There is only one thing that can keep us from receiving God’s gift of mercy.

 

One thing that can separate us from his love.

 

One thing that can prevent us from spending eternity with him in heaven.

 

That thing is failing to repent and ask for his forgiveness.

 

There are two main reasons why people don’t repent.

 

Either our pride causes us to think we don’t have anything to confess because we can’t see our own shortcomings, or we have so much guilt and shame because of our sins, that we feel God couldn’t possibly forgive us for what we’ve done. And while Satan would like nothing more than for us to believe either or both of these lies, I can state with 100% confidence that neither of these are true for any of us.

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All of us are human and therefore we sin. So, we all need to visit the sacrament of confession on a regular basis to receive God’s mercy and forgiveness. This is the means which he gave us to remain in relationship with him in the new covenant. All previous covenants that God made with his people were eventually broken. This is why Jesus gave us the new and eternal covenant. So that when we sin and break our covenant with him, we now have a way to be reconciled through the sacrament of confession.

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Believing that our sin is so terrible, so unique, and so unforgivable is another lie from the devil. If he can make us believe this, he knows

we will be too ashamed to ask God for forgiveness and will be separated from him forever.

 

But let me promise you this. Your sin is not unique. The only original sin took place in the garden of Eden, and all other sins are a result of that sin.

 

If you tell yourself that your sins are beyond the forgiveness of God, then you are saying that what Jesus did on that cross was not enough.

 

That giving his very life hanging on that tree was sufficient to save everyone else in the world but not you.

 

That somehow your sin is so special, that his passion, death, and resurrection aren't enough to ensure your personal salvation.

 

Do you hear how absurd this sounds?

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In the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector, we have two men praying. In our reading of scripture, we have become accustomed to thinking of Pharisees as hypocritical people who often clashed with Jesus over interpretation of the law, but we must understand that to the Jews the Pharisees were thought to be very holy people. This belief makes the contrast between the Pharisee and the tax collector even more profound in this parable.

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Tax collectors were the most despised people in Israel. They worked to transfer money from the Jewish people to the Roman authorities, and they milked their own people dry. They were empowered and encouraged by Rome to raise the taxes as much as they could, and everything above and beyond the legal minimum that Rome demanded, they could keep for themselves. They were literally legal thieves.

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So here are two men praying in the temple, and one of them has many good works to boast about and apparently very few sins. The Pharisees were very careful not to violate the commandments. The tax collector, on the other hand, had committed many terrible sins. And Jesus says something absolutely shocking. He says that the tax collector went home justified, while the Pharisee did not.

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Why?

 

Because God's commandments aren't all that important? No.

 

Because the greatest of all sins, the one sin that will undoubtably send you to hell, is final impenitence, which is the refusal to repent and ask God for forgiveness of your sins.

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But if God can do everything, how can I say that God cannot forgive this sin?

 

Well, let's look at forgiveness. The word “give” is in the middle of the word forgiveness. A gift, in order to be a gift, must be freely given and freely received.

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But why would anyone choose to not accept the gift of God's forgiveness?

 

One reason is pride or self-righteousness, when one believes that they do not need forgiveness.

 

In Mark chapter 2 Jesus says, “Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do."

 

If you think you're not sick, you won't go to the doctor.

 

Jesus is our spiritual doctor, and we are all spiritually sick, and he will heal all who come to him and sincerely repent, but he cannot heal us if we don’t want healing. Jesus himself said, “Everyone who asks receives."  But those who do not ask do not receive.

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The prideful Pharisee did not ask and therefore did not receive forgiveness. He mostly talks about himself in his prayer. In fact, he is praising himself and, in a way, praying to himself. The Pharisee has gotten himself confused with God. That is the essence of pride. Pride gives us a false authority to be our own God. We not only justify our sin but also grant ourselves permission to know better than God.

 

Just as the Pharisees tried to correct Jesus about the law, today we try to correct God by saying things like, “I know you say that life begins at conception but now a days the only thing that matters is the choice of the mother. So, life will begin when we say so, not you, God."

 

Our world today is full of these examples of declining cultural morals overtaking God’s laws. We must remember, we are not God and any good we do is by his grace.

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On the other hand, the tax collector simply cries to God for mercy and receives it. This does not mean the tax collector was a good man. Many tax collectors were unjust, abusive people who took advantage of others in society. Jesus's parable is a bit shocking because most Jews despised the way Jewish tax collectors worked closely with the Romans. They were social outcasts.

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Jesus's point is not that it's good to collaborate with an oppressive regime and cheat the poor, or that fasting is bad and greed and dishonesty are good.

 

Jesus's point is that pride can overshadow all other sins, and that if we have attained all other virtues but retain pride in ourselves, we have no spiritual life.

 

Spiritual life begins with the acknowledgement of our sinfulness. Then through the gift of the Holy Spirit we progress in holiness.

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So, if you haven’t been to confession in a while, why not?

 

Why are you allowing your soul to be separated from the love of God?

 

Why are you refusing the sacrifice given for you on the cross?

 

Each of us are called to approach the Lord with the humility of the tax collector, while striving for holiness like the Pharisee, accepting the gift of God’s mercy and forgiveness which will open to us the gates of eternal glory.  -- Deacon Rob Lortie