Jesus At The Home Of Simon The Pharisee
JESUS AT THE HOME OF SIMON THE PHARISEE
LUKE 7:41-50
Does our thankfulness to Christ for forgiveness show in our warmth toward him and other people?
The simple human story of the woman in the Pharisee’s house provoked the parable of the two debtors. Simon saw the point and rightly, if a trifle disdainfully, answered that gratitude in human affairs is commonly proportionate to benefit received. Simon, too, claimed forgiveness for his sins. The whole Jewish ritual to which he subscribed had atonement and reconciliation for its end. But forgiveness for Simon was part of a legal transaction between man and God. His sins were of the subtler sort, sins of the mind and spirit rather than the flesh—pride, disdain, discourtesy, self-esteem and contempt for lesser folk. He was like the Pharisee who went up to the temple to pray (Luke 18:9-14). He would, as a matter of course, admit a condition of sin, and claim that, by the processes of the Law, he was forgiven. He had never known the bite and viciousness of gross sin, sin which soils all life and ruins happiness.
The broken woman, on the other hand, had found something in the Lord which convicted her and brought her to his feet for cleansing. That one could so refashion and redeem, could so care and pity, filled her with a love which overflowed in passionate thanksgiving. Christ had brought God to her in such guise that she saw the mercy of the Most High, and his willingness to save. She believed that God must be like Christ, and therefore accepted the Christian gospel, although Calvary, its last and complete manifestation, was yet without its cross. And so it was her faith which saved her as the last verse says.
It remains a fact difficult to explain that carnal sin fills the repentant with deep horror, and its forgiveness evokes the corresponding depth of love, while the hateful blemishes of the outwardly respectable, equally guilty in God’s eyes, remain the theme of casual confession and small exercise of heart and mind.
Note 7:47: this does not teach justification by works; she is not forgiven because of her love; her love is the evidence of the forgiveness she has received. Love is weak where consciousness of sin is weak.
Lord and Master, make us sensitive to sin,
and aware what it cost thee to redeem us.