Trinity 11
Lk
18:9-14
8/27/17
So how is life in the fly over
states? The term “fly over states,” of
course, describes everything between the east and west coasts of the United
States. It emphasizes the difference
between the coasts and the center of the country.
Apparently the term first appeared
around 1980, and there is some debate about whether it should be regarded as a put
down used by people on the coasts, or a defensive phrase placed in their mouth
by those who don’t live there. Either way, it does capture a real difference
that exists between the culture of the coasts and that of where we live.
Generally speaking, the coasts are
more liberal than the center. They are
more urban. Many of the universities
considered to be elite are on the coasts.
The coasts are more wealthy. In
what you listen to and read, it’s not hard to find a condescending elitism
directed from the coasts towards the center.
You even run into it in the Lutheran church. On more than a few
occasions I have heard the opinion that: “You Midwestern Lutherans just really
can understand the complexity of the issue.”
Elitist condescension is on full
display in our Gospel lesson this morning.
Jesus tells a parable and we learn that he “told this parable to some who trusted
in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt.” Now you don’t need a degree in biblical
interpretation to figure out that Luke is talking about the Pharisees. And sure
enough we immediately hear: “Two
men went up into the temple to pray, one a
Pharisee and the other a tax collector.”
In the Pharisees we meet the self-proclaimed paragons of Jewish piety. They were, for the most part a lay group,
though there were also trained scribes.
The Pharisees had developed an
elaborate system of oral law that directed how one was to keep the Torah – the
law that God had given to Israel through Moses.
The Torah provided direction for many areas of life. But even so, there were far more situations
that required an interpretation about how to apply the Torah to everyday life. The Pharisees’ oral law was there to tell you
how this was done.
And then, the Pharisees had also
added their own rules and laws on top
of the Torah. For example, they took the
requirements that the Torah only applied to priests who served in the temple
and instead said that they were something all pious Jews must do. We usually think about the Pharisees as being
very strict about keeping the law. And this is true, but not quite in the way
you may think. The Pharisees were very
strict in keeping their interpretation
of the Torah. But in many cases these were rather liberal interpretations that
actually made it easier to “keep” the
law.
On the other hand, we have a tax
collector. Now tax collectors have never
been popular. The letters “IRS” probably don’t bring a smile to your face. The Romans had a comprehensive tax system.
When they took a census, it was for the purpose of updating taxation requirements,
not in order to find out how many people there were. Taxation was the most
direct way that people experienced Roman rule.
It was a reminder that they were a subject people. Even in a land like Galilee where King Herod
Antipas was the petty king, taxes still flowed up to the Romans.
Tax collectors were despised because
they were agents of these pagan occupiers.
And then tax
collectors were also thought of as being crooks – because many of them were.
The tax collector assessed the value, which determined how much tax was
collected and how big their percentage was. Bump up the value, and you bump up
your profit.
We learn
that the Pharisee entered the temple and in a prayer that was most likely
spoken out loud so that others could hear it he said: “God, I thank you that I
am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax
collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.” The Pharisee thanked God for how great the
Pharisee was! In particular he referenced
his superiority to the tax collector who was also present for prayer.
The tax
collector was the complete opposite. He
stood off at a distance. He didn’t even
look up. He was beating his breast as a
sign of repentance and sorrow. And his
prayer was one brief sentence: “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” Then Jesus said, “I
tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For
everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself
will be exalted.”
In the verse just before our text,
Jesus had said: “Nevertheless, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on
earth?” In this parable, he is
describing for us what faith looks like. And to be honest, it’s not very
impressive. It’s not about boldly
declaring what you have done. It’s not
about holding yourself up as an example. It’s not about having confidence in
what you have done.
Instead, it looks rather weak. It looks rather helpless. After all, it says
that it has nothing – nothing that is, except failures. That’s not really where
we want to be. It seems better to forget
about the way I was short tempered with my spouse or children. It seems better to ignore the way I failed to
trust God when things in my life didn’t go the way I had planned. It seems better to forget about the way I
enjoyed hearing and sharing that gossip at the expense of someone else’s
reputation.
But Jesus tells us this morning that
it’s not better to do this. The tax
collector comes before God as a repentant sinner. He comes with nothing but his sins that he
confesses as he says, “God,
be merciful to me, a sinner!” And
speaking those words in faith he leaves completely
changed. He leaves justified. He leaves righteous in God’s eyes – and
things are the way God says they are.
By bringing
nothing before God except the sins we confess, we leave justified and righteous
in his sight. We do so because of God’s
grace. It is God’s unmerited love
and favor that prompted him to send his Son into the world as he was incarnate
by the Holy Spirit and born of the virgin Mary.
It was God’s grace that sent Jesus Christ to the cross as the sacrifice
for our sin. It was God’s grace that
defeated death as he raised Jesus up on the third day.
When we
bring nothing before God except the sin we confess, he sends us away
forgiven. He sends us away as a saint –
someone who is holy in his eyes because of Christ. He sends us away as someone who has already
heard the verdict of the Last Day.
In the
parable, the tax collector went up to the temple to pray and confess his
sin. Yet Jesus, the one telling the
parable is the fulfillment of what the temple meant for God’s people. And now we don’t go to a building in
Jerusalem. Instead we go to the Means of
Grace that the risen Lord has instituted.
We return in faith to the promise God has attached to our baptism. We
return to confession and absolution. We return to the Sacrament of the
Altar. We return to the preached
word. Like the tax collector, we come
with nothing except the sin we confess.
And Christ sends us home justified – righteous and forgiven in God’s
eyes.
We come to
God and confess our sin. We say, “God,
be merciful to me, a sinner!” And he sends us home justified – forgiven. We praise and thank God for this. But that’s also not the end of the story. St.
Paul told the Ephesians, “Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one
another as God in Christ forgave you.” God’s forgiveness of us is the
forgiveness that we now pass on to others.
When they approach and ask us to forgive them this is something that we
now do because of what God had done for us in Jesus Christ.
This is not
something that is optional. It is our
Lord Jesus who taught us to pray in the Fifth Petition of the Lord’s Prayer,
“Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.” Forgiveness means that we don’t continue to
hold it against them. Forgiveness means that we don’t continue to bring it
up. Instead we send them away, the same
way that God sent us away – forgiven.
If you say
that this is not humanly possible, I can only say that I absolutely agree. It’s not.
It is only the Spirit of Jesus who can enable us to forgive a wrong that
has hurt us deeply. It is only the Holy
Spirit who can strengthen the new man in us to speak Christ’s word of
forgiveness to them that he has spoken to us.
You can
receive this strength in only one way.
And the good news is that it is a “two for one” deal. The Means of Grace to which you come to
receive forgiveness is also the way
by which the Spirit strengthens and builds up the new man – the Christian
living in Christ – who is able to speak three of the most powerful words the
world has ever heard: “I forgive you.”
Because we
are sinners we come before God in humility with nothing except the sins we
confess. There is nothing we can say
except, “God, be merciful to me, a
sinner!” Because of God’s gracious
saving action in Jesus Christ he raises us up and sends us home justified;
forgiven; a saint in his eyes. As Jesus
says in our text today: “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but
the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
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