Take your Bible and turn to Luke 18:9-14. This is one of the famous short stories of Christ. It’s the story, the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. It’s a message I’ve called the sinner’s prayer because here we have in this passage the original sinner’s prayer. Let’s take time to read God’s word. Luke 18:9. “Also, he spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others. Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and prayed thus to himself. ‘God, 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.’ And the tax collector, standing afar off, would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast saying, ‘God, be merciful to me a sinner.’ 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.” So reads God’s word.
The Prussian King, Frederick the Great, was once touring a prison in Berlin. And as he went through the prison, almost every prisoner to a man fell on his knees before him proclaiming his innocence and asking for the king’s help. But one man kind of stood out. He remained silent. He didn’t say a thing and the king was drawn to him and he asked him, “Why are you here?” To which he replied, “Well, I’m here for armed robbery.” He said, “Are you guilty?” To which he replied, “Yes, I am and I deserve my punishment.” And upon hearing that, Frederick the Great summoned the jailer and ordered him, “Release this guilty wretch at once. I will not have him in this prison where he can corrupt all these fine innocent people.”
I like the story and as the story illustrates, the admittance of guilt is the first step to recovery and redemption. There is no beginning until we end the pretense that we’re something we’re not. Salvation, both temporal and eternal, begins with humility. The humble recognition that you need saving and you don’t deserve being saved. It’ll only be the mercy of God. In fact, the story I just told you is a bit of a parable on the parable we’re about to look at in Luke 18:9-14. This is the parable of the Pharisee and the publican or the tax collector. It’s a story told by Jesus to warn us about self-justification before God or the danger of trusting in our own good works rather than the provision of God’s blood atonement. Jesus wants to be clear about something that salvation is not based on human merit but divine mercy.
One man goes home justified, one man goes home right with God and that’s the man who cries for mercy. It’s not the man who extols his virtue, it’s the man who confesses his vice. And if you go outside the context of Luke 18:9-14, you get that theme, you get that theology elsewhere. Famously Ephesians 2:8-10. “For we are saved by grace, unmerited favor. Through faith not of works, lest any man should boast.” Titus 3:5. “Not by works of righteousness which we do, but by his mercy he saves us.” It’s the sinner’s prayer that God hears, not the self-righteous prattling of the proud. In fact, this parable is a carry on from the previous parable which is focused on prayer. Again, God hears the prayers of the saints and God hears the prayers of the sinner. The saints will be heard as they persevere in believing prayer and the sinner will be heard when they bend the knee and cry out to God for mercy. It’s the contrite heart that God will not despise, Psalm 51:17.
So let me put the text in this context quickly and then we’ll keep moving forward. As I’ve just noted, this parable is tied to the previous parable. God hears the prayers of saints and God hears the prayers of sinners. Prayer requires perseverance and prayer requires humility. Number two. Not only is it tied to the previous parable, it is linked to a good bit of what follows. I mean Jesus has just set before us the fact that God hears the contrite heart. God hears the humble soul. We’re told in verse 14 here that everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and he who humbles himself will be exalted. And immediately we get into the teaching of Jesus on children and the kingdom. And Jesus tells us that children belong to the kingdom and if you want to enter the kingdom, you’ve got to become like a child. A child has nothing to offer. A child simply trusts, humbly accepts. That’s where we’re at.
And then thirdly, finally, I think the context is the ongoing beef that Jesus has with the Pharisees. In chapter 17:20 we’re told now when he was asked by the Pharisees when the kingdom of God would come, he answered them. And I have a suspicion that they are still in and around the Lord Jesus here as he teaches Luke 18:9-14, and he addresses those who trust in themselves will be epitomized in a Pharisee in the story. So here’s your outline if you want one. We’re going to look at the one purpose, the two persons, the two postures, the two prayers, and the one perspective. We have a lot of ground to cover so let’s get going. The one purpose, verse 9. “Also he spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised others.”
Right there in that verse, the mystery of the meaning of the parable is removed. In this verse 9, we have an interpretive steer. We’re told how to interpret and look at the rest of the parable. In fact, the interpretive key is hanging on the front door. The purpose is to expose self-assurance, self-confidence and self-conceit on the part of those who go before God. Jesus wants to expose this idea of having a high view of mankind. You see, fallen man, instead of recognizing that he has fallen short of God’s glory, that he doesn’t meet with God’s approval, tends to exalt himself rather than abase himself. In Proverbs 20:6 says, interesting. “Most men will proclaim each his own goodness.” That’s a danger, that’s a vice, that’s a propensity in the heart of fallen man which is ironic. Here we are fallen. Here we are beneath the standards of God’s holiness. Here we are without God’s approval, but we tend to exalt ourselves. We tend to blow our own trumpet. We tend to carry in our back pocket a resume that we’re happy to read to others for their edification.
