As we look at this parable of Jesus today, we should remember that it comes in the context of Jesus’ teaching about the characteristics of the coming of the kingdom of God.  This is what Jesus is presenting here in chapter 18.   As I said last week, it’s not a couple of stories about how to get more results from our prayers.  Many people have taught this section that way.

But this whole chapter must be looked at in the context of chapter 17 vs. 20, when Jesus responds to a question about the coming of the kingdom of God.  So even though vs.1-8 mentions prayer, and this parable starting in vs.9 mentions prayer, that is not the main thrust of this teaching.  The main thrust is the coming of the kingdom of God and being prepared for it.  In last weeks parable, the teaching was that when the consummation of the kingdom is delayed, we are not to become disillusioned or discouraged, but we are to continue to keep praying for the return of the Lord.  In spite of all that is going on in the world, in spite of the fact that it looks like God isn’t paying attention, Jesus is encouraging us to not lose heart, but keep focused in prayer on the glory which is yet to be revealed.  Don’t give up.  Don’t lose heart. God is going to act in judgment, and we need to be looking for His return.

Now in today’s parable, the emphasis changes somewhat.  Jesus is still talking about the kingdom of God and will continue to do so through the end of the chapter.  But specifically in this parable He is indicating that righteousness is required to enter the kingdom, and  contrasting those who think they are righteous, with those that God declares are righteous.

Now that is a pretty significant distinction. What this parable is teaching is that it is entirely possible to be self satisfied in your definition of righteousness, and yet not satisfy God’s standard of righteousness.  And that would be a tragedy, would it not?  To go to the end of your life thinking you have obtained righteousness,  only to have the King of Heaven declare you unfit for the kingdom.

Now this is a very simple parable.  There are only two people in this illustration.  Two men come to worship God, and yet only one is justified.  The first person that Jesus talks about is a Pharisee.  I don’t want to take for granted that everyone here is familiar with a Pharisee.  So let me give you a quick definition.  A Pharisee literally means “separated ones”.  They were a sect of Judaism that strictly observed the law of God and consequently served as something of a public barometer of religious  fervor.  Jesus said about them at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount that unless your righteousness exceeded the righteousness of the Pharisees you could not enter the kingdom of heaven.  To borrow a quote from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, “they were pretty righteous dudes.”  They were known for a fastidious approach to keeping the law.   And that brings up another important aspect of the Pharisees.  They loved to be known for their religious fervor.  They paraded their righteousness in public and made sure that everyone knew just how religious they were.  Jesus called them hypocrites.  The word hypocrite literally means an actor on a stage.  They did their works for the applause of men.

In Matthew 6 Jesus says three times that the Pharisees did their good deeds to be seen of men. [Mat 6:2, 5, 16] 2 “So when you give to the poor, do not sound a trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, so that they may be honored by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. … 5 “When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. … 16 “Whenever you fast, do not put on a gloomy face as the hypocrites do, for they neglect their appearance so that they will be noticed by men when they are fasting. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full.”

Now that is the negative aspects of the Pharisees, but to be fair let’s also consider the positives.  After all, no one is perfect, are they?  The good attributes of Pharisees were that first of all they worshipped the one true God.  They recognized and had faith in Jehovah God.  They revered Him.   Secondly, they believed the Scriptures.  They studied the Scriptures and memorized large portions of them.  Thirdly, they prayed regularly.  Fourthly, they were zealous for good works.  And fifthly, they were faithful in attending the religious festivals and Sabbaths associated with worship.

Now none of those things are bad in and of themselves.  It’s all good stuff; they believed in the one true God, they studied the Scriptures, they prayed a lot,  were zealous for good works, and were faithful in worship.  Sounds like they would have made a good Baptist, or a good Methodist, for that matter.  The point is, it sounds like your typical committed church member, doesn’t it?  Basically good people, church going, God fearing people.  In fact, I would go so far as to say that compared with the average church member today, they actually went much further.  The Pharisees were fastidious about worshipping God.  They took it to another level.  They were the kind of people that if you knew them, you would say “if anyone was going to get to heaven, then the Pharisees were.”

I can’t say that without remembering this lady in the church where I grew up down in eastern N.C.  Her name was Mrs. Brown.  She was the quintessential church lady.  She wore those cat eye glasses that they wore back in the 60’s, and she had a bee bonnet hairdo.  She kind of had a bad overbite too, which she was self conscious about so she kept her lips pursed all the time.  To a little 11 year old boy, Mrs. Brown seemed like the picture of what holiness was supposed to look like.

Back in those days, my dad who was the pastor, loved to preach on the rapture.  And I had developed a morbid fear that somehow Christ was going to come back and everyone was going to be taken, except for me.  Well, one day I thought it actually happened.  We lived next door to the church in the parsonage.  And I remember one summer afternoon, I couldn’t find my mother or my brother.  So I went over to the church to look for them.  And I didn’t see anyone at the church.  My dad’s study was empty.  My mother and brother were nowhere around.  And the really scary thing was there was a day care center in the back of the church.  And that was empty too.

