Grace is Freely Given

Luke’s parable of the Pharisee and the tax-collector has always been one of my favorites. I can see it so clearly: the Pharisee standing tall and proud, reeling off his accomplishments to God, sneering at all those despicable types beneath him, catching sight of the tax-collector to round off his list of low-lifes. Meanwhile the tax-collector can’t bring himself to be anywhere close to where God might be, won’t even look up, just thumps his chest and pleads for mercy. A starker contrast could not be made.

No doubt the tax collector had plenty to repent. Collaborating with the hated Romans, publicans (to use the older term) were notorious for demanding more than required in order to line their pockets. No wonder they made the list of cheaters. The Pharisee, on the other hand, was doing everything right, following every letter of the Jewish Law, completely confident that the way to salvation was to live by the Book. He wanted to be sure that God knew just how good he was.

And that was his downfall. The Apostle Paul, who as Saul tried to out-Pharisee the Pharisees, discovered one blinding day on the Damascus road that his ideas about salvation were totally wrong. It didn’t come from works of the Law, but through the grace of Jesus Christ. There is nothing one can do to earn salvation. It is freely given to us. As Paul put it in Romans 5:8¸ “while we were still sinners Christ died for us.” We didn’t have to do all the right things first.

That temptation to “works-righteousness” is never-ending. A favorite book of mine is A Serious Call to a Devout and Holy Life by William Law, written in 1728. John Wesley came upon that book and scrupulously put it into practice. The term “Methodist” was used to describe John and his friends because of their stringent religious practices, unusual in that day. Yet the more Wesley toiled at his prayers, the more miserable he became. It was only when he encountered Moravians, with their deep pietistic faith, that he understood that the grace of Christ means more than the works of the Law.

We all have some Pharisee in us, and those of us who are male are also prone to his pride. Kathleen Fischer maintains that pride is the essential male sin, whereas its opposite, a conviction of unworthiness, is the essential female sin (at least in Western culture). That’s why some classic Christian practices – such as the Orthodox use of “God, be merciful to me a sinner” as a repeated prayer – can be very difficult for women.

All of which brings us back to grace. So many of the stories from Luke these past Sundays deal with what we do and how we act. In each one the forgiving love of God is so great that at times we want to protest, especially at the unfairness of God loving someone else so much. At least in this week’s story, the “right” person is forgiven. Yet the message is the same. God’s grace is freely given to all through Jesus Christ, if only we will stop focusing on ourselves long enough to accept it.

Pentecost 22: Luke 18:9-14.