"Generosity Flows from a Heart Forgiven"
- Pastor Bob Thomas
Luke 18: 9 - 14
October 28, 2007 (Stewardship II)
One afternoon a carpet layer had just finished installing carpet for a lady. He stepped out for a smoke, only to realize that he had lost his cigarettes. After a quick, but fruitless search, he noticed that in the middle of the room, under the carpet that he had just installed, was a bump. His cigarettes!
“No sense pulling up the entire floor for one pack of smokes,” the carpet layer said to himself. So, he got out his mallet and flattened the bump.
Not long after, as he was cleaning up, the lady of the house came in. “Here,” she said, handing him his pack of cigarettes. “I found them in the hallway. “Now,” she said, “if only I could find my parakeet.”
Sometimes we know when we’ve made a mistake. Sometimes we don’t. It’s the hidden faults the psalmist talks about in Psalm 19 that get us in the most trouble.
Jesus tells the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, addressing it to people who feel self-righteous, and regard others as suspicious at best.
So Jesus is speaking to folks like us—average people who tend to see themselves as better than average. Did you know that studies show that nine in 10 managers rate themselves as superior to their average colleagues, as do nine in 10 college professors. According to professor of psychology David Myers, most drivers—even those who have been hospitalized after accidents—believe themselves to be safer and more skilled than the average driver.
“The one thing that unites all human beings, regardless of age, gender, religion, economic status or ethnic background,” notes humorist Dave Barry, “is that deep down inside, we all believe that we are above average drivers.”
Jesus says that two men go up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and one a tax collector. The story is in Luke’s gospel which portrays the kingdom of God as being full of surprises. The last are first. The humbled are exalted. The despised are honored. The great reversal has begun.
In the gospel lesson for this morning, the Pharisee (a highly respected religious leader) and the tax collector (conspirator with the hated Roman occupying forces) are praying. Now, for a first-century audience (as well as a 21st century reader,) one would think that the religious leader would have no problem praying. After all. He supposedly does this every day. Surely, God will honor his prayer. However, the irony is that the one who comes regularly to pray is not the example to emulate…the problem is not one of consistency, but of intention.
Sure enough, the Pharisee steps away from the crowd in order to maintain his purity before God, and launches into a list of all his religious accomplishments: “God, I thank you that I am not like other people: thieves, rouges, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give a tenth of all my income.” He does everything right, according to the standards of the day, obeying all the religious rules of the road. In terms of keeping God’s commandments, he is way above average.
Then the tax collector bows his head, beats his breast, and says, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” (v.13). He’s feeling so ashamed that he cannot even raise his hands and look up to heaven, which is the standard position for first-century prayer. The tax collector doesn’t make any boasts or excuses—he simply asks for God’s mercy.
There’s no reason to assume that this tax collector is a particularly spectacular sinner. If he were a thief, a rouge or an adulterer, Jesus would say so. It’s much more likely that he is confessing a set of secret, hidden faults—a collection of oversights, errors, and miscalculations that only he would know.
So the above average Pharisee boasts about his generosity while the sin-sick tax collector says… “God, be merciful to me a sinner.”
They both make a connection with God, Right? No!
In a surprising twist. Jesus concludes the parable by saying, “I tell you, this [tax collector] went down to his home justified rather than the other, for all who exalt themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalted.” (vs.14).
The tax collector asks for forgiveness and his heart is made right--justified. The Pharisee is so full of himself that there is no room in his heart for anything else but his pride.
This isn’t what the hearers of the parable expect. They’ve been taught that good behavior draws you closer to God, while bad behavior drives you away. But Jesus is insisting that unless we are aware of our secret faults, humble enough to know that we need forgiveness, we’re going to discover that our minor mistakes can get out of control and will destroy us.
It’s always better to say, “God, be merciful to me a sinner,” than to boast, “Look at how good I am.” The Pharisee’s fasting and tithing seemed noble at first, and his pride in his good behavior seemed to be a minor mistake, but together these factors created a disaster. Without humility, there was no way for him to be right with God!
When you trust God, you get God. But when you trust only yourself, you get…only yourself.”
So real generosity flows from a heart forgiven. Stewardship is not about giving our gifts to show God how good we are…Stewardship is our response to God’s forgiving love and extravagant grace. True generosity flows from a heart forgiven.
