The Russian Leo Tolstoy was a great novelist, apparently.
I've never read him, but apparently he's one of the most famous novelists in the world.
I know who he is.
Historians would say that he's potentially the greatest novelist of all time.
I don't know because I don't read novels as a general rule.
I read biographies of novelists instead.
But with things like war and peace, which I do know about, to his credit, that's pretty impressive.
He wrote something about Anna, somebody at some point as well, if you're familiar with him at all.
But he's Russian, and we call him Leo Tolstoy because we can't pronounce his Russian name, for those who are English.
But it would seem that he believed the press about himself also.
He thought that he was pretty special.
There were certain things I did read about him.
For instance, this prayer that he wrote in his diary.
Help, Father, come and dwell within me.
You are already dwell within me.
You are already me.
A historian, Paul Johnson, wrote,
There are times when Tolstoy seemed to think of himself as God's brother.
Indeed, his elder brother.
Tolstoy once wrote in one of his diaries,
Read a work on the literary characterization of genius today,
And this awoke in me the conviction that I am a remarkable man.
Both as regards capacity and eagerness to work,
I have not met a single man who was more morally as good as I.
Obviously need to get out a little bit more, I think.
He wrote that he felt in his own soul an immeasurable grandeur.
He regarded himself as above the rest of humanity
as part of a historic apostolic succession of moral superiors
like Moses and Abraham and Jesus.
And down the line you get to Tolstoy.
It could be said, borrowing from today's,
the opening words of today's text,
that Leo Tolstoy was confident of his own righteousness
and looked down on everyone else.
The irony of his words is that he got this version
of a superior, moral superiority,
because of his love of Jesus' teaching
in the Sermon on the Mount and his parables.
I'm not sure if he read Luke 18.
Confident of his own righteousness
and looked down on everyone else.
Last week, we started this journey to Jerusalem with Jesus.
We saw there, quite clearly,
that Jesus demands commitment
from those who would follow him.
We saw that Jesus' journey to Jerusalem
is our journey as he sets his face to Jerusalem
to go there and die.
We must set our face to die to ourselves with him.
Luke 9, 23, 24
could not be any clearer
for the disciple of Jesus.
If anyone would come after me,
he must deny himself,
take up his cross daily,
and follow me.
Whoever wants to save his life will lose it,
but whoever loses his life for me
will save it.
Daily, taking up your cross.
Daily, taking on the position of a dead man walking.
Dead to self, alive to Christ.
So when Jesus set his face to walk the Calvary Road,
he was not merely taking our place,
where we are just the spectators in it,
watching him do it.
He was also setting our pattern.
He was both our substitute and our pace setter.
And so the question for us is why?
Why would I want to get on this road with Jesus
when his call upon my life is so massive?
The radical call,
the radical claim of Jesus
is extremely costly.
The highest possible price,
the surrendering of our lives.
Why would you want to do that?
Now, last week I touched on the answer to that question.
And tonight I want to drive down into it.
I want to use this text that's in front of us
in Luke 18 as my launching pad, if you like.
I want to dig deeper
because what we're seeing in this text here
underlies everything about radical.
and everything that's going to flow from this
about radical,
what it means to be a radical disciple.
So we've had the call last week
and now the radical foundation for that call.
And the core issue with this
is how to get right with God.
It's spelled out in verse 14.
I tell you, it says,
I tell you that this man,
rather than the other,
went home justified before God.
That's the core issue.
How to get right.
And so to help us understand that issue clearly,
to understand what it means to be declared right before God,
what it means to be justified,
Jesus tells this story about two extraordinary men.
And these men are drawn by Jesus so starkly.
They're set against each other
so that we can see the issue.
They're characterized so clearly as black and white.
We know from verse 10
that these two men go up to the temple to pray.
But as it says in verse 14,
only one of them goes home okay with God.
Only one of them is a friend of God's
at the end of the experience.
One of them, we are told,
is a tax collector.
The other one is a Pharisee.
Now, we need to sort of pause for a moment.
And it's really crucial for us not to get this all mucked up right from the start.
Because if you're familiar with the Bible at all,
and you've read through the Gospels,
you will know that Jesus constantly goes,
clash, clash, clash to every Pharisee.
Jesus and Pharisees didn't get on.
Jesus said,
the harshest words from the mouth of Jesus
was directed to the Pharisees and the scribes
and the teachers of the law.
