A GOD PLEASING PRAYER  

LUKE 18: 9-14


 Because prayer is such an important topic, I would like to spend next two weeks talking about prayer.  Today, let’s think about how we should pray to satisfy God—the type of prayer that should please Him.  When a child asks for something that we, as parents, deem necessary, it is our natural response to get that item for our children.  Likewise, when we offer a prayer that is in accordance with God’s intent, He will respond immediately to our prayers. 

 In today’s scripture, Jesus compares two completely opposite praying attitudes.  A Pharisee and a tax collector went up to a temple to pray.  These two men do not represent actual people who lived during the time of Christ; rather, the two men symbolically represent two disparate praying attitudes, cast in Jesus’ story to serve as an example.  Jesus is trying to show us, through the example of these two men, the proper way to offer prayers to God—a proper prayer that would be to God’s liking. 

 Let’s look at the prayer offered by the Pharisee.  The Pharisees, during the time of Christ, were conservative regulatory fundamentalists who strove to keep and follow the Torah, or religious laws, that was passed down from days of Moses.  Therefore, the word “Pharisee” has a meaning of “separate, or different, from common people.”  The Pharisees, like their name connotes, followed every regulation—both oral and written—as passed down by Moses to separate or differentiate themselves from others.  

According to Bible scholars, the Pharisees lived by this quote, as it appears in Psalms 1: 1-2:  “Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor stands in the path of sinners, nor sits in the seat of the scornful; but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in His law he mediates day and night.”  The intent of the Pharisees was not necessarily bad.  During the 1st century A.D, invasion of pagan religions and cultures corrupted the traditional Judaism; hence, the effort to keep the traditional religion pure, from secular outside influences, was an important endeavor. 

However, contrary to their original intentions, the assertion of separating themselves from the common multitudes eventually led the Pharisees down the self-righteous path, where they believed that they were the sole righteous and holy people in this world.  Therefore, with their excessive pride, the Pharisees began discriminating against the commoners—especially the convicts and the tax collectors.  The Pharisees began rejecting and expelling all people who did not share their belief from their masses, to keep God righteous and sacred.  Jesus, on the other hand, attempted to realize God’s righteousness by embracing and accepting all tax collectors and sinners.

 The biggest, and most frequent, point of contention between Jesus and the Pharisees was over the treatment of sinners and tax collectors.  The Pharisees considered all people who did not share in their beliefs a sinner; furthermore, they harbored a special disdain and contempt for the sinners and tax collectors, the very people who Jesus accepted and embraced.  Jesus had a particular dislike for the hypocrisy of the Pharisees.  He disliked the pretenses of the Pharisees, who only focused on outer formalities and appearance, regardless of true inner state.  

 An American man invited a college student and the girl friend of this student over for a dinner.  In order to create a comfortable ambiance, the man took off his coat and tie, and recommended that the student do the same.  After a long hesitation, the student took his host to a quiet corner and explained why he could not take off his coat and tie.  “The only portion of my shirt that I ironed were the cuffs and the collar; if I take off my coat, all the embarrassing wrinkles in my shirt would show.”  Perhaps the Pharisees were like this student’s shirt; the ironed cuffs and collar gave an aura of cleanliness and neatness; yet, underneath, their morals and convictions were decayed and flawed.  This is why Jesus despised the Pharisees.

 Going back to the topic of today’s gospel, why did God not like the prayer offered by the Pharisee?  According to verse 11 of today’s scripture, “the Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself.”  Praying by himself means the Pharisee prayed for the sake of being seen by others, as a show of display.  The Pharisee’s prayer was not offered as a prayer for God, and only God, to listen; rather, it was offered as a prayer of display.  

The latter portion of verse 11 also illustrates the fact that the Pharisee took great pride in being different from other people. “God, I thank You that I am not like other men—extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this tax collector.”  Here, the Pharisee stresses his own justness, his own elite status, his own sanctity while passing judgment on others.  Not only did the Pharisee loudly proclaim his difference from the extortionists, the unjust, and the adulterers, he even goes as far as to say “or even as this tax collector.”  

