
look fully at God, not at other people who we feel better than, not at other
people who we are envious of, not at ourselves and our own efforts. Thanksgiving is the natural next step once we
have recognized our own desperate need for God and then have begun to see him at
work all around us. True thanksgiving is
an important way of recognizing our utter dependence on God after we have begun
living into his Kingdom.
So the prayer is easy: Lord,
have mercy. Thanks be to God.
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