A group of three people,
Pharisees,
just copped it from Jesus.
Woe to you.
Curse to you, Pharisees.
And so,
we just automatically think that the Pharisee is the bad guy.
But not in first century Palestine
for the followers of Jesus
who heard these words from Jesus' mouth for the very first time.
Peter, James, John, and the rest of the boys.
The Pharisee was deeply respected in first century Palestine.
They were a pillar of the community.
Trustworthy.
Very generous to the poor and needy.
And we can see in the text here,
he says,
I'm a good guy and I give a tenth of everything.
Very, very generous.
They were not men who made their money out of religion.
They were regular church attendees
who were deeply, deeply serious
about their commitment to God
and obedience to God.
On the other hand,
you've got the tax collectors.
And they are lowlifes.
They are very greedy.
No one would socialite with them.
Tax collectors were considered absolute filth
because they were traitors.
They were Jewish people
who teamed up with the occupying Romans,
joined forces with the occupying Romans
against their own people.
They had sold out their families,
their friends,
their nation,
their religion,
their God for the sake of money.
And so the Romans came in,
they occupied,
and they said,
we're going to charge a 20% tax
on everyone in this area.
And to collect the taxes,
they recruited these people
who were Jewish people,
put their hands up,
and said,
yeah,
I'll collect taxes from my own people.
And the Romans gave them permission
to put their cut on top of that.
Whatever you want,
whatever it is that you,
you know,
you want to buy yourself a fancy camel,
you know,
put an extra tax,
you know,
you want to buy yourself a bigger house,
put whatever tax.
So a tax collector could add
whatever they wanted on top of that.
And when they went in
to collect the taxes,
they had the Roman soldiers
with their spears,
protecting them
and ensuring that the people
handed over the money.
Tax collector would hand over his dollars
to the Romans
and keep the rest for himself.
So this guy,
as far as their friends,
their nations,
the other Jewish people,
these are scum.
They were not welcome
in any place of worship.
Tax collectors historically
were known
when they didn't have
the Roman soldiers around them,
were very vulnerable
and they were known
to be stabbed to death
in broad daylight
in marketplaces
and people would not come
to their aid at all.
You would spit on them
and kick them
while they're dying.
Step over them
to buy you apples
or whatever it is that you buy.
And they hated the tax collectors.
And so here we have,
these are the two men,
the pillar of the community
and the absolute scum
going up to the temple to pray.
Most likely,
it's one of the two daily
worship services
that took place in the temple.
One was at dawn,
one was around
three in the afternoon.
They were both services
of atonement offerings.
And each service would begin
in the inner sanctuary,
sorry,
outside the inner sanctuary
at the great high altar
where the sacrifice
of a lamb
for the sins of Israel
was made.
The service would include
the sound of a silver trumpet
and the clanging of cymbals
and the reading of a psalm.
And the officiating priest
would then enter
the outer part of the sanctuary
where he would offer incense
and he would trim the lamps.
And at that point,
he would take the blood
of the sacrifice,
disappear into the building
to offer the sacrifice
of atonement.
And when the priest
disappeared in the building
by himself
in the inner sanctuary,
it was time then
for those who gathered
into the outer courts
to offer private prayers
to God
while the offering
of atonement
was being made.
And here,
we read the private prayers
of our two characters.
Forget who these two men
are on the outside
and what the perceptions
of society are of them.
Their prayers reveal
their hearts
and the heart
is what God sees.
Pharisee prays like this.
Father,
God,
I thank you
that I'm not like other men.
Robbers,
evildoers,
adulterers,
or even that scumbag
tax collector
sitting over there.
How dare he?
I fast twice a week,
I give a tenth
of all that I get.
It's like he's praying
and just hugging himself
and man,
I'm a great guy.
He praises himself.
He adores himself.
He starts with,
God,
I thank you,
but instead of thanking God
for what God has given him,
he's thanking God
for what he has given God.
He's thankful for that.
And he does it so spiritually.
He spiritualizes
his self-righteousness.
He says,
God,
thank you.
God,
I thank you
that I'm okay.
And then he goes on
and explains
how different he is
from other people.
And the problem
with this Pharisee
is that his evaluation
of himself
is based on the wrong standard.
He's using the wrong measure.
He compares himself
with other people.
I'm okay, God,
because there's always
someone worse than me,
especially that
scumbag
tax collector
over there.
