Who is the “bad” person in the reading we just heard? In one corner we have the assumed villain in the Pharisee—a pious, religious person who is set in the rituals of his faith . . . who is quite confident in the words that he is speaking. In the other corner we have the tax collector—a societal scrounge who feeds off the people for a government despised by the people . . . who isn’t too sure about his faith but is willing to admit that he is at the mercy of God. Is it the Pharisee? Is it the tax collector?
Who are you putting your money on?
Jesus, in telling this parable, never says. God hears both of their prayers, but only one receives his request. Jesus never states that one is a better person than the other . . . only states that they both present their prayers differently. The villain or should I say villains are the people who are addressed in the reading . . . those to whom Jesus is telling the story. Remember, the reading began: “To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable . . .”
It has been said that one should never judge another until he or she has walked in the other person’s shoes. One of the most difficult things about being a human being is that we have a tendency to be judgmental and often our judgments are based on ignorance . . . we just don’t know any better.
Don’t believe me? Well, how quick were you to jump on the wagon and declare the Pharisee a villain? Think about it . . . all you know about the Pharisee are the words he spoke in prayer. You know nothing else about the person . . . not a thing. But all of us are ready to brand the guy a villain.
It is true that the Pharisee has a way with words . . . knows how to sell himself . . . how to make himself look good. Likes to toot his own horn. But is he a “bad” person? We don’t know.
On the other hand, is the tax collector a “bad” guy? We do know a little about being a tax collector. Often tax collectors were chosen from the ranks of the people being taxed. We know that they were working for those who were deemed to be enemies of the people. We know that their main job was to collect the government’s taxes and turn them in . . . if they collected more than needed the government did not care as long as they got what they wanted. And, we know that there were probably those who took advantage of the situation and the people thus earning all tax collectors a bad reputation.
Do we know whether this tax collector was one of those rogues? No, we do not. We know nothing about this person other than the fact that he is a tax collector and not too flowery with his words. We do not know if this man was forced to do this job or face the consequences of refusing. We do not know whether he was an honest collector who took no more than the government wanted. We know nothing. Nothing at all. We just know that he did not have much self-esteem . . . that he did not think highly of himself. After all his prayer says it all: “God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”
But God knows. God knows the heart. It is not the words of our mouths that signify faithfulness but the actions of our lives. Remember, love is not a noun but a verb. Verbs denote action.
That is why Jesus addresses his parable to the group that is listening. They were self-righteous . . . confident in their righteousness . . . and, because of this they cared not for anyone else. They looked down on everyone else. All of us want to look good in the eyes of others . . . want to make a good impression. We’ve all tooted our own horns from time to time. The problem with that is when we allow such righteousness to be the hammer we use on others . . . or should I say, use to not care for others . . . to show indifference. That was the problem with this group that Jesus was addressing . . . they didn’t care about others . . . they were indifferent.
Elie Wiesel was a Romanian-born American writer, professor, political activist, Nobel laureate, and Holocaust survivor. In 1958 he published his book, Night, which was based on his experiences as a Jewish prisoner in the Auschwitz and Buchenwald concentration camps. The book has sold over ten million copies in over thirty languages. He says this about indifference: “The opposite of love is not hate, it's indifference. The opposite of art is not ugliness, it's indifference. The opposite of faith is not heresy, it's indifference. And the opposite of life is not death, it's indifference.”
Indifference . . . to not care. How sad when we know that we are all in this together.
God cares . . . the question is: do we care?
Jesus wants to know. Not by the words that we speak, but by the actions of our lives . . . by what we do.
As the followers of Jesus, we have to care. We cannot make assumptions in our assessment of others . . . in our judgments of others. If we truly knew others and ourselves, would we be so quick to be judgmental . . . to be indifferent . . . to not care?
I recently met a person who said that whenever she meets someone she doesn’t know the first thought in her mind is, “What I don’t know.” In particular she wants to discover what it is about this individual that she does not know. She wants to know about them . . . their lives . . . their interests . . . their loves . . . everything that she can. She wants to know the person because in knowing the person makes that individual valuable, wanted, and even loved. She wants to know the whole story. In this she discovers the thread that connects her to the other. She believes that we all need to do this in our lives and that if we did the world would be a different place. In her way she is willing to walk in another’s shoes before making judgment. Shouldn’t we all?
Indifference is slowly seeping into the world we live in. That indifference is destroying the civility we once knew. It is walking away from God’s will to build the kingdom . . . to live in love. As the followers of Jesus, we cannot allow the words that we proclaim to be the opposite of what we do. If we do that then we are no better than those for whom the parable was told. And God knows . . .
A couple of weeks ago on our church’s Facebook page there was a quote by William Wilberforce. The quote said: “You may choose to look the other way but you can never say again that you did not know.” It is the indifference that exposes the heart and God knows the heart. Remember they will know we are Christians—followers of Jesus—by our love. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment