This Man Is Justified
St. Luke 18:9-14
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
St. Luke 18:14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.
Dear fellow redeemed in Christ our Lord… When you are considering a Biblical account and how it applies to you, one helpful thing to do is try to see how and why you fit into the story. Ask yourself these questions: “Who am I in this particular portion of Scripture? Which character represents me, my thoughts, my actions?” Well, in today’s Gospel, you have two choices. Either you are the Pharisee or you are the tax collector. Either you are the self-righteous puritan or you are the thieving, stealing, unclean sinner. It’s not much of a choice is it? But those are the options. Who are you?
“Jesus spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others.” “Well,” you say, “that’s certainly not talking about me. I know I’m not righteous. Nobody’s perfect.” However, don’t be so quick to dismiss what Jesus says. Sure, I don’t think there’s anyone here who would stand up and say that they’re perfect and righteous. All of us have made our share of mistakes; all of us have our flaws.
But how much truth is there to the idea that we think that the flaws we do have aren’t really all that serious? And how much truth is there to the idea that we all have pretty good justifications for our mistakes? “Some person did something to me and set me off. This or that happened to me in my childhood; my parents are to blame. The circumstances I was presented with left me no good options. I didn’t ask to be born into this situation.” Trying to justify ourselves and our sin like that is the opposite of being justified by God through faith in His mercy. And it is most certainly the opposite of a repentant heart.
Most people think, “Sure, I’m sinful, but who isn’t?” – as if that were a justification! “All in all I’d say I’ve lived a decent life. There’s more good than bad in me, and certainly that counts for something with God. I try my hardest to do what’s right, and when I mess up, God certainly isn’t going to send me to hell for that, is He? I mean, come on, I go to church when I can, I give offerings, I volunteer. Compared to a lot of others in this society, I think I’m doing OK. Look at the politicians. Look at the immorality and hypocrisy of celebrities; look at all the weirdos and perverts in society. I’m a better person than they are. I thank God that I’m not like that. I’m just regular person, doing my best to live a good life, and I think in the end God will reward me for that.” That sounds a little more familiar, doesn’t it? And that is exactly how the contemporary Pharisee talks and despises others. If that is how you are tempted to think or talk, God help you and grant you repentance.
The Pharisee’s problem was not that he thanked God for where he was in life. Indeed, we all should do that. If we suffered the worst consequences of our sins, every one of us would be in awful shape, right? And not just awful shape, but eternally damned! As the saying says, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.”
Nor was the Pharisee’s problem that he tried to live an outwardly righteous life. It would be great if all of us would be more pious and zealous in seeking to do what is good and right. It would be great if all of us would give the full 10% tithe in our offerings.
No, the Pharisee’s problem was that he trusted in his own works as if those very works would put Him right with God. His problem – and it was a BIG one! – was inward; his problem was in the heart. This man did not place His confidence in what God had done for him but in what he thought he had done and could do for God. He really wasn’t worshiping anyone or anything but Himself.
You can see that the focus of his religion was backwards in the way that he prays. Five times in his short prayer he uses the word “I.” “I thank You that I am not like other men–extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.” In fact, Jesus says the Pharisee prayed “with himself,” almost as if God was the bystander and he was the main event.
Beware of prayers and forms of worship in which God is simply a prop and window dressing while the focus is really on those doing the praying or on their worldly agendas. In the end that is self-worship and self-righteousness. And that is exactly the problem with so much of so-called contemporary worship. God’s name is used, but the center of attention is the people on stage and what they’re doing and how they’re performing and the agendas they’re pushing. The focus is not the words and works of God.
God gave His good and wise Law not so that you may justify yourself but so that you may see how much you need His help and deliverance, how much you need Him to justify you. The Law is there not so that you can see how good you’re doing compared to others. It is there so that you can see how you’re doing compared with the holy God and what He requires. The purpose of the Law is not only to show you how you must live but also to expose how greatly you have fallen short of its demands.