That's what we do
with morality.
We always,
ironically,
when it comes to wealth,
we don't think
we're wealthy
because we can always
find people richer than us.
When it comes to morality,
we always look down the line
and find people
who are morally worse than us,
which makes us feel
more comfortable
about ourselves.
We always
default
towards
an inflated
view
of self.
We're like
filthy coal miners,
you know,
five kilometers
below the earth's surface
in all the darkness
and coal dust
and dirt
and mud
and stuff,
comparing ourselves
with each other,
imagining who's
the most cleanest
in this environment.
Who cares?
You're all filthy.
We compare ourselves
with whoever
makes us comfortable
regardless of our own filth,
regardless of our own sin
and corruption.
And in this case,
the Pharisee
is feeling great
because,
well,
there's the tax collector
just over there.
You see,
a religious person
is easy
on themselves
and they're hard
on everyone else.
That's a religious person.
Easy on themselves
and hard
on everyone else.
God's assessment,
the true tape measure,
the true line
of the human condition
is quite different
and his diagnosis
is what Sam read out to us
in Ephesians 2.
Let me read it to you.
As for you,
you were dead
in your transgressions
and sins
in which you used to live
when you followed
the ways of this world
and of the ruler
of the kingdom of the air,
the spirit who is now
at work in those
who are disobedient.
All of us also lived
among them at one time,
gratifying the cravings
of our sinful nature
and following its desires
and thoughts
and like the rest,
we were by nature
objects of wrath.
And you see the diagnosis
in Romans 3.
There is no one righteous,
not even one.
There is no one
who understands,
no one who seeks God.
All have turned away.
They have together
become worthless.
There is no one
who does good,
not even one.
No one righteous,
no one who seeks God.
Worthless,
dead,
that is the natural
human condition
left to our own devices.
We are dead
in our sins.
And so the core
of human nature
is not basically good
and we just need
to mine the goodness
out of it somehow
and let people flourish.
It is in fact
fundamentally bad.
We are spiritually bankrupt.
We are spiritually dead,
born dead to God
because we are born sinners.
And so therefore,
spiritual life
is impossible
for something for us
to conjure up in ourselves
because corpses
cannot help themselves.
That doesn't mean
that we are as bad
as we all can possibly be
because God is gracious enough
not to totally remove
His sovereign and gracious hand
from our lives
and leave us
to our own devices.
What it does mean though
is that sin
has totally marred
every aspect
of the human life.
Every aspect.
We've got nothing
to offer God.
We've got nothing
to contribute.
Not only do we not
have any righteousness
in our account
but we've actually got
a massive debt
in our account.
We are spiritually bankrupt.
We are deserving
of God's wrath.
Far from being
a good person,
every person sits
under the wrath of God.
And so we don't need God
to make up the difference
between our deficiencies
and what He requires.
we need God
to provide
a remedy
for our guilt,
for our rebellion,
for our sin,
our pollution
and our offenses
against God.
What we need
is radical mercy.
We need
radical grace
to provide
a satisfaction
for God's justice
to cancel a debt
that we cannot pay.
And that
is what this
low-life
tax collector
understands.
Everything on the surface
and on the inside
tells him
that he has
no reason
to look to himself
for hope.
And his prayer
is simple.
Have a look at it there.
He beats himself
on the chest
and he says,
God,
have mercy
on me,
a sinner.
And see what Jesus
says at the end of that
about this prayer,
verse 14?
I tell you that
this man,
rather than the other,
went home justified
before God.
Now the word
justified there
means to be
approved,
legally
declared,
innocent
of all wrongdoing
and to receive
the approval
of God.
And this
lone life,
it says,
is right with God
and the pillar
of the community,
the paradigm
of virtue
goes away
not right
with God.
And you see this
if you've read
through Luke's gospel,
you'll see this
again and again
in Luke's gospel.
In Luke 7,
there's a Pharisee
and a sinful woman.
In Luke 15,
there's a father
with two sons.
One son
stays at home,
always does
what he's told.
And then there's
a younger brother
who rejects his dad,
says,
I want nothing
to do with you
but I want my
share of the hidden
runs off,
spends the money
in wild living.
And then here
in Luke 18,
we have a pillar
of the community,
we have a traitor
and in every case,
the good person,
we have a good person
and a bad person,
the bad person
is saved,
the good person
is lost
in every one
of those stories.