You know what it says in 1st Samuel 15:12, “And Saul built a monument to himself.” Whoo! But that’s what we tend to do. We like to build monuments to ourselves. Hey, look what I’ve done. Look who I am in comparison to what he is. That’s the one purpose. Jesus wants to expose that nonsense. We tend to trust our own wisdom over the truth of God’s Word. We tend to trust our own plans over God’s will, right? We tend to lean on our own understanding instead of trusting God, we tend to trust our own strength over the comfort of the Holy Spirit. We tend to trust our own righteousness over the gift of God’s righteousness through Christ. We tend to trust our own riches over the reality of Jehovah Jireh. We tend to trust in military power rather than the Lord of hosts. We tend to trust what we see rather than the invisible realities of the next and other life. That’s our tendency as man.
I have a quote in my study that I printed and framed and hung on the wall. I came across it in the reading of the history of the Plymouth Brethren movement, which was very strong in Ireland and Scotland where I and my wife grew up. And the leader of that movement was a man called J.N. Darby. And in my early years as a Christian, I had a J.N. Darby study Bible and so on and so forth. But in writings about him, he made this statement, “All Irish men whom grace has not total mastery over, have an amazing confidence in themselves.” And I think that’s true. You can tell an Irishman, but you can’t tell them much. We have an amazing confidence in ourselves. We have an inflated view of who we are. We saved civilization after all if you’ve read the book.
I think it was Bishop Sheen here in Los Angeles, a Catholic bishop who said, “The reason the Irish fight each other is to ensure that they have a worthy opponent.” We have an amazing kind of conceited confidence in ourselves. Would you agree with me? It’s just not the mark of the Irish. All men have a tendency to be conceited. Proud to be an American. We sang that last Sunday. I think I know what we were trying to say, but boy, that’s a line that should kind of stick in your throat a little bit. Conceit, confidence, trusting in oneself, exalting oneself over others, parading oneself before God. It’s a human family disease and Jesus exposes it. Jesus diagnoses it. I’m going to tell you a story about those who trust in themselves and then look down on others. So that’s the one purpose.
By the way while this parable will focus on the religious fallacy of that, this Pharisee parading his righteousness before God and before man in a not so religious day, in a not so religious culture like the West. We’re still trusting in ourselves just in a different way. Listen to these words by Gary Inrig. “For these first century Jews, this confidence extended to their relationship with God because of their religious deeds. They were righteous before God. Modern people are less concerned about God than about themselves. Their goal is not so much divine approval but personal approval, feeling good about myself. It is assumed that we are innately good and that our need is to get in touch with our feelings, to actualize our true selves and thus to realize the full potentiality of our human nature. Secular humanism tells us there is no deity. Trust your humanity. Cosmic new age humanism tells us humanity is deity. Trust the God within.”
We’re still trusting ourselves, just in a different form. One is religious, the other is secular, but it is man touting his goodness. Jesus wants to crush that. Jesus would remind us if that’s the path you’re on, that’s the one that leads to hell because the man that exalts himself God will humble, but the man who crawls his way to the cross, God will lift up and bless. So it brings us now to the two persons, the one purpose, the two persons, the Pharisee and the publican or the tax collector, verse 10. “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.” They constitute cultural chalk and cheese, polar opposites. What a contrast. And we need to put ourselves in the shoes of the original audience who see one man as a hero, a cultural icon, the Pharisee, and the other man as a zero, a dirt bag within society, the tax collector.
See from our vantage point, we tend to smell out the hypocrisy of the Pharisee, but that’s not how the original audience would’ve seen it. The Pharisee would’ve been the hero and the publican would’ve been the zero. That’s just to help you understand that. We have a bad image of the Pharisee, but that wouldn’t have been the case as Jesus told the story. That’s why it will come with a wow and a wallop in verse 14. The scandal of grace. You’re telling me that the Pharisee is not a justified man? Yeah, that’s exactly what I’m telling you because you see for that day he was an upstanding citizen. He was a patriot, he was a cultural cornerstone, politically and religiously a conservative, a biblical scholar, an outstanding leader, highly respected. Nicodemus was a Pharisee. Don’t forget the Apostle Paul was a Pharisee of the Pharisees. There was about 4,000 of them in Jesus’ day.
On the other end of the scale we have the publican, the tax collector who’s in cahoots with the Romans. He’s fleecing his own people who are under subjugation. He’s a rat. He’s the worst of the worst. He’s a turncoat, traitor. He was licensed by the Romans to put tolls on the road, tariffs on imports, and tax on anything that he wanted and he often skimmed off the top or took from underneath the table. That’s why when you get to Luke 19:8, the chief tax collector, Zacchaeus, after he gets converted realizes, “You know what? I took a lot of stuff from a lot of people. I need to give it back.” I just want you to get the contrast. This guy’s a pariah, a money grubber, a crook, and a traitor to his country. That’s the contrast. And the original audience will go, “We know who the good guy is.”
Let’s catch our breath. Let’s appreciate the scandal of this story when we get to its conclusion. Given that contrast, given the hero-zero comparison, this will come as a scandal. This will show us by the way, the radical nature of Christianity and the radical nature of the gospel because Jesus here is comparing a justice of the Supreme Court or a Bishop in the church, to a drug pusher in East LA or a pimp on the streets of San Francisco or a sex trafficker down on the border with San Diego. That’s the comparison. It’s shocking, it’s scandalous in terms of its outcome. This is an edgy story where we are taught that the gospel is not for good people but for bad people, the sinner. Not for people who clean themselves up, but for people who want washed.
David comes to God stained with the sin of adultery. He says, “Wash me.” The gospel is not for people who do things, but for people who repent and trust in what Christ has done for them. That’s the gospel and it’s scandalous to the religious and their sensibilities and it’s scandalous to the inner god within man who likes to parade himself and promote himself. This is the gospel of nothing in my hands I bring. People don’t like it. Judaism has metal scales. Hinduism has metal scales, weighing the good with the bad, one man with another man. Islam has metal scales, but Christianity has a wooden cross upon which Jesus hung for men, the just for the unjust that we might be brought to God. That’s the scandal. It’s the publican who cries out for God’s mercy based on grace that gets accepted. That’s a turn up for the books. And you know what? Sometimes even the gospel can scandalize a church.
When I was being trained at the Irish Baptist College in Belfast, I was put with a man who became a lifelong friend to this day, Freddie McLaughlin and this church, Milltown Baptist Church, was on the edges of a housing estate called Beaver, rather rough and tough neighborhood. And for many, many years, very few people from that neighborhood came to the church. The church was for the well-to-do, the well-heeled, the well-behaved. And Freddie began reaching out into that estate. Him and I did a tent mission in that estate and people started getting saved and wonderful testimonies of transformation began to take place and some of those people, rough and ratty, started showing up on a Sunday morning and bringing some of their friends and bringing some of their family. Freddie and I and many in the church were loving it, but not everybody, not the well-to-do, not the well-heeled, not those even in a Baptist church who didn’t realize it, but who were trusting in themselves and their goodness in comparison to others. Because you’ll know if you’re trusting in yourself when you look at someone who’s less than you and you despise them.
In fact, Freddie told me, and it shocked me that this kind of language could ever be used in a church, but he heard a woman from a rather nice area say, “Look at the riff-raff that’s now coming to this church.” Even the gospel can scandalize some within the church. Let’s move on. One purpose, two persons, two postures. The two men took different physical positions and postures. Look at verse 11. “Now the Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself. ‘God, I thank you I’m not like other men.’ And the tax collector standing afar off, would not even raise his eyes to heaven.” Now historically, from what I can tell in my research, Jewish men who were ritually pure, which would’ve been the Pharisee, they could stand in the court of the Israelites which bumped up against the court of the priests.
This man was at the center of Jewish worship and temple worship. It was a narrow area just inside the Nicanor Gate, but the tax collector most likely given this reference to him standing afar off, he’s remaining in the outer court where the Gentiles are and it’s open to all. Both men are standing separate from the crowd but for different reasons. The Pharisee prays with himself. That may infer that even in the court of the Israelites, he’s kind of gone off onto a corner away from others by himself to pray with himself and he does that because he’s too good to mix with others. “I thank God I’m not like other men.” One stood apart out of a sense of superiority, but the other stood apart out of a sense of shame. See, the one man stands apart because he’s too good to mix with others. The publican is keeping his distance because he knows he’s bad.
The Pharisee is at the center of temple worship, believing he’s close with God. “I thank you God, that I’m not like other men.” While the publican is on the circumference of temple worship because he senses the gulf between him and God, that his sin has separated him from God. He can’t even look up. He’s so embarrassed by who he is and what he’s done in the light of God’s holiness and kindness in his life. Now here’s the point on this two postures. Isn’t it ironic that the Pharisee thinks he’s closer to God when Jesus is telling us that in fact it is the publican who’s getting closer to God because God will not despise the contrite heart, right?