Well, when I found the day care empty it was the last straw. I started running around the church crying, sobbing, calling out for my mother, thinking that somehow God had decided that I wasn’t really saved and had left me behind.  I was so upset at the thought of having to go through the tribulation and see the anti Christ and all that, that I didn’t know what to do.  And then I thought of Mrs. Brown.  I said to myself that if anyone was saved, it would have to be Mrs. Brown.  And so in desperation I ran home and called her house.  And the phone rang and rang.  And just before I hung up the phone someone picked up the other end.  It was Mrs. Brown.  I was so relieved I couldn’t stop crying.  When I told her what had happened she said she had been leaving the house and forgotten something and came back inside just as the phone was ringing.  Thank God for Mrs. Brown.  I probably wouldn’t be here today if she didn’t answer that phone.

Now that doesn’t have much to do with my message, but the Pharisees were kind of like Mrs. Brown.  If anyone was saved, you would have to think it was the Pharisees. From all outward appearances these were good people, the best of people.  And yet Jesus says that they were not justified before God.  So as we look at this parable we need to figure out what was wrong about their worship. Something was missing. So Jesus reveals what the Pharisee is missing  by means of his prayer. Prayer is one element of worship. And so Jesus examines his prayer, because his prayer reveals his heart.  Now in the parable Jesus says that this Pharisee comes to the temple to pray.  There were morning and evening prayers that were offered at the times of daily sacrifices.  And I am sure that as a good Pharisee regular attendance at the temple sacrifices was his daily practice.

Now it’s interesting how Jesus describes his prayer.  He says in vs. 11, “The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself: ‘God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.  I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.’”

Now let’s examine his prayer.  First of all, notice that he is standing.  We have already looked at Matthew 6:5 where Jesus describes a Pharisee praying and standing in a synagogue or on a street corner.   Now there was nothing wrong about standing to pray, in and of itself.  You can stand, you can sit, you can kneel, or you can fall down prostrate; all of those may be appropriate postures of prayer.  But the implication here and in Matt. 6:5 is that the Pharisee was standing in a place and in such a way so as to be seen of men.  So that is the first indication of something wrong.  This person loves the spotlight. They have to be up front, on stage.  Their attitude reveals a lack of humility.

You know, I always feel uncomfortable when some one wants to pray over me in public.  Maybe it’s a lack of humility on my part, I don’t know.  I try to be accommodating.  But sometimes I have to be just a little suspicious of these people that will pray over you in a public place, laying one hand on your shoulder and raising the other hand in the air.  And they go off on this long prayer, supposedly for your benefit.  Maybe I’m too cynical, but I can’t help but wonder sometimes if it is because they want to be seen to be praying over you, to be in the position of the one doing the blessing, and you end up feeling like you’re being used for their benefit.

Jesus says in Matt. 6:5 that they pray standing in synagogues or on the street to be seen of men, and consequently they have their reward right here on earth.  Jesus gave instruction in Matt. 6:6 how to pray; He said pray in your closet, pray in secret, and your Father who sees the secret things will reward you.  The point is not whether you are standing or sitting or in private or public, the point is your attitude and your motivation for praying.  The point is that you reveal your secrets to God, knowing that God knows the secrets of your heart.

Secondly, notice Jesus says this Pharisee was praying to himself.  That almost seems like Jesus misspoke.  And yet I think it is deliberate.  The Pharisee may have been addressing God, but he was speaking to himself.  He was praying for everyone else’s benefit, but not God’s.  He was not praying for God’s will to be done, for God’s kingdom to come, but he was praying to be heard by men, to be seen by men.

I often have people say that they don’t know how to pray in public.  Listen, the way to pray in public is not to rehearse, not to listen to how others do it and then try to mimic their style or way of delivery.  It’s not to show how great you are at oratory or prose.  The way to pray is to humble yourself before God.  Open your heart to God and just talk to Him in sincerity and humbleness as if you were the only person in the world.  Empty yourself of your pride.  I’d rather listen to 20 seconds of prayer like that than 30 minutes of prayer from someone that wants to show everyone all the scripture that he knows and all the doctrine that he thinks he knows.  God doesn’t like to be used either.  He won’t accept worship which uses Him to show off.

Thirdly, his prayer reveals his pride and self righteousness.  He prayed, “God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.”  Notice that this guy manages to mention himself five times in two sentences.  That is an indication of where his heart is at.  He is prideful.  He is comparing himself to others, and those that do so tend to magnify others shortfalls while minimizing there own.

