“[Jesus] told his next story to some who were complacently pleased with themselves over their moral performance and looked down their noses at the common people: ‘Two men went up to the Temple to pray, one a Pharisee, the other a tax man. The Pharisee posed and prayed like this: ‘Oh, God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, crooks, adulterers, or, heaven forbid, like this tax man. I fast twice a week and tithe on all my income.’ ‘Meanwhile the tax man, slumped in the shadows, his face in his hands, not daring to look up, said, ‘God, give mercy. Forgive me, a sinner.’ Jesus commented, ‘This tax man, not the other, went home made right with God. If you walk around with your nose in the air, you’re going to end up flat on your face, but if you’re content to be simply yourself, you will become more than yourself.'” (Luke 18:9-14, The Message).

Which one of these am I? Pharisee or Publican? By the way, Publican is just another way of saying tax collector, but it alliterates and it makes me sound smarter. But I digress.

When I listen to a sermon, do I automatically bring up someone else to mind who should be there to hear the convicting message, or do I apply it to my own heart? I think I’m the Pharisee on this one.

When I look at a homeless man who looks like my idea of homeless– filthy, bedraggled and drunk– do I think to myself “Thank God that’s not me or anyone I know!” or “That is someone Jesus died for and that very well could have been me but for the grace of God”? Again, I confess to being a Pharisee.

Do I look back on my week and see all the obvious sins I avoided and religious duties I performed, or do I see within a nature still bent toward sin and as capable of any vile thing as the worst criminal? Pharisee yet again.

The worst thing I can say is, “Thank God I’m not like that Pharisee,” because it just proves that I am exactly like him. At least he’s honest about his hypocrisy. I try to pretend to be a tax collector while strutting around like the biggest Pharisee of them all.

Lord, have mercy on me, a Pharisee.