Psalm 51:17, David’s confession. He’s a murderer, he’s an adulterer, and he says, you know what? If it was sacrifices you desire, I could pile them up, but it’s a broken heart and a contrite spirit. It’s me humbled before you in all your glory and holiness, acknowledging the distance my sin has created, the offense that my lawlessness has indeed perpetrated. God, exalts the humble. That’s what we’re being taught in verse 14. And if God exalts the humble, that means that the one who is at the center of temple worship is really in the circumference and the one who’s at the circumference of temple worship is really at the center, drawing near to God. God lifts the pure in spirit. God draws near to those who are afar off. It is the sinner trusting Christ and not himself that’s brought near to God. Ephesians 2:13 says what? “That through the blood of Christ, we have been brought near.” Love that language.
See, here’s a man standing afar off. How does he get near? Not by trusting himself, not by talking about his virtues or his good deeds, no. It’s trusting in the mercy of God through Christ. And when you put your hand in Christ’s hand, he will bring you to the Father. So the first step to knowing God is knowing yourself as a sinner separated from God. I want to say that again. Guys, I’m assuming nothing this morning. The first step to knowing God is to know yourself as a sinner separated from God and deserving of his eternal displeasure, in hell forever. That’s the first step on the road to redemption. Know yourself before God as a sinner. The second step is knowing God and what he did for sinners.
I’m going to jump ahead of myself a little bit. When the publican here asks for God’s mercy, he doesn’t use the normal word for mercy. He uses the word for mercy seat, where the blood of a sacrificed animal, a lamb, was shed and the mercy seat was covered in the blood, which covered the broken law in the Ark of the Covenant. So as God looked down on the nation, he saw the blood that had been shed as an act of atonement for the brokenness and the lawlessness that marked the people. And so you not only got to know yourself in the light of who God is, holy and you’re not and you’re at a distance with him, you’ve got to know what God did for you in Jesus Christ upon a cross. You mustn’t trust in yourself. You must trust in Christ. You must not look down on others, you must look up to God. You need to humble yourself before the one who humbled himself and became obedient unto death, even the death on the cross.
I like what J.C. Ryle said, looking back on his own conversion. “It is easy to be a convert from one party to another, from one sect to another, from one set of opinions to another set of opinions. Such conversion saves no such soul. What we all want is conversion from pride to humility, from high thoughts of ourselves to lowly thoughts of ourselves, from self-conceit to self-abasement, from the mind of the Pharisee to the mind of the publican. A conversion of this kind we must experience if we hope to be saved. Thus, our conversions are wrought by the Holy Spirit.” I love that. Have you been converted, brother? Can you consciously say that you have consciously rejected the mind of the Pharisee? Nothing in my hands I bring. I have nothing to offer you, Lord. All I can do is confess my sin and you’ve converted from the mind of the Pharisee to the mind of the publican. If I’m going to be saved, it’s going to be an act of mercy, a display of grace.
NBC commentator Tim Russert a few years ago described a meeting he had with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican. Russert was a very committed Roman Catholic and took his religion seriously and the Pope put his hand around Russert. Russert tells this story himself and he says, “You are the man from NBC and I’m told you’re very important.” Taken aback, Tim Russert says, “Well, Your Holiness, there’s only two of us in this room and I’m certainly a distant second” to which the Pope replies, “Yes, you are.” We could talk about the Pope’s response, but that’s not the point of the story. The point of the story is you need to know yourself in a certain setting. Tim Russert, you. I’m second. You’re first. And that’s true in social settings, but it’s also true in spiritual settings. You need to know yourself and who you are in the presence of a holy God. And I’ll tell you what you are, you’re done and you’re undone and you’re separated and you’re condemned and you’re in a bad place and only mercy will lift you out of it.
All right, let’s keep going. The two prayers. This is fascinating. The two prayers. One purpose, two persons, two postures, two prayers. Now back to our text. They offered two different prayers. The Pharisee stood and prayed, “God, I thank you I’m not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers or even as this tax collector. Then verse 13, “And the tax collector standing afar off would not so much as raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and said or prayed, God, be merciful to me a sinner.” Just a little aside here, public prayer was offered at the temple twice a day. 9:00 AM according to Acts 2:15 and 3:00 PM according to Acts 3:1. And we want to spend a little bit of time looking at these prayers because they are a window into a man’s soul.
