C, Commemoration of the Reformation - Psalm 46, Luke 8:9 Romans 3:21-25a "Pacification of our Passions"

Luke 18:9 (ESV) “He (Jesus) also told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt…”

From where does your peace come?  We’ve just sung Martin Luther’s paraphrase of Psalm Forty-Six, “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God”.  In the Psalm's first three verses we hear, “God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble. Therefore, we will not fear though the earth gives way, though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam, though the mountains tremble at its swelling.” (Psalm 46:1–3 ESV)

When chaos in the Southern Ocean threatens to overtake you to whom, or what, would you turn?  Do you turn to God, no matter what happens?  Is he your trusty shield and weapon, your faithful helper in all need?  Luther rightly pens that God is a mighty fortress, so do you find yourself fleeing to God’s gifts, his word, and the Holy Spirit regardless of the events of evil that come your way in the world?

Jesus Christ is the only one who does!  In the midst of the storm of life, in the midst of being incarnate in sinful human flesh, Jesus looked to God as his refuge and strength.  The Holy Spirit was his buttress of truth and support as he endured in human flesh that never succumbed to the sinfulness of that flesh. Having put off his divinity, and clothed himself in human weakness, Jesus knew the Lord of Hosts was with him; the God of Jacob was his fortress!

Although Jesus looked to God as his fortress, he still suffered for the sake of the gospel.  In his suffering Jesus glorified God by being that which would pacify the wrath of God for our sin.  Jesus’ suffering for the sake of the gospel was a suffering for the sake of saving us from sin!  Jesus is the only person who can claim to suffer for the sake of being good in God’s eyes.  The rest of us suffer for the sake of the gospel in our sinful natures, and like the Israelites, Jews, and countless Christians throughout time, we suffer every time we turn away from God and reject his pacification, seeking to pacify ourselves.

Jesus tells a parable that compares the pair, a Pharisee, and a tax collector, who’ve come to the temple.  Luke prefaces the parable with these words about Jesus, who: “told this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and treated others with contempt:” (Luke 18:9 ESV)

Jesus tells this parable to the pious whose piety proceeded from the pacification of themselves.  In other words, their peace came from within themselves, either from their pride, their personal power, or their possessions.  Their understanding stood under no one!  Their knowledge of God was even made subject to the self.  Their trust was in themselves.  When people saw and praised their projection of goodness, they took pleasure and found their peace in this piety. Like a baby sucking a dummy (a pacifier), they pacified and quietened themselves sucking on self-pleasure. When our piety is self-centred, we’re dummies sucking dummies!

In the parable Jesus likens these folk to Pharisees.  In our understanding today, a Pharisee, is a sanctimonious person, a hypocritical pretender, who projects themselves as good while being otherwise. Many of us today are guilty of being just this, and this is Jesus’ accusation of the Pharisees.  However, Jesus came into conflict with the Pharisees, and our understanding of a Pharisee comes from Jesus’ conflict with them, but of all the Jewish parties in Israel, Jesus was most similar to the party of the Pharisees.  That’s why he came into conflict with them.

Pharisees were strict observers of the Law!  Jesus was too!  In fact, Jesus was a better follower of the Law, he might be looked upon as the perfecter of what the Pharisees were seeking to do.  So, what is the difference?  It comes down to intent and that is spelt out in the parable proper!

What is the intention of the Pharisee when he comes into God’s presence?  He comes in having done his best to keep the Old Testament Law.  That is why he prays, “God, I thank you that I am not like other men, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I give tithes of all that I get.” (Luke 18:11–12 ESV)

Keeping the Law required one to do what he had done, and he thanks God for it!  In fact, his piety would outdo you and me!  These men were not half-hearted about God and his word, by any means.  They spent their waking lives seeking to do the right thing.  We might look upon them as holier-than-thou, and they most probably were.  So too was Jesus!  In his human flesh, susceptible to sin, he remained holier-than-thou, holier than you and me, without sin!

However, the intent of the Pharisees keeping the Law was for their own glorification.  There was nothing wrong with trying to uphold the Law.  In fact, God commanded it, and even today we seek to keep the Commandments, by fearing and loving God.  On the other hand, Jesus’ intent was never for his own glorification but for the glorification of God.  Jesus’ piety was a faithful piety that glorified God and his Law!

So why is it that Jesus compares the pair, the Pharisee, and the tax collector, in the parable?  Both stand apart from each other, and others. Jesus constructs the parable placing both men in the temple. The Pharisee compares himself aloof over the tax collector, he makes himself God.  Before God, the tax collector compares himself as an unworthy sinner.  The Pharisee separates himself by taking comfort in himself, and the tax collector separates himself by taking no comfort in himself. 

A tax collector in the temple would have raised the anger of the Pharisees, it would have really niggled their pride having heard Jesus say that the tax collector went down to his house justified.  Who is the tax collector?  He is the lowest common denominator in Jewish society.  Although he’s a Jew — after all Jesus places him in the temple too­ — he collects taxes for Rome!  The tax collector is looked upon as a double agent!  A tax collector in the temple would have received the contempt of Jews, in just the same way you and I might look upon a sex offender, or someone whom you believe has wronged you. Now Jesus says this person goes to his home justified over you!