Only when we genuinely open our hearts and receive God’s forgiving touch can we see the image of God in the people around us. When I was in Columbus a couple of weeks ago I stopped at Tuttle Crossing and I noticed several groups of young people with tattoos, piercings, baggy clothes and unusually styled hair…And even before I could catch my self, I thought, “Druggies, up to no good.” And as I watched people walking through the mall I noticed a young mom pushing a stroller with two toddlers. The mom turned back to look in a window the toddler in the back just stood up and toppled over the back of the stroller hanging on by one foot. Before the mom could rescue her child, two of the pierced guys that I had seen earlier, ran to the stroller and grabbed the child, lifting him upside down, but safely into his mother’s arms. The baby was fine, screaming but fine. The mother was so grateful. I was convicted by my judgmental thoughts. Different skin colors, hairstyles, tattoos, piercings, body shapes and makeup choices are just superficial…The deep down truth is that we are all children of God, created in the image and likeness of God. That is what we ought to be looking at.
And how many times do we judge others more harshly than we judge our selves. Think about that the next time you are in the line at the post office or the department of motor vehicles…and the line is moving along at a snail’s pace and you’ve got other places to go and better things to do…And when it’s finally your turn at the window, the clerk mess up your transaction and you want to lash out, saying, “Pay attention and get it right.” We’re so quick to judge others, but slow to judge ourselves because we know how hard it is for us when we are feeling tired or ill or distracted by our personal problems. The Pharisee in the parable sees just like we see…we see so well the sins in those around us but not the secret sins in our own lives. The truth is, that until and unless we are as honest with our selves and with God—just like that hated tax collector was when he hit the pavement and asked for mercy we’ll be so full of our selves that there won’t be room for God to work and act in our lives. And unless we open our hearts to God and allow his forgiving love to wash and renew us, the only giving we’re likely to do is to puff up our pride and prop up our reputations.
Bible commentator and master preacher, Fred Craddock suggests that in reality the Pharisee is not a horrible villain, nor is the tax collector a perfect hero. Despite his arrogance, the Pharisee is, in fact, a pillar of the community, faithful and dependable. His problem is that his prayer and his life are out of sync. It is the same with the tax collector: While his prayer for mercy is in the best spirit of the Psalter’s psalms of penitence, his life is not. He likely continues to collect taxes, he cooperates with a cruel and oppressive government. Neither character can be absolutely embraced or dismissed. Each simply shows us a side of our selves that needs integration.
There is something of these characters in all of us. In order for us to reduce our spiritual split personalities, serious prayer will be necessary—prayer that is honest, prayer that does not separate us from the world but plunges us heart first into the world so that our generosity can make a difference.
Deitrich Bonhoeffer was a Lutheran pastor in Germany during the rise of Nazism. He was a resister in the Confessing Church movement and because of his alleged involvement in a failed attempt to assassinate Hitler, served more than three years in Tegel prison before his eventual execution in a concentration camp at Flossenburg.
While he was in jail, he wrote prayers, papers, and letters, which were preserved and later published. The letters and papers express his utter disbelief in the powers of evil in the world; his anger, grief, sadness in knowing that millions of Jews were being carted into camps and gassed while the apathetic Christian world looked on. Less than a year before his execution, on Christmas morning, 1943, he wrote this prayer…that I have been praying this week:
O God, early in the morning I cry to you.
Help me to pray.
And to concentrate my thoughts on you;
I cannot do this alone.
In me there is darkness,
But with you there is light;
I am lonely, but you do not leave me;
I am feeble in heart, but with you there is help’
I am restless, but with you there is peace;
In me there is bitterness, but with you there is peace;
I do not understand your ways,
But you know the way for me…
O Merciful God,
Forgive me all the sins that I have committed
against you and against my fellow men.
I trust in your grace and commit my life wholly into your hands.
Do with me according to your will
and as is best for me.
Whether I live or die, I am with you,
and you, my God are with me.
Lord, I wait for your salvation
And for your kingdom.
Amen.
That’s the prayer of a man who knows that the discernment of God’s will begins with a humble confession and the surrender of his own pride. Generosity is not a virtue that we cultivate but rather a gift that we receive when our hearts are made pure through God’s gracious forgiveness.
“God, be merciful to me, a sinner.” Amen.