You realize that your prayer life says a lot about you, the regularity of it or the irregularity of it. The language you use, the spirit in which you approach God in prayer says a lot about you. Robert Murray M’Cheyne, the great Scottish Presbyterian said, “What a man is alone on his knees before God, that he is and no more.” And what did he mean by that? He just said, the content, spirit, and manner of your prayer reveals the true convictions you have about God. So these two prayers are going to reveal a lot about these men. Their words are going to betray their hearts. See, on the outside the Pharisee looks good, but then he starts speaking and he’s proud.
The publican doesn’t look good on the outside. His head down looking at his feet, keeping his distance, but on the inside there’s a work of grace beginning to take place where he is humbled and he’s at an end of himself. He’s overwhelmed by the glory of God, swallowed up in the thought of God’s holiness and how he relates to that. He’s not at a good place with God and so he cries for mercy. Here’s an interesting little aside. The two prayers that we are looking at here would remind us and it’s rather scary and sobering that worship doesn’t always bring the best out in people. Whoa. Worship doesn’t always bring the best out in people? In fact, in Matthew 6 Jesus will talk about the Pharisees and how they love to stand at the corner and pray. They like to be seen by man.
Talks about this in Matthew 23, about they love to make long prayers out of pretense to make themselves look more than they are. Guys, this is scary, but I want you to think about it, myself included. As a man who stands behind the pulpit, it’s even more scary. The worship of God can become a pretense for self-exultation. This man said, “I thank God” and then he went on to self-congratulate himself. That’s scary. Self-righteousness, human pomposity can show up in the holiest of exercises. Dare we display pride in the throne room of God? That was the devil’s original sin. I don’t want to be party to that. I don’t want to go anywhere near that, showing off in the presence of the holy and glorious God. Prominence and performance in worship, I get scared of the modern worship experience. Lights down, lights on the stage, professional musicians, professional singers. Excellence is good.
But what about heart, depth, theology? Are we not in danger of turning worship now into a performance, a concert, an art that’s about the performers and the artists rather than the God before whom we stand? What about long pretentious prayers? What about seeking the spotlight as a leader, drinking in the adulation, pouting when you don’t get it? Love the story of the pastor who kind of preached his heart out, felt he had done a good job in the text. His theology was spot-on and on the drive home from the service he thought his wife would’ve recognized that and by now she would’ve said something. “Honey, that was a wonderful sermon.” He wanted a little bit of feedback and maybe a little stroking of his ego and again, she didn’t. And so he thought he would help her along and he thought he’d come in the back door and he said, “I was just thinking the other day, there’s not that many great expositors today.” He’s hoping that would maybe trigger something like, “Well, thank God we’ve got you.” To which she replied, “Well, there’s one less than you think.”
Good for her, good for her. Sometimes we seek the spotlight, we seek human adulation and maybe the worst form… Well that’s not true. At least another dangerous form is the self-aggrandizing testimony. We kind of love these kind of testimonies, don’t we, in the evangelical church? We’re not that excited when a twelve-year-old girl stands up and says, “You know what? I grew up in a Christian home and I was protected from a lot of the bad things that have gone on in this world. I’m almost embarrassed to tell you I’ve really no story to tell you other than I’m part of an eternal story where God saved me by his grace and kept me from all the hurt and the damage I could do.” And that doesn’t wet our whistle or float our boat. We like the story of the drunk, the adulterer, the terrorist, and so do I.
It’s all amazing grace. I like the story of the twelve-year-old and I like the story of the drunkard. I just don’t like it when I go home thinking more about the person who gave their testimony than the one they were meant to testify about. And that’s the issue here. Listen to this great insight from Tillich who was a German theologian. He said this, “When a man has had an experience of God, let him beware of telling it to men and making comparisons. The stench of hell is nothing compared with the evil odor emitted by divine grace gone putrid. The grace of God actually can be corrupted by spiritual vanity and the so-called children of the world are quick to note this and are repelled by it. How many a non-Christian for whom Christ died, just as he died for you and for me, has learned to know the grace of God only to this fatty form that reeks of pride and has been turned away in disgust, preferring to stick with his honest nihilism.” That phrase stands out. It can be an evil odor emitted by divine grace gone putrid.
Let’s keep moving, but let’s look at the two prayers quickly. The first thing to notice is that the Pharisee didn’t really pray. It was more of a self-congratulatory testimony. Well, thank you, Lord, I’m not an extortion. I don’t take things by force from others. I’m not unjust. I’m not an adulterer. Haven’t broken that commandment. If you’ll notice too, he prays with himself. That could be translated by himself, could even be translated or the implication would be to himself. He prayed by himself, with himself, about himself. Amazing. Watch how many I’s turn up in your prayers by the way. Make sure your prayer is not me, mine, my and mine. In fact, he uses the word I five times in 34 words. He nods to God and then he speaks about himself out of an idolatrous heart. This man attempted a one-man band parade down Heaven’s main street, crassly self-righteous. He didn’t thank God for who God was.