Paul said in 2Cor. 10:12 about such people that “when they measure themselves by themselves and compare themselves with themselves, they are without understanding.”  Such people measure themselves by others, compare themselves to others, and think that they are more righteous, more zealous, and view others with contempt.  But the problem is that they are using the wrong standard of measure.  They are measuring fallen men against fallen men, and not against the standard of holiness that God requires.

God’s standard of holiness is found in the OT and the NT, and it is the same standard in both.  It says in Leviticus chapter 11 and 19 and in 1 Peter 1, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.”  I quoted RC Sproul a couple of weeks ago as saying that the holiness of God is the only attribute of God that is repeated in triplicate.  Both Isaiah and Revelation declare that God is holy, holy, holy.   The scriptures do not say God is love, love, love.  But it does say that God is holy, holy, holy.  And when you measure yourself by the standard of God’s holiness, then everyone comes short of the kingdom of God.  There is none righteous, no not one.  The Pharisee only measures himself against other men. He measures outward manifestations, and doesn’t examine his heart.

So the Pharisee’s prayer reveals that he is self righteous.  Not holy in the sight of God, but only appearing holy to himself and to men.  And to bolster that self righteousness, he gives a list of what he does which he think constitutes righteousness.  He says, “I fast twice a week.”  The law only required that one fast once a year, and that was on the day of atonement.  There were other times someone could fast if they wished, but there was only one day required.

The problem though isn’t his fasting, it’s that he did so to be seen of men.  That’s what Jesus said in Matt. 6.  Jesus said that rather when you fast, you should wash your face and put on normal clothes so that people won’t notice that you’re fasting.  And your Father who sees in secret will reward you.  Jesus says if you’re noticed fasting by men, then you already have your reward.  I can’t help but wonder if those people that fast at Lent and mark a cross on their forehead in ashes, I can’t help but wonder if they take these instructions by Jesus seriously.  They must not.

And the other thing this guy offers as an indication of his righteousness is that he tithes of everything that he receives.  Under the old covenant, they had a theocratic style of government that required ten percent of what you got went to fund the national government, ten percent went to fund the national festivals and feasts on high holy days, and ten percent every third year for the poor. So altogether there was about a 23 and a third percent tax, that’s what funded the theocratic kingdom of Israel.

But again in Matt. 6, Jesus says the problem with the Pharisees tithing was that they sounded a trumpet before they gave to draw attention to themselves.  And so Jesus said that rather than tithing producing righteousness, they received an earthly reward, they got the praise of men.  Jesus said in Matt. 6 that the way to give alms was not to let your right hand know what your left hand was doing.  Now I think that had a double meaning.  It meant don’t broadcast to your neighbor know what you are giving, first of all.  But I think secondly it meant don’t calculate your giving.  There was a sort of ancient calculator that was called a abacus.  It required two hands to use it.  And so I think that Jesus means don’t worry about figuring out exactly what your ten percent would be.  But the Lord loves a cheerful giver.  Give according to need, recognizing that Jesus is Lord even of your pocketbook.

Now remember, this is a parable. It’s fictitious account designed to illustrate a spiritual principle.  So this isn’t an exhaustive list of what kinds of things contributed to this Pharisee’s self righteousness.  But these would have been exemplary things of a self righteous, prideful spirit that was not justified before God.

The second character in the story was called a tax collector.  And there really aren’t too many positive things you could say about a tax collector.  They were on the bottom of the social ladder.  These guys had sold out to the Roman government in order to get a tax collection franchise.  So in the eyes of the Jews, they were traitors of the lowest order.  But not only were they traitors, they were looked at as crooks.  Because they had the authority of the Roman government to charge any amount that they deemed obtainable as long as the government got their share.  So the tax collector would add exorbitant fees on top of the taxes and everything over and above the tax he would pocket.  And he had the government to help him extract these taxes by use of force if necessary.  So pretty much everything the Pharisee said he was glad he was not in the earlier prayer was attributed to tax collectors.  The Pharisee said I’m glad I’m not a swindler, unjust or an adulterer, like this tax collector over here.  See, the only people that would hang out with tax collectors was prostitutes who were also outcasts from proper society.

But for some reason, this tax collector has come under conviction.  He knows that he is a sinner of the worst order.  He knows that technically they could run him out of the temple.  But he comes to the temple, under conviction of his sins, and he too offers a prayer.  So let’s look at his prayer and what it reveals about this man.

Vs. 13, “But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, ‘God, be merciful to me, the sinner!’  This guy is standing as well.  So there is nothing wrong with standing to pray.  But this guy’s attitude is completely different.  He is not standing up front, hoping to be noticed by everyone.  But he is in the back, unwilling to even lift his eyes to heaven.  And Jesus says he is beating his breast.  Now that was something that was associated with mourning.  Mourners, especially women, would wail and beat their fists upon their breasts as they cried out in anguish over the dead.

