Rev. David Holwick
First Baptist Church
West Lafayette, Ohio
February 29, 1984
The Pharisee and the Tax Collector
Luke 18:9-14
There are basically two ways to approach God. This short parable is one of the best at pointing them out. It's a very simple setting.
Jesus says two men went up to the Temple to pray. One of them was a Pharisee. The name Pharisee means "the separated one." Today I suppose they would be called Fundamentalists. Pharisees only numbered around 3,000 people at any one time but they were highly respected as pillars of the community. It required a lot of dedication to be a Pharisee because they had to obey the Old Testament law perfectly.
Most of you know how picky the Pharisees were. One example is their rules concerning hand washing. For them, to eat food with unwashed hands was a grave sin leading to poverty and disaster. Nov obviously this kind of rule is a good way to stay healthy but this really wasn't about hygiene. The hands had to be washed a certain way. You had to keep the water in a special place. You had to use enough water to fill one-and-a-half eggshells. The water was poured over both hands then you rubbed them vigorously. Then you held your hands up so the water ran down your wrist and off. You're not done yet. You have to take another one and a half eggshells of water and rub your hands but this time you hold them down, so the water ran off the fingertips. If anything was changed or omitted it was a great sin. The average Jew couldn't be this picky but they admired those who were. [from William Barclay]
To be a Pharisee was to be a cut above everyone else. In verse 11 the Pharisee stands and prays. Like most Jews he probably spread his arms out toward heaven and said out loud, "God, I thank thee that I am not as other men are. . . ." He then goes on to describe the rest of humanity - extortionists, unjust-criminals, adulterers. The Pharisees isn't like these people. He doesn't commit gross sins. Then he makes it personal: ". . . or even like this tax collector." You can imagine his contempt as he said this. These are the bad things he doesn't do.
In verse 12 he thanks God for all his good qualities. He fasts twice a week. This means he's very religious - the Old Testament only required Jews to fast once a year, on the Day of Atonement. This guy fasts 102 times that. And he tithes. The Greek literally reads, "I give tithes of all I obtain." He doesn't just tithe his income. He also tithes what he buys. Very few people really give ten percent of their earnings to God. The average is closer to two or three percent, even for committed Christians. But how many would dare to tithe their income and then pay a tithe on the cost of their car or their house? This Pharisee is going beyond God's requirements. He is super-religious. He is a truly good - and he knows it. Many of Jesus' parables contain exaggerated elements to make it a good story but there is evidence this isn't an exaggeration. A certain Rabbi Simeon is recorded as praying, "If there are only two righteous people in the world, I and my son are those two. If there is only one, I am he."
In verse 13 the other guy prays. He is a publican, which is an old word for tax collector. The Romans had an interesting way of collecting taxes. They figured out how much money they needed from each area, then auctioned off the right to collect taxes to the highest bidder. Once a tax collector made his quota, he pocketed the rest. That's a great incentive for personal initiative. They made you pay a tax to enter a walled city, or to cross a bridge, or for owning a cart, or even for each wheel on the cart.
It's nice to know some things never change. I finished my taxes this week. I filled out the infamous 1040 form. I also had to fill out a Schedule C for my business expenses, a Schedule W for the married working couple deduction, a 2106 for my car allowance, and a 4562 for depreciation and amortization. Then there were the Ohio State forms and the West Lafayette forms. To top it all off, they sent my form 916 - County Return of Taxable Intangible Property. What is intangible property? Only the publicans know for sure.
Tax collectors were despised. Every one of them was crooked. Jesus himself lumped them with sinners and prostitutes. The Roman historian Tacitus notes that he once saw a statue erected "to an honest tax collector" - that's how rare it was. So this tax collector must have been one of the most hated men in town but he also went to the Temple to pray. Instead of praying in the crowd he stood off in the distance. He didn't lift up his hands or even his eyes. Beating his breast, he uttered seven words, "God, be merciful to me, a sinner." He's telling the truth here. He IS a sinner. In Greek it's even more emphatic because he calls himself THE sinner.
The heart of Jesus' teaching is in this prayer. Look at the beginning and the end, "God.... me, a sinner." When you really look at God, you should sense that there is a gulf between his burning holiness and your sin. The tax collector felt this but between the words, "God" and "me, a sinner," he places a beautiful expression - "be merciful unto me." He doesn't approach God on the basis of good works or by comparing himself to others. He only focuses on God's gift of mercy which he doesn't deserve.
In verse 14 Jesus applies the parable. Claiming that he knows how God acts, Jesus says the tax collector was justified and not the Pharisee. The translation, "rather than" the Pharisee is too weak. What Jesus really says is the tax collector was justified and the Pharisee was not justified. One was made right with God and the other was not.
For Jesus' audience this would have been a shocking conclusion. This is like comparing the President to a rapist and having the rapist come out ahead. Some people who are bothered by this try to read between the lines. They say the Pharisee must have had some secret sin or the tax collector was decent after all, sort of like the proverbial prostitute "with a heart of gold." This kind of reasoning misses the point. Both men are really sinners. The Pharisees doesn't know it and trusts in himself. The tax collector knows he's a sinner and throws himself on God's mercy.
You cannot be saved until you realize you are a sinner. This would seem easy but often it's the hardest step to take. Evangelist Eddie Martin once conducted a crusade in Bluefield, West Virginia. At the salvation invitation a well-dressed woman came forward. It was Rev. Martin's custom to have them repeat "the sinner's prayer" with him. He took her hand and prayed, "Dear Lord, I know that I am a sinner. I know I can't save myself. I need forgiveness for my awful sins. Please accept me, Jesus." But as he prayed for the woman she was silent. He looked at her and asked, "Don't you want to be saved?" She said, "Yes, I want to be saved - but I'm not a sinner." "Then you can't be saved," he said. "Jesus only died for sinners." "But Rev. Martin - I'm a GOOD SINNER!"
We don't like to see ourselves as we really are before God. Even religious people have this problem. In the September 1983 issue, Newsweek magazine reported on an important study on religion. The three-year study focused on Christians in Minnesota. The researchers found that only fifty-seven percent accepted the belief that all people are sinful. One-third said they made many mistakes but were not sinful themselves. According to Newsweek, one typical respondent actually said, "The day I die, I will only have to look up at my Maker and say, Take me! Not Forgive me! The reporter noted, "In short, Minnesota Christians tend to attribute sin to others."
Most religious people aren't as conceited as the Pharisee. They're just complacent. They think things like, "God has room for one more. I'm not perfect but I'm good enough to get in." Heaven only has room for sinners. That's why Jesus didn't like religious people. It's true! Jesus very rarely condemns fornicators, prostitutes and murderers. He condemns religious people right and left. He calls them a brood of vipers.
Lots of people sleep in late on Sunday. You haven't, you're in church. That makes you religious, which is very dangerous. Some of us are more like the Pharisee than we'd care to admit. We compare ourselves with other people and come out ahead. We look with contempt on them.
Are you really right with God? Do you see yourself as a sinner totally in need of his grace? When you hear the sinner's prayer, does it describe your relationship to God right now?
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Typed on September 25, 2005, by Sharon Lesko of Ledgewood Baptist Church, New Jersey
Copyright © 2024 by Rev. David Holwick
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