Proximity and Distance

Before we dive into the Powerball and the reading I want a kind of address to context, if we briefly turned back to the 11th, verse of Luke in the 17 chapter, we find Jesus and Company on the Move. He's traveling to Jerusalem, but he was traveling, is Luke. Reitz passing along between Samaria and Galloway. The most people here are those two places, the former has a pretty well-known Parable attached to it. And the ladder is kind of thought of as Jesus's home turf. But if you only thought about it, that way you would actually missed a pretty important point that relates to this week and to this portion of the scripture, And Israel at this time, you had almost a caste system people from the city. Centres were generally more educated and more fluent all the inhabitants of the rural areas were by-and-large. Either living off the land or making away with daily daily bring. Give me a estimate basic literacy, but they were not as religiously observant, or finicky ice, pastini. Do I lose These are called the amhaarets the people of the land, you may think of them kind of us the country bumpkins. They were looked down upon by the people in Jerusalem. Galloway in particular had only recently been to the heist and was called in Hebrew hot Galia. Galileo of the nation's for the Gentiles they are still within the boundaries of the camp and Galilei so to speak.

Then you have the Samaritans. These were considered enemies, they were in pure, they were mix. Their religion was a little bit Jewish little bit pagan. They were definitely outside the boundaries. So the past Jerusalem, Jesus is taking a path that most Jews probably would not have been comfortable with and I think he was being delivered in that choice. If we move into verse 9, Luke writes, he told this Parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and treated others with contempt. Now, the previous 8:28 tells us that the people he was preaching to says he was asked by the Pharisees, when the kingdom of God would come. We can logically connect that the individuals and verse 9 were indeed the Pharisees. But even if they weren't just the Pharisees, they were in the crowd listening and they would sure have felt themselves included. When verse 10 states, two men went up to the temple to pray. One, a Pharisee and the other attacks collector. Hear Jesus is giving two types of individuals for comparison. A Pharisee, the most, observant rigorous strict of them of the many Jewish groups in the second temple. And then contrasting him with the telephone, a tax collector, considered the worst of the Jewish groups in the. Because not only did they cooperate with the foreign occupiers of Judah but they often collected more than what they were supposed to. And they were seldomly religious observant Now most of us are familiar with the Bible. Know how this Parable continues on one hand, you have the less than humble Pharisee. You can almost kind of picture a smug look on his face when he prays. Thank you that. I'm not like the other men extortioners on just adulterers or even like this tax collector. The air around them feel like it just reeks of self-assurance and self-righteousness. Then you have a tax collector standing there. Glancing downward fully feeling and living out his shame and guilt as he and verse 13. He beats his breast saying, God, be merciful to me a sinner.

the Powerball ends with Jesus telling the audience, in verse 14, I tell you this man went down to his house Justified rather than the other for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted And we walk away with this notion that we shouldn't be self-righteous. So judgmental like that hypocritical Pharisee. That's the main thrust of the idea and it may be the point. No question and he's an example of faith for many. but I would like to focus on another feature in the parable that often gets overlooked, the mindset of the tax collector, You see what I've heard, this, I've always pictured the Powerball played out like here, these two men are praying and the Pharisee lift his arm for emphasis. He's really wants to make that distance that distinction between himself and the tax collector. And if we unpack verse 13 and resuming to the Greek, it literally says, death to Lonas, micro-thin has tax collector standing or away. He wasn't to the corner, it wasn't a smidge wasn't over there, and she was completely removed away from the Pharisee. The ESV gets it right. But then, the verse continues, he would not even lift up his eyes to heaven. The ESV is in 100% literal here. Literally says, he wasn't willing to lift his eyes. It isn't simply that he did not want to look up at God, but in his State, he either felt unworthy or incapable of doing so. Whatever, raw emotion. He was being racked with, it's stopped him from being able to look towards his Lord. We can see that that tax collector was a externally removed from the Pharisee. But Not only was, he standing noticeably distant from the Pharisee, his outward Behavior. Also. Displayed noticeably his internal distance from God. I like I noted we've all read the terrible at least I know I have walked away with the general idea that don't be the Pharisee. Don't be the self-righteous religious guy in the Jedi. Looking robes. Who thinks he knows something? Cuz he's closer to God.

And while I never want to be the Pharisee, and I certainly want to be like the tax collector, I don't want to be in one respect. I never ever want to be at the point that I cannot approach my God or fix my eyes on heaven.

You see the reading this week from, Jeremiah plays into that message of proximity and distance when it relates that the people sins have separated them from God and they beg him and verse 10, literally do not leave us. Let me read and 2nd Timothy is Paul is going through a list of individuals. He mentions those who have wronged him and deserted him. And as I read, all the readings this week, I could really kind of identify with that idea of proximity and distance and what was going on with in the heart of the tax collector. You see, I know and I am bracelet. I am a sinner. Not that I know I was a sinner and she's a Save Me by taking on my sin, through his self, a sacrifice and now I'm somehow above the messiness of human existence.

Let me level set with you. I'm not perfect big surprise. I know this. I'm married and I've argued with my wife far less now cuz she's trained me better. My kids annoy me and sometimes I don't pick the best workers in a response. I have parents and I have been lost. Some of that work is going to add more to my already. Overfilled played that, I need, to feel some way about it and sometimes I'm going to have a bad day and I'm going to express my frustration in a way that maybe incongruent with my face. There are sometimes. Just sometimes I have not always lead into God and let him guide my path. I feel big and I failed hard. Sometimes I have let emotions be my decision maker. And that's a rabbit Trail, but that's probably not the right move to make.

But there I am just like the tax collector feeling this tremendous Gulf between my God and myself my father and his child and I'm submerged in shame or guilt or regret.

But it's in those moments was very moments that I reorient myself to the reality that my God walks with me through the muck and mire of human life. Our God is Not aloof, it's not sitting in the heavens with angel baby playing harps on clouds. He's not Zeus on Olympus, he's not almond raw traversing. This Guy's in a Celestial, barge Our God is eminently, interested intensely involved, and inexplicably invested in US. He is present with us even in the moments, we fail.

Our God is a god of mercy and we get to live into that reality each week. When we get a reminder, we pray, we believe in a lord whose character is always to have mercy. Our God loves us, he loves us enough, to have someone stand in our places and receive, what we should have, rightfully received years ago. And our savior stands with open arms. Backing off to come and walk with him. And just because I know I'm jacked up, I don't have to let my failures or my weaknesses or my mistakes to find me. I did 20 years, 20 hours, 20 minutes or 20 seconds ago does not define who I am nor my proximity or distance to God. I don't have to live in those feelings or feel somehow separated from God, or from his people or separated from his grace or separated, ever from his Mercy. Jesus came for all of us, not the best of us or the most righteous of us were the most privileged. The vast for the most educated of us. He came for the male. The female do the Greek, the free, and those in bondage. He came that we might have life and have it more fully. He came to give his life as a ransom for me. And that message was meant to spread from Jerusalem, to Judea to Samaria, and to the ends of the Earth. In his flesh, the wall of separation has fallen and all can come close to the father through the name of the Sun. So this week, as I read that terrible, I pray to God that I may never trust in my own righteousness, my own sense of Holiness or surance to separate myself from others. But I also pray that I may never let a wall a rise in my heart or life that brings distance from him to me.

Because like the psalmist says, my soul has a desire and a longing to enter into the courts of the Lord, my heart and flesh with joists in a living God Eminem.

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