Watch that in the text. He didn’t thank God for who God was. He thanked God for who he was. I thank you I’m not like this wretch here at the back of the church. I haven’t extorted and I haven’t committed adultery and I’m not unjust. Scary. He also exalts himself at the expense of others. He finds security in comparing himself to others. We like to talk about the sins of society but not the sins of the church. We like to score looking down rather than the score looking up to the perfect, holy, God. You see this in his life and that’s a problem. He had made man the standard but man’s not the standard, right guys?
1st Peter 1:15-16. “Be holy as I’m holy.” That’s perfect righteousness. This man looked on as he looked up and he did it in pride and he despised others. Here’s a little something worth thinking about. This man went to pray but he forgot to do it. Read the text. He went to pray but he forgot to do it. This wasn’t much of a prayer. This was a self-congratulatory testimony because what is the essence of prayer? Weakness, brokenness, a sense of finiteness. It’s a throne of grace we come to because we need it in times of need.
Matthew Henry the Puritan, said he went up to pray and forgot his errand. You notice there’s no seeking, no knocking, no asking. The greatest of all sins is to be conscious of none. This man doesn’t confess one sin. He doesn’t ask God for one thing because you see, he’s the package. Pride and trusting himself is found in this man leaves no room for repentance, no room for humbling yourself to God and seeking his mercy. Remember Jesus said in Matthew 9 was it? The healthy don’t seek the doctor and the righteous don’t seek the Savior. And the irony is he had broken both sides of the 10 Commandments. He’s nowhere near as good as he thinks he is. He’s self-deceived in his self-conceit. Two-halves of the law. One focuses on loving God and the other one focuses on loving your neighbor. While he is taking the Lord’s name in vain. Thank you Lord.
But he is not thanking the Lord for anything. He’s talking to the Lord about his goodness and his merit and then he broke the other side of the law. He didn’t love his neighbor. I’m not like this man. There’s a sneer that comes with that. The tax collector. First thing you notice is this man’s prayer was hardly a prayer. It was a cry for mercy more than anything. Lord, be merciful to me a sinner. He says nothing about himself. He stands looking at his feet. He doesn’t dare raise his eyes much less his hands in worship. He then beats his breast in acts of contrition, which is in the Jewish culture, just a manifestation of extreme sorrow. The depth and sincerity of this cry for mercy is seen in his self-description. Lord, be merciful to me, a sinner. By the way that should be translated the sinner.
There’s a definite article in the Greek, literally the sinner. Lord be merciful to me, the sinner. It’s as if he put himself in a class of his own. It’s as if he saw himself at that moment as the only sinner in the universe. He was not conscious of himself. He was not conscious of others. He was conscious of his fallenness and his wretchedness and his lawlessness before God. I’m the sinner. Now I need to be mercied. I need mercy. I need grace.
I like what Al Mohler says in his book on the parables. “When I give my testimony of coming to faith in Jesus Christ, I often tell people that I had known even as a young child that I had sinned. That was painfully obvious. But what was essential for my salvation was the knowledge of myself not only as the one who sinned, but as a sinner. In other words, the Holy Spirit brought to my understanding that it was not merely the case that I had sinned against God, but that in my heart I was a sinner. The problem was not just what I did but who I was. Only then that I know to turn to Christ and seize him, believing and repenting of my sins. Only then did I become a Christian.”
Guys, you’re not a sinner because you sin. You sin because you’re a sinner. You’re born in sin and shapen in iniquity. Psalm 51. Psalm 58, you go astray from the womb. You’re a natural-born sinner. You’re born with that bias, that propensity. And you need to acknowledge that. Not that you’ve done wrong, but you are wrong, that you’re unhealthy from toe to head. As Isaiah 1 shows, no defense, just humility. Here’s a contrite heart crying out to God for mercy.
Unlike the Pharisee or the tax collector, he saw himself as a sinner deserving of God’s wrath. And he had nothing to offer God for atonement. And so he cries out to God for mercy. And as I’ve said, this is not the generalized word for mercy. This is a Greek word that means have mercy, be merciful. In fact, it’s the word means propitiate. It’s a big theological term that means to satisfy, to remove offense, to quench anger. It’s literally mercy seat. Lord, mercy seat me. Now, this guy may have been a wretch, but remember he’s a Jewish traitor. But no doubt he has an understanding of Jewish culture and a little bit no doubt of Jewish theology. Here he is in the temple seeking the God of his fathers in brokenness and he knows inside the temple is the Holy of Holies. And inside the Holy of Holies is the Ark of the Covenant.
