February 5, 2017
Sunday of the Publican and the Pharisee
Luke 18:10-14
Sometimes, a young girl I know seems like she’s not listening to our conversation. Then she pipes up and says, “I was just daydreaming.”
Daydreaming, dreams, and imagination. The human mind has been endowed with the capacity to create not only images, but also entire worlds, civilizations, and realms. We cherish the dreams we have where everything is made good: our imagination is such that we don’t want to recreate the things we try to avoid in life. Illness, tribulation, conflict at home or work, and despair. Instead, we create images that promise joy, and children excel at this. Places where savory food is unlimited, where music is always playing, where games have no end.
The dreams of adults tend to shift because we know that we have to confront our reality and live in the moment. One of the most famous dreams comes from an American icon the country recently celebrated, Martin Luther King, Jr., who imagined this country as a place where race would no longer prohibit our children from coming together to share their dreams – and perhaps even make them into reality.
There is one particular dream of mine I want to share with you today. It’s a dream about a community of Christian people who are ever-mindful that they are first among sinners, that they need to be constantly vigilant about becoming Christian, and that all glory is due to God always, for all things. The people of this community have worked very hard to refrain from comparing themselves to other people – other Christians, Jews, Muslims, agnostics, co-workers, students, men, women, rich, poor, and so on – and have refrained from thinking, “I’m better than you.” My dream is of a community of people that receives others charitably, and is even willing to receive correction from those others. The primary prayers of this community are, “Lord, have mercy,” and “Thy will be done” – the other words of the community are “thank You, Lord,” and “I love you.” The primary acts of this community are glorification of God, not glorification of the self.
I don’t blame you if you’re thinking: “he’s in cuckooland.”
But before we agree that my dream is a fantasy that cannot come to pass, let’s think about the parable told us today in the Gospel of St. Luke. Jesus tells us the familiar story of the publican and the Pharisee. The Pharisee thanks God that he is not like other men because he fasts and tithes – he is just. The publican just beats his breast crying, “God be merciful to me a sinner!”
Year after year, we hear this story proclaimed to prepare us for the great fast. The lessons of the story are sustained by our Lenten hymns, asking for God’s mercy, and encouraging us to openly admit our sinfulness.
This year, we have a golden opportunity to witness to the teaching we have received from the Lord and do good – without taking any of the credit.
I know that talking about politics at Church is dangerous and a poor use of stewardship in most circumstances. Hear me out for a moment.
We all know that the political scene is ugly – we may disagree with one another on who is to blame and what is to be done.
The ongoing debate about the issues is resulting in heated debates, in person, in crowds, and online. People are taking pride in scoring a victory over others. People claim moral superiority and boast about their participation with photos and hashtags.
There is a great deal of exposing injustice, extortion, tyrants, bullies, and fallen men and women.
Missing from the cacophony of the public square is the cry of our publican: “God be merciful to me, a sinner!” The Pharisee calls attention to his good deeds: his vain thanksgiving offered to God is his glorification of himself, one that is magnified because he claims his superiority over the publican. The publican does not mention his good deeds: we know only that he implores God for mercy and self-identifies as a sinner, without referring to the Pharisee who is also in the temple.
This lesson is given to us today as a seed for a plant to grow. Jesus Christ is inviting us to start a new process of authentic repentance. Admitting our sinfulness and imploring God for help shows that we want to change ourselves. We want to become people who stop practicing extortion, who are just, who do not belittle our neighbors on account of their sins. Throughout the rest of our pre-Lenten season, God will continue the process of our conversion by inviting us to become people of forgiveness, people who generously give to others with inexhaustible mercy without asking for anything in return, people whose love is so real that we won’t hesitate to offer it to society’s outcasts: the sick, imprisoned, orphaned, and isolated. And God has given us a model: Jesus Christ, who is like us in every way but sin, who humbled himself and was exalted by God for our sake.
There is no legislation, no protest, no hashtag that can stop any one of us from accepting this invitation today. We can repent and make ourselves vulnerable to the living God who will make us into his witnesses who bear the grace of his son and share it for the life of the world.
Brothers and sisters in Christ, I do not know if I have the strength and courage to take this step. I don’t know if you do, either. I do know that God will follow us into the depths of hell to offer us this chance at becoming truly human, truly humble, peoples whose cries of “God, be merciful to me a sinner” will be heard above the fray of self-glorification surrounding us. Together, let us find the courage to become penitents. Together, let us stop glorifying ourselves and glorify the living God. Together, let us give the dream of a Church that prays, a Church that gives alms, a Church that receives every neighbor with love, a Church that glorifies God and is thankful and loving in word, deed, and thought, a chance. JRR Tolkien might have said that we have a fool’s hope: but we confess our faith in the one whose cross is foolishness to the wise and mighty of this world, the one who humbled himself and was exalted by God, and the one who teaches us to humble ourselves so that we can be exalted by God, not by “the crowds.” May we praise our crucified and risen Lord, together with his Father who is without beginning, and his all-holy and life-creating Spirit, now and forever, and to the ages of ages. Amen.
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