There are two ways,
two ways
to be your own
savior
and Lord.
There's two ways
to reject God
and be your own God.
One way
is doing
what the tax collector
has been doing,
living any way
he wants,
thumbing his nose
at God
and frankly,
using everyone else
for his own end.
That's one way
of doing it.
It's obvious
to most people.
The other way
to reject God
and be your own God
is to be
very moral,
very righteous,
very dutiful
and then saying,
well God,
look at me,
now you owe me God
and you people,
you now owe me too.
You owe me the respect
I deserve.
And the mark
of someone
being their own savior,
their own lord,
their own God,
despite all of how
they might look
on the outside,
is that they
look down
on everyone else.
You see,
religious people,
Pharisees,
the self-righteous,
the superior,
are easy on themselves
but hard
on everyone else.
So why is it
that this bad person
goes home right with God
and the good person
gets lost
as it is
with the rest of Luke?
It's not because
one is good
and the other is bad.
It's not because
God,
you know,
doesn't condemn,
you know,
God doesn't condemn
people for being good
and saves people
because they're bad.
It's not like,
you know,
it's not like
he specifically
just saves
all the bad people.
It's because
the good person
doesn't know
they are in fact bad.
They don't know
that they are rotten
and in need
of a rescuer.
They ought to know it
because according
to Luke 18,
at least one
of the symptoms
of our desperate
need of a rescuer
is that we judge
and condemn
everyone else around us
who do not meet
our standards.
We look down the nose
at other people.
That's the symptom
of someone
who needs a rescuer.
And here,
in this story,
as in the others
in Luke,
the bad person
knows that they're bad.
And see the prayer
of this tax collector?
God,
have mercy on me,
the sinner.
That is in fact
a better reading.
It's not a sinner
but the sinner.
He's not trying
to find comfort
in the fact that,
well,
you know,
we're all in the same boat.
He doesn't say,
sure,
I've made my mistakes
but I'm no different
than anyone else.
I'm only human after all.
He says,
God,
I am the sinner.
I am the model sinner.
I'm the essential sinner.
He doesn't care
how he compares
with other people.
He's not looking
at other people.
This guy knows
that he's not okay
with God
and he cries out
in despair
and he pleads
for mercy.
You see,
the religious person
is easy on themselves
and hard on others.
The disciple
of the Lord Jesus
is hard on themselves
and easy on others.
Now,
it's interesting here
in this text
that the word
mercy
is an unusual word.
The common word
for mercy
that's used
in most of the New Testament
is different
than the word
here.
And what it's saying,
and it's used
only in one other place
apart from Luke 18
in the New Testament,
this tax collector
isn't asking God
for sympathy.
He's not asking God
for compassion.
He isn't asking God
to give him a break.
The word for mercy here,
as I said,
is found in one other place
and it means
to appease
or to
turn away
someone else's
anger,
to propitiate
someone else's
anger.
So the tax collector
in this moment
is not saying,
oh Lord,
come on,
let me off the hook,
let bygones be
guy gones,
you know,
I'm not that bad
after all.
He's crying out to God
in this moment
as he sits
in the temple courts
and the sacrifice
for atonement
is happening.
He's crying out,
Lord,
atone for my sin.
I need your anger
to be turned away
from me.
He understood
his true condition.
The wages of sin
is death
according to Romans 3
and he's asking God
to pay that wage
for him.
Pay it for me.
He wants atonement.
You see,
because in this moment
the fog of his
self-righteousness
and his self-justification
has finally parted
and he now sees
who he truly is.
He finally sees
that there is a God
who created him
and keeps him alive
every second.
He finally sees
that he should do
absolutely everything
for this God.
He sees that this God
should be loved
more than anything else
that no one
should be obeyed
more than this God.
He finally sees
that he hasn't even
got close
to that standard.
He finally sees
that if anyone
was as ungrateful
to him
as he has been
to this God,
he would cut them off
forever.
He sees that
that's exactly
what he deserves.
that's what he deserves
from this God.
To be cut off
from the source
of life
and hope
and peace
and so he cries out,
God,
please pay that wage
for me.
the other place
in the New Testament
where the word
for this word
for mercy
is used
is in Hebrews
chapter 2
verse 17
and it tells us
why
Jesus was
on this road
to Jerusalem.