 After differentiating himself from all this sinners of this world in verse 11, the Pharisee, in verse 12, stresses how well he follows all the laws of the religion.  “I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I possess.”  He took great pride in the fact that he tithes and that he fasts and prays twice a week, and included his “achievements” in his prayer.  There is no humbleness to this Pharisee’s prayer.  It was a prayer designed to proclaim to God, and the people around him, of his righteousness. 

 In contrast, what was the tax collector’s prayer like?  During the time of Christ, in 1st century, the tax collectors were the object of hatred among Jews.  Put it simply, the tax collectors were considered as sympathizers, or puppets, of Rome.  The tax collectors were hired by the Roman Empire to collect taxes from Jews who were under the Roman rule; yet, they did not receive stipend from the Roman government.  Instead of stipend, the tax collectors had the latitude of collecting as much tax as they desired.  For instance, if the government levied $1000 tax on a household, the tax collector would collect $2,000 from that household and pocket the difference as his income.  Therefore, the tax collectors became Roman puppets, which, as a loan shark and traitor, sucked the very blood from their fellow Jews.   

 Understanding such social status of tax collector, it is indeed a revolutionary event for Jesus to teach that God will be more satisfied with the tax collector’s prayer.  How did the tax collector pray?  According to verse 13, the tax collector stood afar off to pray.  Unlike the Pharisee, who stood upright full of pride, the tax collector quietly went off to a corner to pray in secrecy and humbleness.  Second, the tax collector dared not looked at the sky; pounding his own chest, the tax collector prayed, “God be merciful to me a sinner!”  This was completely opposite to the self-righteous prayer that the Pharisee offered.  The tax collector’s prayer was a truly repentant prayer, offered in humbleness as he recounted his own inequities and inadequacies.   

 The reason for the comparison by Jesus lies in verse 9.  “Also He spoke this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and despised others.”   After speaking about the prayers of the Pharisee and the tax collector, Jesus, in verse 14, states “I tell you, this man went down to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be abased, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”  From this, we can deduce that prayers which please God are those in which we humble ourselves, where from the depths of our heart we truly repent our sins and ask for God’s forgiveness and mercy. 

 Our prayers must not be offered for other people to hear; it must be a prayer for God.  Saint Francisco of Assisi often went up to the peak of Mount Avignon to pray.  When he prayed on top of Mount Avignon, the only occasional word out of his mouth was “God.”  He did not utter any other words; he just occasionally uttered the word “God,” and prayed for hours on end.  If our focus is on God, then simple prayer could become a much better prayer than one that is decorated with florid phrases. 

 A Jewish Theologian named Martin Buber teaches us that there are two pockets for every human being.  If we put our hand in one pocket, we grasp a sense of smallness—that we are nothing but dust and ashes.  If we put our hand in the other pocket, we grasp greatness—that God has created the universe for our sake.  We live in a world where we can become a saint as well as a sinner.  As long as we remain human, we cannot be completely saintly; at the same time, we cannot become completely evil beings.  Like Martin Luther said, we are righteous while sinners, and sinners while righteous.  We can become full of self-righteousness and pride, similar to the Pharisee in today’s scripture.  

On other days, we may be overcome by sense of our own inadequacies and faults, a kin to the tax collector in today’s scripture.  Our lives are symbolized by the Pharisee and the tax collector—dual sided personalities, where we are righteous yet sinners.  We have, as Buber stated, two pockets—one that makes us bask in our own greatness and glory, and one that makes us drown in the sense of our dearth and perceived insignificance.   Which pocket should we reach for when facing God?
 

According to the Associated Press, a nurse from a hospital dropped a heart that was to be transplanted in a patient.  When the healthy heart became damaged as a result of the impact and shock, the nurse threw the heart in a trash bin and made a false report.  After her mistake and cover-up was discovered, she was suspended and levied a $250 fine.  The official reason for her punishment?  “Inappropriate handling of human heart.”  

As a pastor, after reading this article, I felt that I must be careful not to take any actions that might result in “inappropriate handling of human heart.”  In our hearts, we have both the pharisaic attitude and the tax collector’s attitude.  We have the heart of the righteous, while possessing the heart of a sinner.  It is entirely up to us to determine how we deal with both of these thoughts in our hearts and minds.   

 Do you want to offer the Pharisaic prayer?  Or do you desire the tax collector’s prayer?  Depending on how we control our hearts and minds, we can become the Pharisee—or the tax collector—when offering our prayers to God.