Word of Salvation – Vol.48 No.25 – July 2003

 

Spiritual Deception vs Spiritual Dependence

 

Sermon by Rev A Quak on Luke 18:9-14

Scripture Readings:  Philippians 3:1-11; Luke 18:9-14

Suggested Hymns:  BoW 159; 190; 217; Rej 295

 

Congregation of our Lord Jesus Christ...

Jesus makes the point that the Pharisee didn't go home justified because he was confident in his own righteousness and looked down on everyone else. And our response might well be like this: Serves him right. The pompous hypocrite. He doesn't care about God or the kingdom. He just cares about himself. It's all show. One big facade. He is only interested in himself and his image in the community.

That's the image we have of the Pharisees, isn't it? Unfortunately it's a one-sided image that is not based on all the facts.

Remember the old Westerns where the one thing we learn is that the cowboys were the good guys and Indians were the bad guys. It's a skewed view. Or remember some old war movies where the first thing you learn is that the Germans are all bad guys and that the Allies are all good guys. And the second thing you learn is that the Germans are really bad shots. It's another skewed view.

In a similar way many of us have inherited a skewed view of the Pharisees. And if we are going to understand this parable properly we first have to straighten our perceptions about the Pharisees.

1. Who the Pharisees really were

In order to get the straight view, we need to go back to the destruction of Jerusalem by the Babylonians in 587 bc. Up to that point, all worship in Israel centred around the sacrificial system in the temple. So when the temple was destroyed, was that when the religion of Israel died? Not at all.

When the temple was destroyed, godly men met together and developed a pattern of worship that centred not around the sacrificial system but around the book of the law - our Old Testament. And the spiritual descendants of these godly men were the Pharisees.

They cherished and reinterpreted the law of God for their own day. They built synagogues, taught the Scriptures, and tried to maintain a distinctive Biblical spiritual identity amongst their people. They were the ones who strongly resisted the secular influence of the Babylonian, then Greek, and then the Roman cultures. As each new world power gained position the Pharisees maintained the spiritual life of the nation.

So the Babylonian victory of 587 bc should have really resulted in the death of the Israelite religion because their place of worship had been destroyed and the priests and leaders had been scattered over many foreign lands. Instead, however, at the time of Jesus, we find that the Hebrew religion is thriving. Another temple has been built. Children are being taught the Scriptures, for them to pass onto their children. And the Jews were still worshipping the God of their forefathers and living a distinctive way of life.

And who was responsible for this? Much credit has to be given to the Pharisees. The Pharisees who would not allow the Roman troops to come into the temple and set up the crest of Rome, which was an eagle. Instead they would stand in front of the troops and bare their necks to the swords of the soldiers.

The Pharisees were deeply pious men who stuck it out in an occupied society. They were teachers determined to bring the word of God into the homes of ordinary believing Jewish men and women. They were pillars of the community and the conscientious leaders of the synagogues. They were the salt of the earth who sought to evangelise the Gentiles. They were respected in the community.

If we were to look for someone in our society that would command the same sort of respect as the Jews might have to a Pharisee, we probably need to look at the Australian Diggers, the war veterans. They were men of principle, men of tradition, men of culture, men of standing, men of integrity and, in some cases, men of the Bible. You can see them on television each ANZAC day - chests filled with medals from the wars they've been in. Why did they do it? Because they believed that certain things were worth fighting for, and even laying down their lives for.

We younger ones probably feel that these guys can be a bit "old-fashioned". And it's true that they often don't have a politically correct approach to deal with Japanese and Germans and other immigrants. And they will definitely give an opinion on things like women working, and unmarried couples and single mums. But you've got to respect these guys because they chose to dedicate their lives to something that was bigger than themselves, and bigger than their own bank balance.

Australian diggers, Pharisees, they give much more to the society then this tax collector. So, when Jesus says the Pharisee is not justified, then the people of His day would not think, "that serves him right". They would think, "What's going on, not even the Pharisee makes the grade?" Our Christian upbringing means we have a bias against the Pharisees and we have an affinity with the tax collector. But if you were around in the day of Jesus, you wouldn't be so accommodating.

