Pentecost XXI, Year C

Jeremiah, 14:1-10,19-22
2 Timothy, 4:6-8,16-18
Luke, 18:9-14

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Saturday, the week before yesterday, the parish vestry spent the day in retreat. Our retreat facilitator had advised us to prepare for the retreat by reading Transforming Congregational Culture by Anthony Robinson, a pastor in the United Church of Christ. I recommend it. It has some important messages for us. It's now available at our bookstall downstairs.

Robinson tells of moving to a small town in the foothills of the spectacular Cascade Mountains of the Northwest. He says,

the community had held a contest to identify the town's "best Christian," and the award had gone to the town's only Jew, the owner of the local dry goods store. Mr. Miller was an extremely kind and friendly man: he never said a bad word about anyone, and he was always there to help out in the community. ⁽¹⁾

Robinson points out that for many people 'Christian' means 'nice,' 'friendly,' 'helpful.' That's because many people, including many Christians, think of Christianity as being a moral code. Many people implicitly assume that the Church is a community of the righteous, not a community of the forgiven. Christians bear some responsibility for this popular misconception.

We should be clear: a Christian is not defined by moral qualities, but by his desire to follow Christ and to be healed. Christians are sinners who want God's forgiveness. We are not moralists because Christianity is not about what we do, but about what God has done and is doing for us. Christianity says, "God loves you, and God forgives you." Once we decide to accept his love and mercy, then we try - though with many, many failures - we try to respond to God's love by keeping his commandments to love him and to love one another. It's not: be good and God will favor you. It's: God loves you, and we try to respond with love.

We find this fundamental confusion in today's parable of the Pharisee and the publican. The main point of today's gospel is that our own efforts do not give us life, that our behavior does not put us right with God. God is gracious. He helps those who can't help themselves, those who depend upon him. It's not a new message. We find it at the beginning of Genesis. Adam and Eve ate from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil so that they could be like God. They relied upon themselves, not upon God. We can trust in ourselves, or we can trust in God.

The publican in the parable is a reprehensible man. A publican was a Jewish tax collector. He bought the right to tax his fellow Jews from the Roman forces occupying Israel. In other words, the publican was a collaborator, a traitor to his people, a willing cog in a brutal, cruel, corrupt system of oppression and exploitation. Publicans greedily fleeced the poor to enrich themselves and the Romans. Jews despised publicans and considered them to be ritually unclean, sinners to be avoided.

Most of us have a pretty grim view of Pharisees. Jesus makes them the villan in many of his parables and teachings. At times, he declares woe upon them. The Pharisee in this parable, however, is someone with whom we should identify. He is a dependable, faithful person. He does many good deeds, and indeed his behavior exceeds the demands of the Jewish law. Generally, he's a moral man. He expresses gratitude for the blessings of his life. He has some recognition that his virtues come from God. He prays and fasts and tithes. He sacrifices for God. He takes the scriptures seriously and worships regularly. He's a lot like us. We should identify with him.

S. Luke delights in telling Jesus' parables that shock and offend us. That's what we have today. The Pharisee is not a villain. The publican is despicable. But neither of them gets what we think that they deserve. God's grace surprises. God's ways are not our ways. God shatters our expectations. The Pharisee expected exaltation, and the publican expected condemnation. But God reverses their expectations. That's Good News for sinners.

Last week we heard about the unjust judge who vindicates the poor widow because she is persistent in pestering him. The unjust judge ultimately does the right thing, but for the wrong reason. This week the Pharisee does the right thing for the wrong reason. He prays, and fasts, and tithes, and sacrifices, but not to glorify God, but to glorify himself, to set himself right with God. He's a moralist. He doesn't depend upon grace, but upon his good behavior. The gospel is about what God does, not about us.

The Pharisee has forgotten or can't acknowledge that he's a sinner and in just as much need of grace and mercy as the despised publican. The publican is wicked. He has rotten intentions. The Pharisee, like us, may have good intentions and be a generally good guy, but he still sins, he still fails, he still makes a mess of things. The Good News is that God sets things right. God forgives us.

The sinner is not a vague abstraction, but concrete and specific. Each of us is a sinner. Our hearts and minds are corrupt. None of us should be smug. None of us should have a sense of moral superiority. Just where today's gospel leaves off, Jesus says, "Let the children come to me. . . whoever does not receive the Kingdom of God like a child shall not enter it." (Lk 18:16,17) God wants us to trust him and to depend upon him like a child depends upon his parents. We need humble hearts.

Our need for God is always - not simply at the moment of our conversion, but through every moment of life. That means our hearts and minds have to keep on growing and expanding. Jesus said, "When an unclean spirit has left a man, he will try to return to the man, and when he comes he will find the man clean, swept, and in order, and then the spirit will go and bring seven other spirits more evil than himself, and they will enter and dwell there; and the last state of that man becomes worse than the first." (Lk11:24-26) In other words, following Christ requires constant renewal, a deepening conversion, a maturing faith, otherwise we'll be more ugly and corrupt than we were before we began following Christ.

At our vestry retreat last weekend, one of the primary questions we grappled with was: "What's our business? What are we trying to do here?" In general terms, it's possible to categorize churches into two groups: those who have low expectations of their members and those with high expectations. Churches with low expectations tend to be in the membership business, that is they expect church members to participate in some meetings and committees, to provide some financial support, to play by the rules, to be friendly and nice. Churches in the membership business expect clergy to function as a chaplain. They want a congenial community of satisfied members.

Churches with high expectations of their members tend to be in the disciple-making business, that is they expect church members to continue to grow spiritually, intellectually, and emotionally. Conversion is not a one-time experience, but a life-long process, a gradual deepening. Churches in the disciple-making business are a fellowship of people who are being changed by God, and they expect that by becoming a Christian we are going to become different people. Churches in the disciple-making business expect what S. Paul calls 'the fruits of the Spirit,' that is love, joy, peace, patience, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. (Gal 5:22-23) Those are the marks of a disciple.

Churches in the disciple-making business know that none of us has cause for self-satisfaction. We have to continue to grapple with spiritual challenges, to seek God's grace to enlarge our hearts and our minds, to strive daily, hourly, even minute by minute to follow Christ more closely, to make all of our lives an offering to God, to invite other people to join us in this way of life. Churches in the disciple-making business expect clergy to equip and encourage every parishioner to engage in ministry. Ministry is not something only for clergy. It is God's call for every baptized person. Churches in the disciple-making business don't merely want a congenial community; they want communion with God. And that is risky business because God is full of surprises.

The facilitator at our retreat asked us, "Are we trying to grow disciples or are we catering to people who pay their dues?" We discussed this at our vestry meeting last Tuesday, and I heard a lot of people saying that we should have high expectations for ourselves, that God wants us to be a disciple-making parish. I want to know what you think. I'd like you to talk to me and to talk to vestry members about this. Next Sunday, there will be a presentation at coffee hour to discuss some of things we learned at the retreat.

I read today's gospel very much in the context of our retreat and of our prayers to know what God wants us to be. The parable of the Pharisee and the publican seems to be a clear message that being a conventional 'nice' and 'friendly' Christian isn't enough. Throughout our lives, we can to continue to grow in God's love and mercy. I say to myself, "This dog can still learn new tricks." For me, that's very exciting. It's good news.

+ In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

1. Anthony Robinson, Transforming Christian Culture, Eerdmans (2003), pp. 26-27.