God calls us all back under his word, both Pharisee and tax collector were sinners in the eyes of God.  The tax collector was justified not because he was down on himself.  If he was, he would have been doing the same as the Pharisee.  He would have been focusing on himself.  If the tax collector sought to work his justification with a woe-is-me, I’m-the-worst-in the-world story, this too is still trusting in oneself, a self-centred pacification!  Still a dummy self-sucking one’s dummy!  Still a pharisee but with a perverse reverse piety.  

However, the piety we’re called to is one like Jesus’ piety. His piety is one that trusted in God the Father, even though he died on the cross.  Earth gave its Creator away and the mountains moved into the heart of the sea, as he descended into the abyss of hell, the depths of the devil’s dominion. Yet Jesus’ fortress was not his life, nor his creation, nor any created mountain of stability.  His fortress was God the Father, his buttress of truth was the Holy Spirit, which rested on his human flesh.

Today you are called to have your passions pacified by Jesus Christ, regardless of whether your passions expose you as a Pharisee, or an unworthy tax collector.  All stand the same before the resurrected Son of God who is coming to judge the living and the dead. 

The law speak, “So that every mouth may be stopped, and the whole world may be held accountable to God.” (Romans 3:19 ESV)  

All are warned: “Fear God and give him glory, because the hour of his judgment has come, and worship him who made heaven and earth.” (Revelation 14:7 ESV)

You can comfort yourselves, but not like dummies with dummies, you can spit out the dummy of self-soothing and be pacified by the promise of God and his word.

Hear the gospel, “But now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law, although the Law and the Prophets bear witness to it— the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. For there is no distinction: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God put forward as a propitiation by his blood, to be received by faith.” (Romans 3:21–25a ESV)

The blood Jesus spilt on the cross is now your peace.  His propitiation is your peace; his blood was shed for the pacification of your passions.   His blood now gives peace.

We’re called to remember the reality of the Reformation, especially now as many denominations desire to be liked by the world over against submitting to the word.  We’re called to be reformed in Christ, to suffer for the gospel as the world suffers because the gospel’s diluted to a peace in human myths.  Rather than being dummies pacified by dummies, let us continually be turned to the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding and Pharisaic peace in the sinful self, so your hearts and minds are kept in Christ Jesus.

How? Do this by allowing the Holy Spirit to help you confess your sin onto the cross.  To pick up the word of God and allow the Spirit to move you in it, to glorify God. Be still and know that Jesus is God!  Be still and allow the Spirit to humble you before him who will be exalted among the nations, who will be exalted in the earth.  

Jesus is now at the right hand of God.  Having been humbled at the cross he was justified and exalted to the right hand of God, in his holy habitation that will never be moved. Amen. 

B, Palm-Passion Sunday - Phillipians 2:8-10 "Hard to be Humble"

Philippians 2:8–10 (ESV) And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore, God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth.

To be humble is possibly the hardest thing for us to be or do!  Even those appearing to be humble usually only appear to be humble.  Most will tout, they feel humbled, when they’re praised by peers.  One could argue that feeling is not one of being humbled, in the true sense of the word.  Rather, one feels honoured because they’re actually being exalted! 

However, when one is truly humbled by their peers, they’re not exalted, they’re made low!  The situation knocks them, one is put in his or her place, they’re made to feel low, lower than what they once felt.  When one is truly humbled, rather than claim they’re honoured, they complain they’re hard-done-by, or humiliated!    

True humility calls for the death of self.  When it comes to humility like this, you and I, always look for another way.  Why is being truly humble so hard?  Why is the death of self so difficult that we continually search for other options?  It’s hard to be humble!

In 1980, Mac Davis wrote a song.  Some of you might know its chorus, “Oh Lord it's hard to be humble, when you're perfect in every way.  I can't wait to look in the mirror; cause I get better looking each day.  To know me is to love me; I must be a hell of a man.  Oh Lord, it's hard to be humble, but I'm doing the best that I can.”

I imagine most will resonate with this song’s chorus, more than Philippians chapter two verse eight.  “Being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross.”  When death came to Christ, he was truly humble.  With his divinity put aside, out of sight, he took the low way of the cross. 

To be humble like Jesus, is strange and foreign to us.  To be humble as Mac Davis sings, or more precisely, to not be humble, is so much easier.

We resonate with this song more because of its self-contradicting comedy, the lyrics are haughty and proud while claiming to be humble.  But whether or not we find the lyrics amusing, they expose something not so funny.  So serious is the truth of what they uncover, the remedy comes only through the humility of Jesus Christ.

Like the song, our human humility actually is a humiliation of our humanity, and this leads to death.  The belief we are perfect, or more perfect than the next fellow, is buried within each of us.  When we look in the mirror, perhaps we don’t think we get better looking each day!   Those of us who don’t, still look in the mirror, compare, and picture ourselves better than someone else!  