2. Who the tax collectors really were

Tax collectors were men who also followed the law, but an entirely different law. Their law was the law of the Roman oppressors. Tax collectors were usually local Jews who had offered, no, more correctly, paid for in advance the job of collecting taxes for the Roman government. When the Romans took over a town, they held an auction and they leased out the position of tax collector to the highest bidder. In many ways it was a lucrative business.

Taxes were fixed by law at about 5% of the value of goods. But the tax collector charged his commission on top of this. He also had to make a profit. Which still would mean a reasonable rate of tax but the truth was that he could charge anything he liked, and he often did. Whatever his tax estimate was, that was law, and he had the Roman military to back him up.

This meant that they were a hated section of the community. They were hated because they were considered to be traitors working for the enemy. They were hated because they would cheat and lie and get the soldiers to support them. They were hated because they made a profit by oppressing their own people. For it to succeed, the whole tax collection business depended upon harassment, force, and fear. Such a business would not attract the most pleasant personalities. It would attract men who were aggressive, rude, mean, in-your-face type people. To the average Israelite, tax collectors were the dead flesh of society. The sort of people who you would hope that God would surgically remove when He brought His judgment against Rome. They made profit at everyone else's expense and the disparity was plain for all to see.

Perhaps the best way to describe the Jewish feeling toward the tax collector is to call to mind two recent news items. An executive with the Commonwealth bank was given $32 million as a bonus. I worked it out this way. If you have a person who earns $40,000 per year and works from age 20-65, you would need a group of eighteen people to generate $32 million. The combined working lives of eighteen people. The other news items concerned Westpac which planned to raise its fee structure with increases of between 20-25 percent, even though they have had ten years of record profits.

The way you feel about that sort of news is the way the Jews felt about tax collectors. The rich getting richer, while the poor suffer the consequences. At the same time all parties of the government look on and condemn but don't do anything to rectify the injustice.

The tax collectors were the local fat cats of the Jewish world and they were spurred on by a corrupt government who used force to support their greed.

3. Off to the temple...

Now, we have taken a bit of time to understand the nature of the two people involved. But this was necessary otherwise we wouldn't fully see the teaching of this parable - a parable which Jesus told for the specific purpose of addressing those who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everybody else. It was not Jesus' primary motive to focus on the Gospel to "tax-collector-type-sinners". Jesus' primary motive was to challenge a certain attitude, a certain destructive attitude. So Jesus begins ... Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other a tax collector. Already by this time the Jewish audience of Jesus is thinking: "I know how this one's going to turn out. Jesus is going to say, 'I tell you the truth, not only the Pharisee had his prayers heard that day, but also the tax-collector!'"

Not only the Pharisee, but also the tax collector. But they are in for a shock. So the story unfolds with the Pharisee appearing first. His shoes are polished. His nails are clean. He arrives on time. He takes his accustomed pew, the one his family has had for generations. And He prays:

"Thank you, God, for, as you can see, I am not like some of the people who have been showing up in church lately. I fast twice a week. I give a tenth of my income. I have already made out my pledge card. My, I am special, aren't I? I'm not like that single mum, or that divorcee, or that man who has spent six months in jail. I thank you I'm not like those tax collector types. Thanks for this opportunity to remind you. Give my regards to my good friend, Abraham, won't you? Tell him I'll see him on the other side. After all, I think his seat will be pretty close to mine."

Now I know that is not what the text says. But that is exactly what the prayer is about. Me, myself and I. Me again. My righteousness. My good place in society. My upstanding character.

Jesus takes issue with this. Not because He is against tithing, praying, fasting and other virtues. In fact on another occasion Jesus says, "The teachers of the law and the Pharisees sit in Moses' seat. So you must obey them and do everything they tell you" (Mt 23:2-3). In many ways the Pharisees were faithful teachers. Jesus is not condemning their piety or lifestyle. Jesus takes issue with their attitude. They were confident in their own eyes. They have moved from righteous living to trusting in that righteous living. And it is at that point that they have made a fatal error.