Talking about
Jesus says
for this reason
he
had to be
made like them
fully human
in every way
in order that
he might become
a merciful
and faithful
high priest
in service to God
and that he
might make
atonement,
he might make
mercy
for the sins
of the people.
In other words,
God is
infinitely holy,
he hates
evil and sin
but he came
to earth
in the person
of the Lord Jesus
and he lost
everything.
He lost
his glory,
he lost
his invulnerability,
he lost
all of his riches,
he lost his place
beside the Father,
he was tortured,
he was mocked,
he was ridiculed,
everything was
stripped from him,
even his clothes
were stripped
from him.
He was killed,
abandoned by his
disciples
and he was
doing it for you
and for me
and for humanity
and for this
tax collector
to make atonement
for our sin.
He was paying
the wage
of death
for the sins
of the world.
That is the
radical grace
of God.
And we heard
from Ephesians 2
the natural state
before God
before is that
we are dead
in our transgressions
and sins
but in the very
next verses
in Ephesians
we have the
hope of grace
but
you've got to
love the word
but
because of
his great
mercy for us
God who is
rich in mercy
made us alive
in Christ
even when we
were dead
in transgressions
it's by grace
you have been
saved.
We were dead
in our transgressions
but God intervened
and gave us life.
We were dead
in bondage
to sin
but God intervened
and released us.
We were objects
of wrath
but God intervened
and he poured
out his anger
upon himself.
God who is
rich in mercy
intervened.
Our condition
was hopeless
but God intervened
in grace.
The grace
of God
is his love
freely
given
shown towards
guilty sinners
contrary
to their merit
and in fact
in total defiance
of all their
demerit.
that has nothing
to do with us
it's got everything
to do
with the character
of this God
and the radical
grace and generosity
of God
is the great exchange.
2 Corinthians 8
and 9
says
for you know
the grace
of our Lord
Jesus Christ
though he was
rich
speaking about
internally rich
with the Father
perfect with the Father
yet for our sakes
he became poor
he became human
for everlasting
from that point on
so that through
his poverty
we might join
into the everlasting
relationship
of the Father
that's 2 Corinthians
8 and 9
2 Corinthians 5
21
God made him
who had no sin
sinless
to be sin
for us
so that in him
we might become
sinless
the righteousness
of God
God's radical
grace is the
foundation
and the motivation
of his radical
call
the radical call
to take up our
cross and follow
him
it's his grace
radical grace
self-righteousness
leads to a life
of looking down
your nose
at everyone else
judging people
condemning people
the religious person
is easy on themselves
and they're hard
on everyone else
but the grace
fueled
disciple
of the Lord
Jesus
is hard
on themselves
and easy
on others
on everyone else
you see
God's
radical grace
to us
in the Lord
Jesus
leads to a life
of radical grace
it leads to a life
of abundant
generosity
and graciousness
towards other people
in fact I would say
grace and generosity
in every area of life
free abandonment
in every area of life
so that we take up
our cross
and we follow Christ
we've got nothing
to lose
he's been given
everything
and we see
that happens
for one tax collector
in the very next chapter
I don't want to kind of
steal too much
of my message
which I'll probably
preach on in a few weeks
about this guy
very next chapter
it's just as Jesus
gets right on the
very edge of Jerusalem
and what we introduce
there is to a young
not a young bloke
a little bloke
who is described
as the chief
tax collector
he's the chief
scumbag
he's the chief
low life
he is the lowest
I mean
he's lower than a snake
sliding on the ground
this guy
there's no one worse
in society
than Zacchaeus
self-centered
totally greedy
rejected by all
the recipient of
scorn and hatred
and vitriol
and then Jesus
comes along
and Jesus
is the only person
who looks at him
he's the only person
who speaks to him
and Jesus picks him
out
loves him
and so overwhelmed
by the grace of Jesus
to him
Zacchaeus just
overflows
in abundant
generosity
from that moment
nothing
Zacchaeus holds
nothing back
that is a disciple
who's taken up his cross
and following Christ
we will never
take up our cross
we will never
obey that call
we will never
take up our cross
and follow Christ
as his radical
disciples
until we recognize
our appalling
natural condition
without Jesus
and truly
rejoice
in the wonderful
news
of his radical
grace
we will
always
hold
something
back
from him
until we fully
understand
and appreciate
that he has
never
held anything
back from us