Like the song, those that don’t love me are those that obviously don’t know me!  “I must be a hell of a man!”  Well actually, there’s probably more truth here than the writer of the song intends.  O Lord, it’s not hard to be haughty, at this we all seek to outdo each other!

Even when we’re humiliated by others, we ironically still seek to be haughty.  “Woe is me!  Nobody is as bad off as me”, might be the gripe made!  I’m more worse off than all others worse off!  This is a paradoxical exaltation of one’s lowliness! 

Then there’s also the rejection of humility by stating, “ I’m okay, others have it worse off than me!”  We’ve all been in this situation, and heard these words come from our mouths.

Such is the haughtiness of our humanity.  Humility and holiness are easily confused with humiliation of others and haughtiness!  It takes Jesus Christ to sort it out for us on the cross.  Before the cross, and our baptism into it, as enemies of God!  As well as after the cross, and our baptismal lives carrying our cross, as the Holy Spirit works to recreate us as God’s holy children in Jesus Christ.

Do you remember the Warner Brothers cartoon character, Foghorn Leghorn?  He’s the loud-mouthed rooster who’s anything but humble!  In his struggle to become the “top dog” on the farm he’s in a constant feud with the dog.  Once when he was outdone by the dog he says one of his familiar sayings, “That dog, I say that dog is lower than a snake full of buckshot.”

This saying is similar to an Australian expression, “They’re lower than a snake’s belly!” On the scale of things, you really cannot get much lower than the belly of a snake.  Both we and Foghorn Leghorn, make this statement from a haughty height.  Yet in reality, although we wouldn’t get down in the dirt and look a snake in the eye, we’re already there, humiliating ourselves in the dirt by the height of our human haughtiness.

Two weeks ago, we heard Jesus tell Nicodemus, “Truly, truly, I say to you, unless one is born of water and the Spirit, he cannot enter the kingdom of God.  That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit.” (John 3:5–6 ESV)

Being born of the Spirit is our baptism into Jesus’ death and resurrection!  Jesus goes on to compare himself to the bronze serpent in the Old Testament, saying, “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up.”  (John 3:14 ESV)

As much as you or I wouldn’t get down in the dirt to look a snake in the eye, none of us would willingly allow ourselves to be humbled and lifted up with the shame and lowliness, of a snake’s belly, or a snake full of buckshot.  

It’s at about this point, we realise we have hoodwinked ourselves, between our unwillingness to truly be humble, and our desire to be haughty.  So, without any humour in our haughty humus, we cry out to God, “O Lord, it’s hard to be humble.”  The best we can do is not good enough!  I am a worm of a man; I am lower than a snake’s belly!  And yet, this low, I find myself ungrounded, debased, and like dirt, infested with weeds.

One of Job’s friends who wrongly takes the haughty position in judgement over Job, wrongly misuses God’s truth, saying, “How then can man be in the right before God?  How can he who is born of woman be pure? …how much less man, who is a maggot, and the son of man, who is a worm!”  (Job 25:4, 6 ESV)

Jesus is greater than any friend of Job!  He, the Son of Man, gets down with the afflicted, humiliated by our own affliction, by our own foolish deeds.  As the Psalmist wrote, inspired by the pre-incarnate Son of God, “I am a worm and not a man, scorned by mankind and despised by the people.  All who see me mock me; they make mouths at me; they wag their heads.” (Psalm 22:6–7 ESV)

Jesus becomes that worm, that maggot, lower than a snake’s belly!  Yet, he is lifted up and displayed like a snake, in affliction for all who are afflicted with sin.  The Sinless One, is lifted up afflicted and debased with our sin!  Where we find it too slippery to sort out our true humility from our haughtiness, he came down into the slithering cesspool of our sin, became sin, without sin, and was lifted up for forgiveness of sin.

We, like those on Palm Sunday, may very well have invited Jesus into Jerusalem with shouts of hosannah!  Yet, as we will sing to Jesus shortly, “We made your crown with thorns from deep inside us, hammered your hands with nails no-one supplied us.  We need no help to stage a crucifixion; it’s our affliction.”

How quickly the heights of our hosannahs are reduced to the reality of our human haughtiness in the face of the cross.  Although we did not need help to stage a crucifixion, Jesus now bears your affliction! 

We killed him, yet he needed to be killed for us.  His death was unjustifiable!  Our killing him, is the height of human haughtiness, that condemns us. 

But the paradox of the passion is this; his death justifies us!  He humbled himself in the face of human haughtiness, and this now saves you and me from our haughtiness. 

As you’re led to a deeper knowledge of your haughtiness, see the purity of him, who humbled himself and took the heaviness of your haughty sin.  See the weight of your sin on him!  Let the Holy Spirit produce in you the true humility to carry your cross.   Just as he went through the hardship and humility of the cross,  be led to glorify him in your relationships of forgiveness with one another.  Amen.