Ah, but we are not like that, are we? Are you sure? There are times when we can be just as quick to look down on others and say, "Thank you Lord that I am not like them". We might think of the young people, with their multiple body piercing, the foul language and the anti-authoritarian attitude. The person who has been on job search for more than two years. Pregnant teenagers and single mums who have three children with three different DNA. Lying politicians who constantly lose the integrity test. Gamblers, and alcoholics and junkies - wasting their money and wrecking their families. The high-flying businessman whose career is more important than family and who spends money without discretion. Illegal immigrants who come to this nation to take our jobs and infiltrate with their non-Christian religion. Those who live good lives but who want nothing to do with religion. Homeless people who go to the library to sleep and who smell like garbage.

You see the point? We come to a parable like this and quickly identify with the one who gets the better report - "I'm the tax collector". But the parable is aimed at those who are tempted to look down on others. If we have, even only once, thought "I'm glad I am not like them", then this parable is for us.

That's where the tax collector comes to the forefront. He is the example of not being confident in your own eyes. He is the example of the confidence that comes through Christ alone.

What he's doing there, nobody really knows. He must have sneaked in during the first hymn and you can be sure he won't sign the visitors book. He'll probably leave before the benediction. A tax collector. A Roman-loving, money-grubbing, skimming-from-the-top tax collector. Who let him in, anyway? He doesn't pick up the bulletin. He doesn't sing the hymns. He hasn't even got a Bible. He just keeps looking down and praying, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner!"

Actually, we need to correct the English translation a bit. He calls himself: the sinner. He will not bother to compare himself to others. He finds no comfort in the probability that there are worse sinners in society. He makes no excuses for his behaviour. He sees only himself and how offensive he is to God. He just confesses to be the sinner in need of mercy. And He has come to the right place to make such an admission, for He is in the temple.

At the time the temple was the place to go to when your sins needed to be covered. God had provided the sacrificial system just for this purpose. God had provided a way of escape from punishment. The temple was open for sinners. The ministry of forgiveness was conducted there. God would atone for sin because of a sacrifice of a lamb. The Lord would accept that lamb for the sins of the worshipper.

It's the message of the Gospel in the Old Testament. The good news that sin had been paid for. It was this Gospel which draws the tax collector to the temple because he knows he has nowhere else to go. He can only rely on the mercy and grace of God.

These sacrifices, indeed all the sacrifices of the Old Testament, pointed to the final sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. The Old Testament sacrifices as such did not cover their sins, they were a pointer to a promise.

Only the death of our Lord Jesus Christ covers for sin. The sacrifices of the Old Testament were offered in anticipation of the death of Christ on the cross. And this is what our attention is drawn to as we consider the prayer of the tax collector. Our attention is drawn to an act of mercy. To the mercy of God as He punished His Son. To mercy that is seen as we witness our Saviour taking our punishment. To mercy that allows us to come with nothing except a truckload of sin and go in peace. To mercy where the sinner finds justification. To mercy that is meant to shake self-righteous people to the core.

That's what the appearance of the tax collector is all about. To stress the fact that God will not justify if we are righteous in our own eyes.

4. The verdict

How the outcome must have shocked the original listeners. Two worshippers go up to the temple, a Pharisee and a tax collector. What happens?

Not the expected result: "I tell you the truth, not only the Pharisee had his prayers heard that day, but also the tax-collector!" But a totally unexpected result: "The tax collector went home justified, and the Pharisee didn't".

Both were sinners. The difference was that one looked down on everybody while the other looked into his heart and cried out to God. And through his action the message is clear. This is not just a story of condemnation, but it is a desperate attempt to save those who feel safe and smug in their own self-righteousness.

Do we need to hear the message? It wouldn't be in the Bible if we didn't. You see there is a little Pharisee in all of us. Not all the time - we're not always condemning - but he's there. That little Pharisee who tries to justify our place in God's plan. That little Pharisee who tries to justify how great our works are. That little Pharisee who tries to justify why we might feel a little superior to others. That little Pharisee in all of us who needs to be reminded again and again that justification comes from God alone.

Our only hope is the undeserved grace of God - that justifying action which makes us complete people, clean before God, and ready to be accepted back into the God-fearing community on full and equal terms

So, if you see the little Pharisee in yourself, go over to the tax collector, listen to his prayer, and then humble yourself and make it your own. Because, for any Pharisee, it's the only prayer you have. God have mercy on me, the sinner.

Amen.