You get the picture?  This guy is mourning over his sin.  He is in anguish over his sin.  He has been confronted with the holiness and righteousness that God requires and he knows that he is far, far from righteous.  He knows he is a sinner.  He cries out, “God, be merciful to me, a sinner.”

This guy is exemplifying the kind of attitude that Jesus spoke of in the Sermon on the Mount; the attitude of mourning over your sin.  That’s what Jesus was talking about in Matt. 5:4 when He said, “Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.”   Listen, folks, mourning over your sin is what is required in repentance.  Repentance is not just saying I’m sorry.  Repentance is not just wishing it hadn’t happened.  Repentance is not just having a relationship to God.  Repentance is considering your sin as dead.  Mourning.  Repentance is a desire to turn from your sin.  To renounce your sin.  To run from your sin.  To hate your sin.  That is repentance.  And repentance is absolutely necessary for salvation, for justification, for righteousness.

There are a lot of people trying to force their way into the kingdom of heaven today on the basis of their self righteousness.  “God is my friend, Jesus loves me and I’m special so I’m in the kingdom of heaven.  I worship God.  I do this and I do that.  I’m a good person. I turned over a new leaf.”  But they have never repented of their sin.  And that is a problem.  That was the difference between the Pharisee and the tax collector.  Romans 3:23 says that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. There is none righteous, no not one.  The Pharisee was a sinner.  And the tax collector was a sinner.  Both were excluded from the kingdom of God.  But Jesus says only one left that day that was justified before God.  Two people go to worship God.  Two people pray to God.  Yet only one is justified before God. Justified means made righteous, declared not guilty before God.  Only one.  And that was the sinner.  Those that come to Christ must come as a sinner, confessing their sins, repenting of their sins, turning away from their sins.  And for that person, God will justify them.  He will declare them righteous on behalf of what Jesus Christ did for us on the cross.

The word for merciful that the tax collector uses there is significant.  He says, “God, be merciful to me, the sinner.”  The word merciful comes from the Greek word  “hilaskomai” which  means propitious.  That word is used only one other time in the NT, in Heb. 2:17  which says, “Therefore,  [Jesus] had to be made like His brethren in all things, so that He might become a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people.”  Propitious means to make atonement.

See, this tax collector knew something that the Pharisee should have known but did not; that is he could never achieve the righteous standard of God.  But he knew that the sacrificial system taught that the lamb was slain as a substitute for his sins.  That was why he came there to worship at the time of the evening sacrifice.  He came asking for God to make propitiation for his sins.  That God would in His grace and mercy provide a substitute like He did for Isaac on the altar, when God provided a ram caught in a thicket.  And we know that Jesus Himself was the sacrificial lamb that was offered for the sins of the world.  Jesus was the substitute that could and did live the perfect sinless life that we can never live.

David the Psalmist said, “A broken and contrite heart, O Lord, you will not despise.”  David knew repentance even after he sinned with Bathsheba.  He mourned over his sin, and God restored him and forgave him.  On Wednesday night we are studying Genesis and we saw last week how the Word says that Noah found grace with God.  He found it.  In other words, he didn’t earn it.  God granted to him righteousness on the basis of faith.  And we are saved the same way today that Noah and Abraham and David and all the saints were saved, through faith and repentance.

Jesus declares in vs. 14, “I tell you, this man went to his house justified rather than the other; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Listen, pride is the reason this Pharisee left still in his sins.  And repentance, resulting in humility, was the reason that the tax collector was forgiven for his sins.  There are a lot of people today that want to be religious, that want the recognition that comes from being religious, they like the attention that self righteousness brings, they like the way it feels, but they have refused to acknowledge they are a sinner.  They refuse to repent, to turn away from their sins.  They want to continue in their secret sins while keeping an exterior façade of righteousness for everyone else to see.  I hope and pray that no one here today is like that Pharisee.  Justification, righteousness, holiness according to God’s standard can’t be earned, it can’t be faked.  Because God knows the heart.  There is only one way to justification, and that is through the grace of God extended to repentant sinners.

The tax collector went away justified.  Now there is a lot implied in that statement that isn’t stated outright.  And I don’t have time to go into all of it today.  But let me say this much;  if that man truly repented as Jesus said he did, then it drastically changed his way of life.  He would have had to change the way he did business, wouldn’t he?  He couldn’t claim repentance and continue to cheat people, to rob from people, could he?  He might even have had to quit his job.

Listen folks, let’s be honest with ourselves first of all.  If we truly mourn over our sin, then we must consider our bodies as dead to sin.  We must die to sin.  If you haven’t really done that, you can say you’re sorry all you want.  You can do religious things.  But it won’t produce justification.  God knows your heart.  I urge you to truly examine yourself today in the light of God’s word and ask yourself if you have ever repented of your sins and asked for God’s forgiveness.  He is willing to forgive you.  He will justify you through the righteousness of Jesus Christ’s atonement for your sins if you will just humble yourselves today.  Let’s pray.