The Ark of the Covenant was a gold box and in the box was the commandments of God that Israel had broken. Above the box was the mercy seat, a golden lid. On each end of the mercy seat were two cherubim who guard the holiness of God and represent the holiness of God. And the cherubim are looking down like God is looking down and they see the broken law. And that’s why once a year the high priest would go into the Holy of Holies and he would spread the blood of an innocent lamb on the top of the mercy seat. And therefore the cherubim looking down and the God who is holy looking down, would not see the broken law. They would see the shed blood of an innocent victim and atonement would be made and the sacrifice would be accepted. That’s propitiation. Lord, let your anger against my sin, says the publican, be removed by an act of propitiation.
Now we’re in the Gospels and we’re about to get to the death and burial of the Lord Jesus Christ, who in his death, according to Romans 3:25 and according to 1st John 2:2. “In his death on the cross made propitiation.” Let me read Romans 3:25 as we begin to move towards our close. “Being justified freely by his grace,” says Paul, “through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus whom God set forth as a propitiation by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness.” 1 John 2:2. “Jesus made propitiation not only for us but for the world.”
I was rereading the life of Stanley Toussaint who taught at Dallas Seminary. Got to meet him through my friend Mark Hitchcock. He later become a long-time professor. But remembers when he was being trained as a student at DTS. He got the last year of Lewis Sperry Chafer. And he remembers particularly that sometimes as Lewis Sperry Chafer went through his systematic theology, he would just stop and ruminate and kind focus on something. And in one particular class he was speaking about the death of Jesus on behalf of sinners.
The fact that Jesus’ death was an act of atonement, an act of propitiation, a means of satisfying the wrath of God and the offense of God in holiness. And he stopped in the class and he said three times, “Gentlemen, God is satisfied. God is satisfied. God is satisfied.” And he says he left that class that day reminding himself, God is satisfied through Jesus Christ and I don’t need to satisfy him. I need to find my satisfaction in his Son who satisfied God for me. Guys, God is satisfied. Baptism, good works, sacraments, loving your neighbor, keeping the golden rule. None of that will atone for your sin or else tell me why Jesus was sent. Jesus was sent to make a propitiation, a satisfaction for us.
Which brings us very briefly to the last point, the one perspective. Back to what I said earlier, you’ve got to get how this would fall on the ears of the original audience. Listen to this. Verse 14. I tell you, this is Jesus speaking. Now remember what he set out to do. The one purpose was to expose those who trust in themselves and despise others. I tell you this man, which man? The last man, the tax collector, this man went down to his house justified in a right relationship with God, declared righteous before God, acceptable to God. Amazing. Not the Pharisee. He was justifying himself through good works. But this man asked for God’s mercy through the mercy seat, through the shedding of blood, through the act of propitiation that would ultimately be fulfilled at the cross of Calvary.
All the sacrifices in the Old Testament were made on credit and all the bills were due at Calvary. And Jesus paid that bill. And now this man can go home justified. Acts 3:19, Romans 3:25, 1st Peter 3:18 talks about God justifying the unjust through the death of the one who was just dying for the unjust. I want you to notice as we close, this is important. I tell you this. I tell you it’s this man that went home justified. Do you notice that Jesus is the one who declares him righteous in the story? Why? Because Jesus is the means of justification in the big story, history, the plan of redemption. It’s by grace alone, through faith alone, in Christ alone that we are justified. Can I squeeze this in? I told you at the start, Paul was a Pharisee. He was the Pharisee of Pharisees.
You think this guy’s resume was good? Look at Paul’s. Kept the law, Pharisee of Pharisees, blameless. But there comes a day when he encounters Jesus Christ in person and in the gospel and he says all of that stuff I now count as rubbish, excrement, dung. It stinks. It’s a stench to my nostrils to think that I could patch together some covering for my sin through my acts of righteousness, through my good deeds. Have I forgotten how holy God is? Have I ceased to measure the distance between me and God? So there comes this moment on the road to Damascus, my eyes are open to see my wretchedness, his righteousness. And Paul says, I jettisoned all that trust in myself as he tells us in Philippians 3, if anybody could have confidence in himself, I’m your man. But then there was a day I got humbled and that was the day I got exalted to sit with Christ in the heavenly places.
