Trinity 11

Dear friends in Christ,

It is the will of God that we follow His commands, repent of our sins, and believe in Jesus Christ alone for our salvation. A few days before His crucifixion, our Lord spoke with the leaders of the Jews in Jerusalem. They questioned His authority to teach as He did. They did not want to confess or admit that He was who He claimed to be: the Son of God. As Jesus speaks with them, He desires that they come to the light, that they believe in Him. But He must break through their stubbornness, their pride, their self-reliance. These men were like the Pharisee we heard about in the Gospel for today – praying to God in thankfulness for not being like other men: sinners; and bragging to God about the good they have done.

Pride is a terrible vice. As Solomon wrote in Proverbs, "Everyone proud in heart is an abomination to the Lord" (16:5). It is one of the things that the Lord hates. The Lord spoke through David in Psalm 101: "the one who has a haughty look and a proud heart, him I will not endure." And as Mary sang in her song of thankfulness to God: "He has scattered the proud n the imagination of their hearts" (Lk 1:51). The passages in Holy Scripture that speak against pride are too numerous to mention here. Clearly, pride is a great evil.

Why is pride so bad? Well, first, let us be clear that not all pride is bad. It is good to be proud about a job well done. If a student does a good job on a report or a test, it is fine to take pride in that achievement. The same is true with a craftsman, or with other work. However, pride becomes evil and perverse when you refuse to acknowledge that the strength, the intelligence, the creativity, all the gifts you have and use for your work, come from God alone. Pride is a denial of the First Article: "I believe God has given me my body and soul and all things...". This is where we fail, because pride, at its core, is a denial of God. Pride replaces the true God with another god, a god called, "me." Pride is bragging about ourselves without realizing or caring that what we have is all a gift, a freely given and undeserved gift.

Jesus spoke a parable to those who were proud. He told about two sons. The father asks the sons to work in his vineyard. One son says "no," another son says "yes." The first son is a sinner. He says "no" to the will of God. He says he won't do what he’s asked to do. The second son says he'll do what he's asked. But what do we find out about them? We find out that the first son, the son who said, "no," actually does the will of God by regretting his earlier refusal, and then doing what was asked. The second son, the one who said "yes," is a hypocrite. He does not do the father's will, even though he said he would.

The leaders of the Jews, the Pharisees, were the second son, the hypocrites. They were so proud that they didn't think they needed to follow the will of God. They could do what they wanted because they were so sure they were part of the kingdom of God already. They didn't have to believe what God taught. They didn’t have to hear and trust the words of this Jesus. And so Jesus concludes by saying to them: "Assuredly, I say to you that tax collectors and harlots enter the kingdom of God before you."

Jesus deliberately chose two groups of people that were clearly sinful, and certainly not following the will of God: tax collectors and harlots. These are the ones Jesus says will enter the kingdom of God before the scribes and Pharisees. Why? Are the lives of tax collectors and harlots so much better than the Pharisees? Could these people who cheat for a living and sell their bodies for sex be so much better at following the will of God?

Jesus is not in any way condoning the sinful lives of the tax collectors and prostitutes. What He is doing is telling the scribes and Pharisees that these others repent, they regret their sinful lives, they sorrow over their sin, and they believe in Jesus. This is the will of God. And by faith in Jesus they, the sinners, are saved.

The Pharisees and other leaders of the Jews do not see this at all. In their sinful pride they cannot see themselves as equally sinful in the eyes of God with those other sinners who are so much worse than they are. They do not regret their lives. In fact, they boast about their lives, their charity, their compassion, their generosity. But they forget about God. They have no humility, no recognition that they live purely by grace, by the free gift of God.

For us to hear these words of Jesus rightly we must hear them in humility, with understanding that what we are, what we have, are all free gifts of God. We, like the Pharisees, get into trouble when we start relying on our abilities, as if we are the ones in control, as if we made ourselves, and are not creatures of God. We must see that we are those who say, "yes," to the will of God, and then do not do it. We agree with God in theory, but not in practice. We think God's ways are a good idea, but finally not very practical for where we are in our lives right now. Sinful pride sneaks up on us, making us Pharisees, luring us into denying God – not in big, open, blatant ways. But we do so in more quiet, covert, secret ways. Rarely will we say outloud: "thank you God that I'm not like him or her." But we must admit that such thoughts do come our way.

Like the son who first said "no" to his father, we need to learn regret over our refusal to hear God and do His will. God's law, heard with humble minds and hearts, does not give us a chance to brag. It shows us a whole list of God's demands for our mouths, for our eyes, for our minds, for our hands; a list of demands that we either ignore or abuse. We find much sin in our lives, we find much pride.

God help us to learn regret – to regret our sin, to regret our lack of faith. Jesus Christ gives us great hope today when He points to the salvation that comes to tax collectors and harlots. Not that we're better than they are. But rather to learn that no matter what our sins are, no matter how open or public, no matter how secret and private, in Christ those sins are forgiven. In Christ, pride is replaced with regret, repentance, humility, faith.

Do not look to yourself. Looking in that direction leads to only two things: pride or despair. Rather, hear the Gospel. You are forgiven because of the Christ Jesus who humbled Himself to the point of death, even death on the cross. In the humility of Christ your sinful pride is wiped away, forgiven, freely and completely. And because of that blessed work of the Son of God for each of you, you may enter the kingdom of God, the grace, the undeserved love of God here and now, and the glory of the world to come. Amen.

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