One thing that I have grown to love and appreciate about Luke’s gospel, is that he doesn’t ever seem to just add random biographical selections from the life of Christ.  But Luke strategically weaves together historical events into a theological commentary that endeavors to teach us important doctrines in a systematic way.  And so the key to understanding Luke is to find this thread that ties these incidents and passages together.

I heard Alistair Begg refer to this idea as finding the melody line in a music score.  And perhaps that is a good analogy.  We need to always remember to keep in mind the underlying melody line as we consider the individual notes in order to understand the intended message of the Holy Spirit.

Today’s passage is no exception.  At first glance, it may seem that this is just another miracle of Jesus and a couple of little parables which have no relation either to each other or to the surrounding content.  But I would like to encourage you to look closer today to discover what I think is an important message to the church.

But before we go into the story here we should understand the correlation between the modern 21^st century church and the synagogue that Jesus visited in this passage on the Sabbath day.  I’m afraid that the significance of the synagogue is lost on most modern Christians.  The synagogue was a place of assembly.  It was something that had evolved in Judaism as a result of the Babylonian exile when the Jews were displaced from their homeland and the first destruction of the temple.  The Jews living in Babylon did not have a temple, they had none of their religious and national edifices in the land in which they were exiled, and so the synagogue was a means of bringing the Jewish people together in an assembly where they could worship God.  And they did this through prayer and in reading and being taught the word of God, or the Torah.

But I think it’s important to understand that the synagogue was never an organization that was designed by God.  This was the Jew’s attempt to bring their community together for social, religious, educational and political purposes and to preserve their traditions.  Furthermore, the leaders of the synagogue were not necessarily of the Levitical priesthood as it was in the temple.  But where the leadership really got their authority can be traced all the way back to the book of Numbers 11 when Moses established 70 men to be judges over Israel during the exodus.  These 70 officials that he established became the foundation for what would be called eventually the Sanhedrin.  They were the religious rulers  or judges of Israel.  They were made up of two opposing political/religious groups known as the Pharisees and the Sadducees.  And in the evolutionary process that Judaism went through after the Babylonian exile up until the time of Christ, these religious leaders developed teachings called the Mishna which was a collection of rabbinical instructions which interpreted the scriptures and particularly the law.  So by the time of Christ’s and the Apostle’s ministry, the synagogue, the Sanhedrin and the Mishna had basically taken the place of authority in Judaism.  The priesthood had become corrupt due to the fact that the High Priest was a politically appointed office that was purchased by bribing the Roman government.  This was the status of Judaism in the time of Christ.  It had strayed far away from the original intent of God and plan of God given at Mount Sinai.  It had a lot of shared characteristics with God’s plan, but it had been subverted and changed to the point of outright apostasy. It’s leadership was not appointed by God but appointed by man.  They had their own self interests at heart.  God’s primary way of speaking to the people had always been through prophets who were called by God.  And the prophets, whether Moses or Jeremiah or Hosea, had always been vilified and rejected by not only the national leadership but most of the people as well.

Now I cannot help but point out the parallels between the synagogue and the Judaism of Jesus day and the modern church and Christianity today.  The church was supposed to be the new covenant’s answer to the failures of Judaism.  We were supposed to be the stewards of the new covenant, just as  Judaism was the steward of the old covenant.  But just like our counterparts in the synagogue, the modern church I’m afraid has deviated far from the original plan of God.  That doesn’t mean that God doesn’t have a few people in His church that haven’t bowed their knee to Baal so to speak, but for the most part I’m afraid that the organization known as the church is like rotten fruit, that is swollen in it’s corruption and is ready to burst.  We have added so much disinformation to the scriptures that we have basically emasculated the gospel. We have added so many traditions to the church that it has almost completely obscured the gospel message.  We have leadership and teachers today in the church which God neither ordained nor did He call them to be His ministers.  We see corruption of both a political nature and in every other way, especially morally, in it’s clergy.  And we have produced a false gospel that rivals that of the Mishna which teaches a gospel of self fulfillment and false righteousness and robs people of their chance of salvation.

This is the same type of corruption that Jesus faced in His day, and we find history repeating itself in the 21^st century.  Jesus has been preaching against this hypocrisy ever since chapter 12 vs. 1.  Jesus is preaching against the hypocrisy of the synagogue, the hypocrisy of Judaism, and particularly the hypocrisy of the Pharisees.  He says in His opening sentence of His message in ch.12; “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy.”  In other words, beware of the corruption of the Pharisees, the leaders and teachers of the synagogue.  We can say the same thing today, “Beware of the corruption of the leaders of the church.”  I believe this is Christ’s message today for the church as we know it.  Beware of the hypocrisy that is in the church.

