In countless ways, each of us turns away from God to follow our own way. We organize the whole world around ourselves and our desires. We use other people for our own benefit. We are trapped in webs of systemic oppression and self-deceit. In short, all of us sin.
In starting our Journey today in Scripture, Luke 18, Jesus starts with a parable in verse 9 about two jews. Both went up to the temple to pray. Both of them are at the place of worship. And yet, they differ in how they pray. Now He also told this parable to some people who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and viewed others with contempt: 10 “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood and began praying this in regard to himself: ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, crooked, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.’
So we see here the Pharisee has come to Gods house, prayed as he normally would, then thanked God for not being like other people, specifically swindlers, crooks, adulterers, and even tax collectors. So in basic terms, the pharisee prayed for himself! The pharisee elevates his virtues as being a good, devout, religious person. There may be no doubt about being virtuous. He tithes about five times more of his income than average in his denomination and thanks God that he is so loving and obedient to God.
But I want you to notice something, the Pharisee moves beyond counting his virtues into contrasting himself with ‘crooks, evildoers, adulterers-or, even tax collectors. In other words, “God, look what a good boy I have been for you!”
Before I continue, I want to be clear on something. It is very honorable to God to give him thanks for all you have. There are no discouragements there. We should be proud of our accomplishments in a healthy way. But we are to do something far more elaborate towards identifying ourselves as sinners to God verses examining ourselves as a servant.
2 Corinthians 13 tells us, “Test yourselves to see if you are in the faith; examine yourselves! Or do you not recognize this about yourselves, that Jesus Christ is in you—unless indeed you fail the test?” 2 Peter 1 tells us, “Therefore, brothers and sisters, be all the more diligent to make certain about His calling and choice of you; for as long as you practice these things, you will never stumble; 11 for in this way the entrance into the eternal kingdom of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ will be abundantly supplied to you.”
In short, we are to examine ourselves daily, ensuring our p’s and q’s are in line with Gods.
So let us continue in Luke, But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to raise his eyes toward heaven, but was beating his chest, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, the sinner!’
Let me give you a history lesson here. While the Pharasee’s was the religious rulers of the day, it instilled in the Jews of the day to disregard anyone who was not of the religious order of the Jewish faith. The tax collectors, who were sometimes Jews that worked directly for the Roman empire, were considered an outcast. This particular tax collector thought he did not believe himself worthy, so he prayed from a distance. Its very possible fellow Jews would have shunned him from the temple if he got too close to them like he was a disease just being a sinner in their own eyes.
Between the Pharasee and the Tax collector, what difference do you read here between the two’s prayers to God? Its rather simple, as Jesus tells us, I tell you, this man went to his house justified rather than the other one; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
Both men went home justified in some sense. The Pharasee wrapped himself in self-justification he had worn to the temple. Before even walking onto the property of the temple, his mind was set, his attitude was fixed, nothing was to change that. The tax collector did something far more meaningful. He wrapped himself in the righteousness of Jesus, a sinner saved by grace. James 4 “But He gives a greater grace. Therefore it says, “God is opposed to the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” 1 Peter 5, “and all of you, clothe yourselves with humility toward one another, because God is opposed to the proud, but He gives grace to the humble.”
Friends, each of us wreak with stubborn sin. It’s a odor we will never relinquish until we meet God. Romans 5:8, 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us., period!
One thing for certain that I don’t think the Pharasee realizes, is that his sin, our sins, will find us out! We cannot hide from it! We can make ourselves look great in the eyes of others, but we can never fool God.
In May of 1948 three men robbed a bank in Hoyt, Kansas, getting away with $1,000. Shortly thereafter two men were killed in a car wreck, and police thought they were the robbers and the case was closed. Four years later, however, something unusual happened. On a Sunday morning at the Seward Avenue Baptist Church a young man named Al Johnson stepped to the pulpit and revealed to the congregation that the day before he had gone to the district attorney and confessed his role in the crime.
“I thought about the bank robbery many times,” Johnson, who was a teenager when the crime occurred, said, “I prayed about it and asked the Lord to give me an answer. It seemed that He would give me only one answer and that was to give myself up.” Johnson also revealed that he had borrowed the money to repay the bank his share of the stolen funds. The statute of limitations had expired, but Johnson said that even if it meant going to prison, he could not keep the secret any longer. Johnson agreed to help the authorities locate the other two men, who had not been, as was previously believed, the men involved in the car accident.
The Tax collector was fully willing to acknowledge that his sin was subject to God's grace. His sin was recognized and brought to the surface, which as jesus mentioned is what humility does. It gives us a dependency on God by his grace. We should know as Christians that our sins need to be flushed out and forgiven to proceed with God's full blessing. We cannot hide from our sin, or even still, hide our sin from God.
Sometimes we think the best approach is to hide our sin to avoid embarrassment and exposure or the potential consequences. That approach never works in the long run. God sees everything—nothing is ever hidden from His view. His hatred of sin is so intense that He will never allow us to prosper by covering our sin. The toll of hidden sin on the physical, emotional, and spiritual health of the sinner is vast. It is far better for us to confess and seek the mercy and forgiveness of God.
Selma Elmore’s conscience must have been bothering her. In October 2010, The 44-year-old woman flagged down a police car in Lockland, Ohio to ask if there was a warrant out for her arrest. After the officer informed her that there was, she ran away. Her previous warrant was for failing to pay a fine, but her new problem, resisting arrest, was much more serious. Sometimes we try to pretend as if we have not sinned and try to run away from the consequences, but we always end up getting in worse trouble than before.
1 John 1 tells us “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous, so that He will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.” Hebrews 8 tells us, “ ‘Know the Lord,’ For they will all know Me, From the least to the greatest of them. 12 For I will be merciful toward their wrongdoings, And their sins I will no longer remember.”
The only solution is to acknowledge our sin before God here and now! Don’t wait! Believe it or not, the Church of God is a hospital for sinners like you and me, not a house for saints! We are born in sin but we do NOT have to die in sin. And our main goal is to serve and please God. When a man asked George Mueller the secret of his service, Mueller responded: “There was a day when I died, utterly died; died to George Mueller, his opinions, preferences, tastes, and will; died to the world, its approval or censure; died to the approval or blame even of my brethren and friends; and since then I have studied to show myself approved only to God.” “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous, so that He will forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. 10 If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.” Amen.