{"id":617,"date":"2021-04-01T09:31:35","date_gmt":"2021-04-01T13:31:35","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/js1cd06kre.onrocket.site\/?p=617"},"modified":"2021-04-01T09:31:35","modified_gmt":"2021-04-01T13:31:35","slug":"the-pharisee-and-the-tax-collector","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/2021\/04\/01\/the-pharisee-and-the-tax-collector\/","title":{"rendered":"The Pharisee and the Tax Collector"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Throughout Lent, we\u2019re exploring the parables of Jesus \u2013 the two dozen or so stories that were his chief means of describing the reality of God\u2019s rule on earth. <\/strong>

When one of my earliest mentors, Dr. Howard Lindquist, was a young pastor, he visited the home of an older woman who was highly regarded in the community.

At one point during their conversation she sighed, \u201cYoung man, has anyone ever told you how wonderful <\/em>you are?\u201d  Feigning modesty as best he could, Howard smiled and answered, \u201cWhy, no!\u201d  Whereupon the woman said, \u201cThen where did you ever get that idea?\u201d 

Ouch. <\/em>

During the time that I knew Howard, which was some 40 years later, he was still processing that comment.

From time to time, people debate which sin or character defect is the worst of the worst.  For British theologian C.S. Lewis, it was no contest.

\u201cThe essential vice, the utmost evil, is Pride.  Unchastity, anger, greed, drunkenness, and all that, are mere fleabites in comparison.  It was through Pride that the devil became the devil.  Pride leads to every other vice.  It is the complete anti-God state of mind.\u201d<\/em>

It can safely be said that pride is in the mix of almost everything that goes wrong in our relationships with God and other people.

It\u2019s fun to spot this character flaw in other people.  But it doesn\u2019t take long before a disturbing realization dawns on us: 

Pride is not \u201csomebody else\u2019s problem.\u201d <\/em>

That message is at the center of one of Jesus\u2019 memorable short stories, the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector:

To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: \u201cTwo men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other one a tax collector. The Pharisee prayed to himself: \u2018God, I thank you that I am not like other men\u2014thieves, adulterers\u2014or this tax collector. I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.\u2019 \u201cBut the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, \u2018God, have mercy on me, a sinner.\u2019 \u201cI tell you that this man went home justified before God rather than the other. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.\u201d <\/em>(Luke 18:9-14)

It’s worth noting that during the time of Jesus, the Pharisees were the good guys.  The tax collectors were the bad guys.  But when it comes to who might impress God, Jesus flips the script.

Historians estimate that there were never more than about 6,000 Pharisees at any given moment.  They weren\u2019t clergy and they had no official status in Israel.  The Pharisees (\u201cthe Separate Ones\u201d) appear to have been a super-religious laymen\u2019s club.  They took it upon themselves to live as religious stormtroopers on behalf of the whole nation, striving to be models of perfect obedience to God\u2019s Law. 

At least a few rabbis taught that if the entire nation was obedient to God for just 24 hours, he would simply have to send the Messiah and set things right. 

The irony, of course, is that they were blind to the Messiah who was already in their midst. 

The vast majority of Judeans didn\u2019t have the time or the resilience to do what the Pharisees did every day \u2013 study, discuss, and live out the finer points of the Law.  In the minds of ordinary people, the Pharisees were spiritual heroes.  They were the ones who were doing it right.  So it must have been jarring when Jesus regularly called them out for their spiritual arrogance. 

Notice that the Pharisee in the parable prays to himself<\/em>.  His \u201cprayer\u201d is more like a declaration of his religious accomplishments.  He feels even better about himself when he notices that a tax collector has dared to show his low-life, traitorous face in the courts of God\u2019s temple. 

Tax collectors were despised.  They were regarded as professional thieves.  The Romans (who had conquered Judea) demanded that something like 40-60% of personal income be sucked out of the country and deposited in Rome\u2019s coffers.  They typically recruited \u201clocals\u201d to do the collecting \u2013 men who knew their neighbors and what they might be trying to hide from the authorities. 

Collectors generated their own compensation by demanding funds above and beyond what Rome required.  Many of them thus became rich at their neighbors\u2019 expense, flaunting their wealth openly.

It\u2019s no surprise that such individuals were regarded as soulless traitors.  Faithful worshipers may not have been able to describe exactly what they would see in heaven \u2013 but they were quite certain they would never see a tax collector.

While the words \u201cInternal Revenue Service\u201d rarely prompt warm feelings, most of us don\u2019t hold personal grudges towards IRS employees.  If Jesus were telling this parable today, what kind of character might inspire the universal contempt his original audience felt?

Perhaps we should imagine a sex trafficker, or a drug dealer who peddles pills to local kids, or a businessman who ran a pyramid scheme that ruined the lives of several of your friends.  He walks into your church on Easter Sunday, unable to meet the gaze of others.  But there he is, hoping against hope that he can receive a shred of forgiveness. 

The tax collector in Jesus\u2019 story doesn\u2019t even dare to look in God\u2019s direction.  \u201cGod, have mercy on me, a sinner.\u201d  The Greek is even stronger:  \u201cGod, have mercy on me, the<\/u><\/em> sinner.\u201d  He is the poster child for spiritual bankruptcy, and he knows it. 

But according to Jesus, he is right where God wants him to be.

What is the first of Jesus\u2019 Beatitudes at beginning of his Sermon on the Mount?  \u201cBlessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.\u201d (Matthew 5:3)  What a strange message.  How happy are the spiritual zeroes \u2013 those who have no bargaining chips when it comes to God, who realize they have absolutely no leg to stand on (as opposed to that Pharisee praying over there who thinks he\u2019s doing quite well, thank you). 

There is no Beatitude describing the blessedness of those who congratulate themselves for being winners.  But the divine welcome mat is always out for those who stand before God with empty hands and broken hearts. 

No matter what lies behind us, there is always hope as we look ahead.    

In his book Breathing Under Water<\/em>, Father Richard Rohr says that we have two choices:  We can come to God by getting rid of<\/em> our sin.  Or we can come to God because<\/em> of our sin \u2013 which turns out to be the only way anyone can actually come to God.

As far as figuring out a way to get rid of our sin\u2026

Jesus has a gift to give us on Good Friday. <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Throughout Lent, we\u2019re exploring the parables of Jesus \u2013 the two dozen or so stories that were his chief means of describing the reality of God\u2019s rule on earth.  When one of my earliest mentors, Dr. Howard Lindquist, was a young pastor, he visited the home of an older woman who was highly regarded in the community. At one point… Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":618,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[177,200,201],"class_list":["post-617","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-parables","tag-pharisees","tag-poor-in-spirit"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=617"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":619,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/617\/revisions\/619"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=617"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=617"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/glennsreflections.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=617"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}