He said, I’m looking forward to that day when I will stand before God with a righteousness not my own. In fact, the tense of Luke 18:14 is, and this man went home having been justified. It was instant. Instant. And it was a righteousness he didn’t have. So it was a righteousness that he had to get from another and it would be imputed to him and it was. His faith was counted and righteousness was imputed. Listen to these words as we close. I want you to hear them well. This is the gospel, guys.
John MacArthur says this. Think of it. Jesus, God in human flesh, the holy one, the perfect sinless one says that in one moment an extreme sinner can be pronounced instantaneously righteous without any works, without any merit, without any worthiness, without any law keeping, without any moral achievement, spiritual accomplishment or ritual. No time-lapse, no penance, no works, no ceremony, no sacrament, no meritorious activity whatsoever, nothing to do. Instant declaration of justification on the spot, permanent. Wow. How can that be? Because the only righteousness that God will accept is a perfect righteousness and since you can’t earn it, he gives it as a gift to the penitent who trusts in him. That’s the gospel. All the sinner ever does is receive the gift coming in penitent, trust, pleading for atonement to be made in satisfaction to be found in another. That’s our parable.
Here’s a parable that I think will maybe simply summarize our parable, an imaginary story. And with this we’re done. A man dies and goes to heaven. And of course, as folklore would have it, St. Peter meets him at the pearly gates and he says, “Here’s how it works. You need a thousand points to make it into heaven. You tell me all the good things you’ve done and I’ll give you a certain number of points for each item depending on how good it was.”
And man said, “Okay.” “And when you reach a thousand points, you’re in.” “Okay,” the man says. “I was married to the same woman for 50 years.” “That’s wonderful. Give you a point.” The guy goes, “One point? Okay, then I attend the church all my life and supported its ministry with tithes and Christian service.” Peter says, “That’s terrific. One point.” And the guy goes, “One point? How about this? I started a soup kitchen in my city and I worked to provide shelters for the homeless veterans.” Peter says, t”That’s fantastic. One point.” The guy goes, “One point. At this rate, the only way I’ll get into heaven is by the mercy of God.” To which Peter replies, “That’s a thousand points. Come on in.” That’s a little fallacious. But in just terms of it’s just the point. It’s super substantive.
You get to the pearly gates, my friend, there’s only one way you’re getting in and that’s through the one who’s on the other side of the pearly gates, and it’s not Peter or a Pope or Mary or some other intermediary. It’s Jesus Christ, the one mediator between God and man, the one who laid down his life. Yeah. The one who laid down his life for you and made satisfaction with God, so that by faith in an instant, you become acceptable to a holy God based on a righteousness that’s not your own. Guys, I hope that is your possession. If it’s not at this instant, you can have it. You can bow your head and with a contrite heart that God will not despise, you can offer the sinner’s prayer.
Lord, I’m the sinner. I’ve broken your law. I’ve lived a life for myself. But I need redemption. I need forgiveness. And it only can come from you. I can’t atone for my sins. Nothing in my hands I bring. But I see there’s a mercy seat. It’s not a box and a golden lid. It’s a cross on a hill called Calvary where your Son shed his blood for me. Put your trust where God put your sin, put it in Christ. Don’t trust yourself. Trust him who’s trustworthy. Lord, we thank you for our time in the Word this morning, for this wonderful, challenging, exposing, scandalous parable that gets us to the heart of the Gospel simply, quickly, by showing us a man who trusts himself, a man who finds comfort that his name is on the roll of a church, or that he’s been sprinkled with water, or that he’s gone through confirmation or he’s done some good deed and by human measurements, he’s better than most. Lord, you want to remind us that man is trusting in himself and his good works and that’s not going to cut it.
And then there’s the other man, the tax collector, not unlike the thief on the cross who’s got nothing to offer, who prays the sinner’s prayer, which is a prayer God will always hear. And it’s a prayer that’s focused on what God will do for him despite what he has done against God.
Lord, we thank you for your mercy. Thank you for the amazing nature of grace. I pray that every man here today will go home justified, that we’ll stop playing the self-justification game. Embrace the Gospel, live in the good of what Jesus did for us and the gift of his righteousness and obedience to us and we will live in the security of that. That won’t lead to us doing whatever we want. We’re not saved by works, but we’re saved on the good works. And we’ll go out and live and glorify the one who has justified us. Lord, we thank you for the Protestant Reformation and the rediscovery of this great truth, sola fide, faith alone, by grace alone, in Christ alone. Not penance, not good deeds, not alms, not giving to the poor, just faith alone in Christ. Lord, help us to be justified men through the perfect man, Jesus Christ. Amen.