The apostle Paul says the same thing to the church in 1 Cor. 5:6, “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”

The problem in Jesus day was that they had taken the law of God which was given by God to produce repentance, and they had twisted it to produce self righteousness by works.   So God made Jesus the scapegoat to take on Himself the penalty of the law that we might be given the gift of righteousness in the new covenant.  But the problem with the church today is that we have taken the grace  which was supposed to produce repentance, and we have twisted it to produce self righteousness without works. Eph. 2:10, “For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them.”

In spite of the fact that grace has paid the penalty of the law, we still have hypocrisy paramount in the church.  Instead of grace producing godliness, we have grace producing licentiousness; lawlessness.  We have hypocrisy today running rampant in the church under the name of freedom, but there is no sense of repentance, there is no conviction over sin, there is no abhorrence of evil, and there is very little godly works as the result of grace.  What was supposed to be the result of this magnificent gift of grace has been turned once again into an opportunity to indulge the lusts of the flesh.  And we have done just like our forefathers the Jews have done, we have had every privilege,  and yet have not born fruit in keeping with repentance.

Jesus had just given a parable concerning this situation in vs. 6-9, in which He says the owner of the vineyard came year after year to see if the fig tree had born any fruit and yet it had not.  And so the caretaker was going to fertilize and dig around the tree, perhaps prune the tree for one more year to see if it brought forth fruit.  But if at that time it still had not brought forth fruit, it would be cut down.

And God did cut down the fig tree that was Israel in 70 AD.  The temple was destroyed again.  The synagogues were shut down or destroyed.  The rulers and religious leaders were put to death.  Tens of thousands of Jews were massacred and the remnant scattered to the four corners of the world.  And then God took this magnificent gospel, this great gift to mankind, and He gave it to every tribe and every nation of the world that it might go and bear fruit.  But 2000 years later I have to ask, if Christ should return today, would He find fruit in the church?  Would God be pleased with the stewardship that we have given to the gospel purchased by the blood of Jesus Christ?  Would God be pleased with the stewardship of His Word, the Bible?  Would God find the church employed in the business of the kingdom of God or would He find a church that has deviated from the gospel of salvation to teaching a gospel of self gratification and self righteousness devoid of fruit?

My opinion is that there is scant difference between the hypocrisy of the synagogue and the hypocrisy of the church.  Notice our text again and let’s see what it says in this regard.  I think Jesus deliberately picks a fight in this synagogue.  I know that is at odds with some people’s theology, but I think that Jesus knows that He has less than a year left to His ministry, and they aren’t getting the message.  And so He takes the gloves off so to speak from this point on.  He is deliberately confrontational.  But the fact is that He doesn’t have to work very hard at it.  The gospel is by itself confrontational.  All you have to do is speak the truth of the gospel and people will take offense.  But Jesus isn’t dodging the issues to avoid confrontation, He is actually spurring it on.  He has already said in chapter 12 vs. 49, “I have come to cast fire upon the earth; and how I wish it were already kindled!”

So Jesus comes into the synagogue and begins to teach on the Sabbath.  This is sort of like walking into enemy territory.  He knows that this is hostile territory.  But He also knows that this is an opportunity to present the gospel. And by the way, this may have been the last time that He came into a synagogue.  But He came because this would have been where the Jews would congregate on the Sabbath.  There is thought to have been almost 500 synagogues in Jerusalem. Jerusalem’s population swelled to as many as 600,000 people during festivals according to some estimates.  So each synagogue might have served a thousand people or so. Jesus and the apostles after Him saw these assemblies as an opportunity to reach the Jews with the gospel.

Now the details of the story are important, but remember that the healing of this woman is not the central objective of Luke recounting this story.  The purpose is to reveal the hypocrisy of Judaism.  But nevertheless, let’s look at the particulars.  Notice that Jesus summons the woman to Him.  Jesus sees this woman bent double and supernaturally recognizes that she is suffering from a demonic spirit.  And so He calls her over to Himself and says in vs. 12, ““Woman, you are freed from your sickness.” And He laid His hands on her; and immediately she was made erect again and began glorifying God.

Now my purpose today is not to teach a message about healing.  But as a point of interest, please note that the woman did not have to have any faith to be healed.  She didn’t even ask to be healed.  Jesus initiated the whole thing.  Listen, the point that needs to be clear is that this woman was seriously deformed.  She was bent over double for 18 years.  And Jesus healed her instantly. Blind and mute people were healed instantly. Paralyzed people were healed instantly.  Dead people were raised instantly.  It is criminal the way these fake healers like Oral Roberts or Pat Robertson or Benny Hinn get away with this charlatan hocus pocus in these healing services where no one who has any real visible signs of illness are ever healed, and the poor disfigured, deformed people are turned away and led to believe that they did not have enough faith.  If you want to know what that feels like to be one of the seriously handicapped people in wheelchairs that get ushered out the side door after their services, then see me afterwards and I will give you a link to Joni Eareckson Tada’s testimony of her experience with faith healers after becoming paralyzed from her neck down. I don’t deny the possibility that Jesus still may heal someone today, but I want to assure you that Jesus never healed like those guys purport to heal.

