Being Ashamed Before God

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Do you ever get excited about accomplishing your goals and then boast about it?

Do you ever pride yourself on earning your right to be close with God through prayer, believing the right thing, or just being a good person?

Do you ever congratulate yourself for having lived your life the “right way”?

In this Sunday’s gospel reading, we heard about two men who went into the temple to pray. One thanked God for being a good person while the other one asked God for mercy. Between the two of them, only one went away right with God.

The Good News is that salvation isn’t a game that we win by following the rules. Instead, salvation is about not being ashamed to be ashamed in the presence of God and trusting him, and only him, to rehabilitate us.

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It’s human nature to want things

We want all sorts of things in life.

We want a good job.

We want to make an impact in the world.

We want a loving spouse and happy children.

We want a nice house and a fast car.

We want our political party to be in power.

In short, we want things our way to have our desires satisfied.

It’s not hard to get what we want. There are a lot of successful people out there.

And, when we don’t get what we want, there’s plenty of people out that will not only empathize with us, but also sympathize with us as well.

All we have to do post our desires on Facebook, go to a rally, or make a ruckus to draw attention to our cause.

And, when we’re successful, boy does it feel good!

We get a sense of accomplishment–a sense of having impacted the world for the better, even if our enemies are at home licking their wounds—they’ll soon see that we were right . . . or so we tell ourselves.

Our motivations are controlled by our drives

It’s how we make our decisions and how we decide to live our lives.

Often times, our spiritual life is also run the same way.

We want to be successful in life and we want to be successful in our spiritual lives as well.

So, we approach it as we do with everything else in life.

We think we’ve got it right so we try to do “religion” our way—both inside and outside the church.

We think society and schools need to pray the way we pray.

We think the church needs to be organized the way we want it organized.

And, its the same in our private prayer lives as well

We set prayer “rules” and goals, not that they’re bad . . . but they can become an end in and of themselves.

For example, you decide to pray the morning prayer every morning when you get out of bed. You accomplish this rule and you become proud of yourself.

And, because you’re used to “victories” in the secular world, you believe ther should be “victories” in the spiritual life as well.

You’ve set your mind to do something and now you’ve done it.

You start to tell yourself, you’ve earned your righteousness. God would be proud, you think.

Your prayer rule has become an idol!

Well, this is exactly what the Pharisee did

He too had desires. He too wanted to be right and do things his way.

And, he was successful and proud of himself.

So proud, in fact, that he went to the temple to tell God how well he’d done!

“I thank you, God, that I am not greedy, dishonest, or an adulterer, like everybody else. I thank you that I am not like that tax collector over there. I fast two days a week, and I give you one tenth of all my income.” (Luke 18:11-12 GNT)

It sounds like he got it.

He’s the perfect parishioner. He follows the fasts, says his prayers, and, to every priest’s delight, he gives the church 10% of his income.

But, as successful as he was in accomplishing his goals and putting his life in order, Jesus says this man did not go home right with God.

So what went wrong? How did he mess up? What didn’t he do?

Well, that’s just it . . . he did everything except let God do the work.

Our salvation depends on humbling ourselves

This means not being ashamed to be ashamed in front of God.

It means being still and trusting that God is God and you are not.

It means allowing God to wash you in his grace and allow him to save you.

When we try to do it on our own, our sinfulness gets in the way because it’s our human nature, our desires, that are running the show.

St. Paul once wrote,

What human nature does is quite plain. It shows itself in immoral, filthy, and indecent actions; in worship of idols and witchcraft. People become enemies and they fight; they become jealous, angry, and ambitious. They separate into parties and groups; they are envious, get drunk, have orgies, and do other things like these. I warn you now as I have before: those who do these things will not possess the Kingdom of God. (Galatians 5:20-21 GNT)

This may not be intentional.

I’m sure it wasn’t with the Pharisee. I’m sure his told himself, “This is what God wants me to do. He wants me to be a good person, give to the church, follow the fasts, and pray.”

But, in the end, he made his desire to be right an idol and that’s what he worshiped.

Setting goals, organizing a calendar, and producing a plan can get you places in this world. But that’s just it, it gets you places in this world, but not in God’s Kingdom.

The Kingdom is very different.

There, we’re simply called to trust God and allow his love to do the work.

This is what the tax-collector, also known as the Publican, got right . . . he recognized that his ego got in his way.

He recognized that he couldn’t do it all.

At some point, he had to give it all over to God.

But the tax collector stood at a distance and would not even raise his face to heaven, but beat on his breast and said, ‘God, have pity on me, a sinner!’ (Luke 18:13 GNT)

He trusted in God.

He trusted in the knowledge that he had nothing to give except his own failure.

And guess what . . . God was able to transform this man.

I tell you,” said Jesus, “the tax collector, and not the Pharisee, was in the right with God when he went home. For those who make themselves great will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be made great.” (Luke 18:14 GNT)

This tax-collector, through his trust in God, became a new creation.

He was put right with God and found a new way of living.

The Holy Spirit dwelt in his heart.

Now that he formed a new relationship with God, he could rediscover his relationship with others.

What did that look like?

Exactly as one would expect when the Spirit of God dwells in one’s heart.

St. Paul writes,

“. . . the Spirit produces love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, humility, and self-control. There is no law against such things as these. And those who belong to Christ Jesus have put to death their human nature with all its passions and desires. The Spirit has given us life . . .” (Galatians 5:22-25 GNT)

So I’m wondering . . .

How have you been like the Pharisee trusting in your desires, trying to have things your way, and boasting of your accomplishments?

In what ways can you “turn around” and repeat to realize your unworthiness before God?

How will you allow the Spirit to bring new life in your spiritual walk with God and with others?