[Note: this is what I'll offer as fodder for discussion today at our pericopal study group. I don't think I could survive without this wonderful weekly meeting where the almost sacrament of "the mutual conversation and consolation of the brethren" takes place.]
Oremus. Almighty and everlasting God, always more ready to hear than we to pray and to give more than we either desire or deserve, pour down upon us the abundance of Your mercy, forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid and giving us those good things we are not worthy to ask, except through the merits and mediation of Christ, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever. Amen.
Readings: Genesis 4:1-15 / Ephesians 2:1-10 (1 Cor. 15:1-10) / Luke 18:9-14
The collect is remarkable in this post-Trinity season for picking up the theme of the Sunday. It was originally Leonine, and to that the Gelasian sacramentary added “forgiving us those things of which our conscience is afraid” and the Prayer Book (1549) added “always more ready to hear than we to pray.” Bishop Cosin in 1662 further changed the conclusion from “giving us that which our prayer dare not ask” to the present form. Thus it’s grown over the years.
The Introit speaks of “God setting the solitary in families” or “giving them a home to dwell in” – the solitary calls to mind the tax-collector who stands off by himself and yet goes to his house justified, given a home indeed!
The first reading recounts the birth of Cain and Abel (don’t miss the messianic prophesy that Luther’s Bible nails in verse 1 – where the Hebrew lacks “help of”). The focus is on the murder in the heart of Cain and how even with murderous heart he would dare to stand before God and dismiss his brother and his murder as unimportant. Luther’s hymn on the Dutch martyrs has the mark of Cain being God putting the blood of Abel on his forehead. St. Augustine sees in these two and in the animosity that exists in the heart of Cain toward Abel the beginning the two great “Cities.” The City of men is typified in Cain, with his anger that his self-chosen worship is not acceptable, in his murderous intents and actions, and in his whining. The City of God is typified in Abel, where the worship God accepts has the Lamb of sacrifice upon the altar and where he suffers from the hand of his own brother who will not join him in his worship that consists of receiving mercy from the hand of God.
The Epistle listed first in LSB was chosen to match the Gospel, obviously. It contains the core of St. Paul’s exposition of grace and salvation as pure gift. To those dead in sin (other places he speaks of those dying in it) comes the gift of resurrection to new life. Resurrection always comes as grace and gift because of the nature of the dead. Important in this passage is that it shows that in Christ we have been coronated and seated with Him (not just IN Him) and thus we reign even in this age as kings and queens. Yesterday we celebrated Mary’s death and subsequent enthronement as queen. She’s all of that not different from you, but together with you. And she reigns as we reign in this life by love alone. This is the love that Cain forever wars against and rejects, but which Abel goes on giving in his suffering. Note that though our resurrection in Christ is done without reference to our works, it is done so that good works may result, and even those are to be “graced” – received as gifts from the hand of God who prepared them beforehand for us to “walk in” – one might almost say, for us to enjoy. For even the love that is resisted and rejected is still enjoyed by those who give it – it flows from God to them as the gift of His presence, His joy, His Spirit.
The traditional Epistle is also quite apt, for it recounts the faith of the one-time Pharisee who had to learn to count all loss so that He might possess the Crucified and Risen Lord as His only life.
The Gospel in Detail:
Luke 18:9 He also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt:
Can’t get much more anti-fideism than that! They believed all right. But the object of their faith wasn’t God or His mercy, but THEMSELVES. Namely, that they were righteous or just. The proof of their faith in self and in self-righteousness was in the treatment of others. Louw & Nida suggest that the word means to look upon a person or object as though it had no value; thus to think that others (or, more literally, the rest) were worthless, that they didn’t count. This evokes from our Lord’s mouth today’s parable, and do we not all need to hear it? For when we treat others with contempt (mocking the Ablaze folks, for example), are we not dividing ourselves out and regarding the remainder with contempt?
10 “Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.
The temple, recall, was to be a house of prayer for all people. See Isaiah 56:7. And in the great prayer of consecration uttered by King Solomon, like the toll of a great bell, comes the line: “hear in heaven and forgive.” The temple was the divinely appointed place for the dishing out of God’s mercy, His forgiveness, His amnesty and pardon. So why would anyone go there who didn’t want what’s on the menu?
11 The Pharisee, standing by himself, prayed thus: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.
Standing by himself, perhaps praying to himself, but the putting apart of himself from the rest is crucial in his definition of self. He is a Pharisee, and they are a people set apart. They didn’t play at the religious game half-heartedly; they threw their might into it. And that’s why he had to stand apart. Because if the people crept a little nearer they might notice the embarrassing fact that he was a man in need of mercy himself. Keep them at arm’s distance and maybe they won’t notice that, after all, at least in his heart, he is not different from “the rest” after all. Is he in earnest in his thanksgiving? Certainly we can thank God when He keeps us from vile behavior, but this man is really congratulating himself, as the next words show.
12 I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.’
None of this is criticized by our Lord. Fasting is a good thing and our Lord assumes His own will do so! Giving tithes is a good thing, commanded by God, so that to fail to do is to rob God Himself as Malachi makes perfectly clear. But to dwell on the denial of food to the body and the giving of tithes and alms, is to move the focus away from where it simply must be when we gather “coram Deo.” For God does not look as man looks; Man indeed looks on the outward appearance, but God looks upon the heart – as God reminded Samuel when he was impressed with David’s pretty-faced brothers. And if the gaze of the One in the temple reaches to the heart, what then? “O God before whom all hearts are open, all desires known, and from whom no secrets are hid” – terrifying but true words from the Collect for purity. You can’t go dodging the eye that sees you to your depths. To pretend you can is to play the religious game – keeping both God and others with observing eyes, at a distance from whom you really are.
13 But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even lift up his eyes to heaven, but beat his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!’
Afar off, not lifting eyes, but beating his chest, he prayed the prayer that the Temple was put in place to answer: “O God, be merciful to me, a sinner!” Not the Kyrie eleison mercy, but the mercy that goes with the Temple, the mercy with the stress on the instrumentality of its being given: “be propitious to me.” Grant me the sacrifice of forgiveness that will give me pardon and life. Not Cain’s grains; not even Abel’s lambs, but the Lamb, the one telling the parable. He is the ultimate answer as in His Body which is THE Temple, He carried out the ultimate oblation, the sacrifice of mercy that all need who would ever presume to stand before the all-seeing eye of God. And since we all need it, there is no playing Mr. Peacock. Before the eyes that penetrate to the depths and see the whole of our lives, there can only be the plea for pardon
14 I tell you, this man went down to his house justified, rather than the other. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
So much for “justification” being the brain-storm of St. Paul. At the clencher of Jesus’ parable is a sinner going to his home “justified.” Things turned topsy-turvy. The man who considered himself righteous and did not ask for the mercy that the Temple offered leaves with all his sin still upon him. Ever notice that in the parable of the Sheep and Goats, the Sheep apparently have no sin, and the Goats apparently have no righteousness. Those who don’t realize their need for mercy now will be given the last true look at themselves as they head off to the fire. The man who did not consider himself righteous, who knew that God saw down to the depths and trembled in terror at the thought, and so pleaded for the Temple’s gift: for propitiation, expiation, forgiveness, the gift that wipes out sin. That one got what he asked for.
Was he declared righteous or made righteous? Whenever you are confronted with this silly question be sure to point to Genesis 1. The Lord’s declaration creates. Always has and always will.
He doesn’t leave us in ignorance about what it all means: you do the exalting and God will take care of the humbling; or you do the humbling and God will take care of the exalting. Can’t be both ways, which will you have it be?
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