But the main point that Luke wants to make in this account is the response of the synagogue official.  He says the synagogue official was indignant.  Indignant is the typical response of a hypocrite.  Here is a woman that comes into the synagogue, probably had been coming there for years bent over double, in pain and suffering, and in a moment she is made well and glorifying God.  But the indignant, self righteous official says, “There are six days in which work should be done; so come during them and get healed, and not on the Sabbath day.”

Jesus responds to that ridiculous statement by calling the guy a hypocrite.  Look at vs. 15, “But the Lord answered him and said, “You hypocrites, does not each of you on the Sabbath untie his ox or his donkey from the stall and lead him away to water him? And this woman, a daughter of Abraham as she is, whom Satan has bound for eighteen long years, should she not have been released from this bond on the Sabbath day?”

See, even their own Mishna had provided for the relief of suffering animals on the Sabbath day, and the law of God provided for relief of suffering on the Sabbath, so Jesus says, why shouldn’t this woman be released from suffering on the Sabbath?

Jesus said in Mark 2:27, “The Sabbath was made for man, and not man for the Sabbath.”  The Sabbath is a picture of God’s provision of rest. Hebrews 4:9 says, “So there remains a Sabbath rest for the people of God. For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His.”

So here is the hypocrisy of this synagogue official.  The Sabbath is a picture of the rest we can find in the salvation of God, and yet he is denying the rest that Christ provided for this woman by healing her from this oppression by Satan. This woman then is a picture of the sovereign work of the Lord in salvation, a picture of the enslaved, oppressed sinner under the burden and bondage of Satan, helpless and hopeless, robbed of dignity, bent over under the burden of sin. And she is met by the Lord and He out of His compassion delivers her, straightens her up and brings glory to God. This is the picture of the work of God in salvation.

But it is the hypocrisy of the synagogue official that I think is the main point of this story.  He is indignant.  He is self righteous.  He is trusting in his form of religion.  But he shows no true compassion because he has never been repentant. He has never seen himself revealed in the light of the law as depraved, utterly sinful and in need of salvation.  He saw himself in the light of the law that he manipulated and believed that he was good enough.  And not only is he still in bondage, dead in his sins, but he wants to keep his people dead in bondage as well.  He doesn’t want them healed.

I think that a majority of the church today is still in the bondage of sin.  Because what is lacking most in the church today is preaching on the utter depravity of man; man’s utter sinfulness, hopelessly lost condition.  That we are totally without merit.  And concurrently what is missing is teaching of God’s absolute holiness.  Absolute pure righteousness.  And what the message of the gospel must be first and foremost is that sinful man is an abomination to God’s holiness.  The church today doesn’t speak of sin and doesn’t teach what holiness means, but just wants to tell people that they can have a relationship with God.  But God cannot have any sort of relationship to man because He is holy and we are so sinful.  We do not have a real understanding of our total depravity and God’s total holiness and how far apart those two realities are.  That’s why the primary message of the gospel has to be that of repentance.  Repentance, absolute remorse over your sinful condition, recognition of your absolute bankruptcy before God, and your need for forgiveness. Repentance is the prerequisite for forgiveness.  And the fruit of repentance is a desire to turn away, to forsake our sin and follow after righteousness.  To hunger and thirst after righteousness.

Immediately following this healing of the woman, Jesus gives two short parables that illustrate the hypocrisy of the synagogue and the danger of false teaching.  But I’m afraid that the true significance of these two parables has been lost in much modern teaching. I’ve often read and heard these two parables interpreted as if they stood alone and that leads to a wrong interpretation.  But the first word of vs. 18 should tie these parables to the preceding passage.  It is  “oun” in the original Greek, and it should be translated, “then, therefore, accordingly, consequently, these things being so.”  So vs. 18 should read “So therefore He was saying, “What is the kingdom of God like, and to what shall I compare it? It is like a mustard seed, which a man took and threw into his own garden; and it grew and became a tree, and THE BIRDS OF THE AIR NESTED IN ITS BRANCHES.”

Now if you’ve been here faithfully in the past then you know that I have said that the kingdom of God on earth is the church.  It is the visible manifestation of the invisible kingdom of God on earth, that is God reigning in the hearts and minds of His people.  The church is the body of Christ, and He is the head.  So Jesus is saying that the church is like a mustard seed which a man planted in his garden and it grew and became a tree and the birds of the air nested in it’s branches.  Now at first we may think that’s just an inscrutable riddle, but on the other hand think that it doesn’t sound too bad.  We all remember Jesus saying that we need to have faith like a mustard seed.  So the first reaction is that this is something good Jesus is saying about the church or the kingdom of God.