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Question: Who is in the better position – the man about to go in for heart surgery or the one unaware that he has the same condition and who is about to keel over dead? Who is in the better position before God – the Pharisee who falsely thinks that everything is fine, or the tax collector who understands the true diagnosis? Dear friends, learn from the Pharisee and the tax collector. Believe the terminal diagnosis that the Law has made about you. Humble yourself before God in true repentance; seek His healing, His cleansing, His righteousness.
It is written, “The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and a contrite heart – these, O God, You will not despise” (Psalm 51:17). The Lord certainly did not despise the tax collector like the Pharisee did. The tax collector came not in pride but in lowly penitence and faith. This is not fake humility or simply going through the motions. The tax collector stood afar off from those praying in the temple; for he knew how his sin cut him off from God and others. He did not raise his eyes to heaven, for he knew he deserved no heavenly blessing. He beat his chest when he prayed in token that he was worthy to be punished severely. He cried out in words that expressed his only hope, “God be merciful to me a sinner!”
The tax collector placed his confidence and trust not in anything about himself but entirely in the Lord and His mercy. He despaired of his own merits and character and entrusted himself completely to the merits and character of God. He relied not on his own sacrifice but on God’s sacrifice. For when the tax collector prayed for mercy, he used a word that has to do with the offering up of the animals there in the temple. He desired the atonement for sin that only God could provide through the shedding of blood.
Remember, it was at these times of public prayer in the temple when an animal would be sacrificed on the altar according to God’s command to cover the sins of the people. Therefore, at the very moment in which the tax collector prayed, “God be merciful to me a sinner!” his prayer was being answered right there in the sacrifice which the Lord provided. The tax collector trusted in the Lord’s sacrificial mercy, and he yearned for the day when the Messiah would come and bring all these things to their fulfillment.
The Pharisee thought he was righteous, but he was not the one who was justified before God. It is the tax collector who went down to his house justified, declared righteous in God’s sight.
And so it is also for each of you who pray in humility and penitent faith, “God be merciful to me a sinner!” The sacrifice has also been made for you, not in the temple, but in Jesus’ body, on the cross. There Christ, the Lamb of God was offered up once and for all. By His shed blood your sins have been fully atoned for, and by faith you have been put right with God. As it is written, “You who once were far off (as the tax collector stood far off) have been brought near by the blood of Christ” (Eph 2:13).
You are justified before God, declared righteous in His sight through faith in Christ. “For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast” (Eph. 2:8-9). It is all yours because of the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ. That is what we boast and brag about. Just as the lifeblood of Abel the shepherd covered the dust of the ground, the blood of your Good Shepherd Jesus covers you who are made from the dust and gives you new life. For His blood cries not for vengeance but for mercy. Just as the ground opened its mouth to receive Abel’s blood, so we open our mouths in the Sacrament to receive the blood of Christ for our forgiveness and to raise us up to new life.
At the beginning of this sermon I pointed out how, in applying a Bible passage to yourself, it is good to find where you are in the story. But even more so, it is of utmost importance to find where Jesus is in the story for you.
In today’s Gospel He is there in the temple, the place of God’s holy presence; He is there in the sacrifices, which foreshadowed His own. And Jesus is also there in the tax collector, who humbled himself and was exalted in the end. It is written that the Son of God humbled Himself even to the point of death on the cross, in our place and for our sins. Therefore, God the Father has highly exalted Him and given Him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.
Dear fellow baptized, to be a Christian is nothing other than to follow in this way of Christ; to be laid low with Him through repentance and death to sin, and to be raised up with Him through faith to new life and the resurrection of the body on the Last Day. It is to continually be fed with His Word and forgiveness-giving Sacraments in order that you may remain in the one true faith and be certain of your entrance into the life of the world to come.
Don’t make the mistake of looking within yourselves like the Pharisee; there is nothing there but sin and death. Look, instead, outside of yourselves like the tax collector. Look to Christ alone, for in Him there is full forgiveness and life.
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