But actually Jesus is saying the exact opposite.  Remember, this comes in context with His rebuke of the synagogue official’s hypocrisy.  First of all, it’s important to understand that mustard seeds produce bushes, not trees.  What Jesus is describing is an abnormal growth of the seed to become a tree that birds nested in it’s branches.  And there is an important element to understanding birds in Jesus parables.  If you remember in the parable of the soils in Matthew 13, Jesus said the birds that ate the seed were the devil and his angels.  And so the picture Jesus is presenting here is that the church grows abnormally large, and the devil and his angels find nesting places in the branches of the church.

Folks, this is such a clear picture of the Christian church today.  The church today has become a monstrosity that incorporates every strange foul doctrine that the demons of hell can devise. 1Tim. 4:1, “But the Spirit explicitly says that in later times some will fall away from the faith, paying attention to deceitful spirits and doctrines of demons by means of the hypocrisy of liars seared in their own conscience as with a branding iron.”  Listen, as I keep saying, don’t for a moment think that the devil is not in the church.  Don’t think that just because some wacky experience happened in church that it must be of God.  And don’t forget that the devil knows more scripture than you do.  He has had thousands of years to perfect his schemes and deceit.

Paul told the church in Acts 20 to be on guard, because he said, “I know that after my departure savage wolves will come in among you, not sparing the flock; and from among your own selves men will arise, speaking perverse things, to draw away the disciples after them.”  Listen, the greatest enemy the church has today is not the forces of evil outside the church, but within the church itself.  And it’s always been that way.  This is what Jesus is preaching against. Remember the fig tree.  It is a flourishing tree that should bear fruit, but instead it is just become a roosting place for birds, for doctrines of demons, for false teachers.  And Jesus said if it doesn’t bear fruit then He will cut it down.

And so Jesus gives one more illustration of the corruption that is in the church.  Vs. 20, “And again He said, “To what shall I compare the kingdom of God?  It is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three pecks of flour until it was all leavened.”  Now once again, this parable is often interpreted incorrectly, as some sort of prophecy of the growth of the future church.  But if you remember the context of this message, that it started with Jesus saying “Beware of the leaven of the Pharisees, which is hypocrisy,” then that should give you a clue as to how you are to interpret it.

Leaven is always presented in the Bible as a picture of sin.  And so this parable is warning that the church is able to be corrupted by sin.  The mention of three measures of meal was the standard grain offering that was given to God.  So the correlation is clear.  This is unconfessed sin in the church that is a corrupting influence. Essentially, Jesus is giving a picture of corrupt worship. Hiding sin within corrupted an offering to God.  And I’m afraid that once again this is a picture of the current condition of the church.  The call of the church today is to come as you are to worship God.  That as long as you offer to God the praise of your lips and maybe raise your hands or something then that is all that God requires of us.  And there is no mention whatsoever in the church today by and large about the need for repentance, for confession, for turning away from sin.  And I’m afraid that the church is as guilty as the self righteous Jews of the synagogue who refused to repent at the preaching of Jesus.  We’re guilty of coming with unconfessed sin to the worship of God in the church.

This is why today’s Christian church is more carnal than that found in Corinth.  You can be living with your boyfriend in immorality and be perfectly content in church today.  You can divorce your husband at will and be perfectly content in church.  You can smoke pot on the weekends and get drunk on Friday nights and be perfectly happy at a church.  Because we have no concept of the abhorrence that God has for sin, and furthermore, we have no abhorrence of it ourselves, and rather than just tolerate sin, we embrace it, even celebrate it in the church.

But I put the blame squarely on the shoulders of the leaders of the church. That is why Jesus most scathing criticism is not of the prostitute or the person enslaved to sin, but of the synagogue officials, of the Pharisees and rabbis that were teaching a false doctrine that permitted sin to flourish without remedy.  And that is my primary concern today.  As a shepherd I am tasked with protecting the sheep from the ravaging wolves that rise up among ourselves, from within our own ranks.  My job is to expose it for what it is; hypocrisy, the doctrines of demons, designed by the architect of all false religions, Satan himself.  We need to cleanse ourselves from the old leaven. 1 Cor. 5:6, “Do you not know that a little leaven leavens the whole lump of dough? Clean out the old leaven so that you may be a new lump, just as you are in fact unleavened. Therefore let us celebrate the feast, not with old leaven, nor with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth.”

In Revelation 2 and 3, Jesus gives one last message to seven churches.  And all but two of those churches had moved away from the truth and towards apostasy.  And Jesus gives a similar message to all of them.  I believe that the church today is in the last days, and the message Jesus gave to the last church was that of Laodicea, to which Jesus said, “‘I know your deeds, that you are neither cold nor hot; I wish that you were cold or hot.  So because you are lukewarm, and neither hot nor cold, I will spit you out of My mouth.  Because you say, “I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,” and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked,  I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent.  Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.”