SPEAKER_01: What's it become?
SPEAKER_01: Father, son, and holy spirit.
SPEAKER_01: Let's bring it.
SPEAKER_01: Almighty God.
SPEAKER_01: The Lord be with you.
SPEAKER_01: Let us pray.
SPEAKER_01: For God, whose blessed Son came into the world that he might destroy the works of the devil and make us children of God and heirs of eternal life.
SPEAKER_01: Granted, having this hope, we may purify ourselves as he is pure.
SPEAKER_01: When he comes again with power and great glory, we may be made like him in his eternal and glorious kingdom.
SPEAKER_03: Weeping and groaning because God no longer even turns toward the offerings and receives with a finger at your hand.
SPEAKER_03: You ask on what account.
SPEAKER_03: On this account, because the judge of all flesh was a witness between you and the wife of your youth, in which you betrayed her.
SPEAKER_03: And is not the spirit of the one who is not a god.
SPEAKER_03: And what does the one desire God in the spirit?
SPEAKER_03: So God you're owned spirits and against the life of the one you like no one.
SPEAKER_03: And the one who despises around We will be song.
SPEAKER_03: Be not angry on account of the wicked.
SPEAKER_03: For they soon wither like wild grass.
SPEAKER_03: Be still before the most high and wait patiently for her.
SPEAKER_03: Let go the anger and forsake wrath.
SPEAKER_03: For the wicked shall be cut off.
SPEAKER_03: For the faithful one loves justice.
SPEAKER_03: I have seen the wicked oppressing.
SPEAKER_03: They passed on, and suddenly they were no more.
SPEAKER_03: Regard the blameless and behold the unright.
SPEAKER_03: But transgressors shall be utterly destroyed altogether.
SPEAKER_03: The salvation of the righteous is from the ever present God.
SPEAKER_02: In order that we may also obtain salvation in Christ Jesus with eternal glory.
SPEAKER_02: For if we die together, we will also live together.
SPEAKER_02: If we endure, we will also remain together.
SPEAKER_02: If we deny Christ, he will also deny us.
SPEAKER_02: If we are faithless, faithful he remains, for he cannot deny himself.
SPEAKER_02: The word of the Lord.
SPEAKER_01: Jesus also told this parable that certain folk who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and despised everyone else.
SPEAKER_01: Two persons went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.
SPEAKER_01: The Pharisee was standing by himself, praying thus.
SPEAKER_01: Thieves, cooks, adulterers, or even like this tax collector.
SPEAKER_01: I fast twice a week.
SPEAKER_01: I give a tenth of everything I require.
SPEAKER_01: But the tax collector standing far off would not raise his eyes to heaven, but rather he was beating his breast and saying, God be merciful to me, and I tell you this one.
SPEAKER_01: Went down to his home, made righteous rather than the other.
SPEAKER_01: And I wouldn't tell you, if you do that in the South, that's a long tradition of a way of trying to earn some backhanded compliments and pity.
SPEAKER_01: And it has nothing to do with humility.
SPEAKER_01: I had a teacher who told me that humility means being who God made you to be, no more and no less.
SPEAKER_01: And here's what Southern culture needs to hear: exactly who God made you to be and no less.
SPEAKER_01: And some of us need to hear and know more.
SPEAKER_01: My suspicion is if you're a woman and a southern woman, you need to hear no less.
SPEAKER_01: And my suspicion is if you're a southern man, you need to hear no more.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm saying that as a southern man.
SPEAKER_01: And how is it that we do this?
SPEAKER_01: Look, if you've been to church, you've heard this parable before.
SPEAKER_01: And of course, what we like to do, if you've been to church a few times in your life, is when you hear the word Pharisee, think, oh, like that's Darth Vader, like that's the evil hypocrite who's wrong.
SPEAKER_01: And I just want to let you know Jesus was a Pharisee.
SPEAKER_01: He was a Pharisee.
SPEAKER_01: And when you hear the word Pharisee at the time of Jesus, the image that should immediately come to mind is St.
SPEAKER_01: Francis of Assisi or Gandhi or Mother Teresa.
SPEAKER_01: Like Pharisees were the people who went out of their way on I-45 to help you change your tire when you had a flat.
SPEAKER_01: This parable is a surprise.
SPEAKER_01: Tax collectors sold mattresses and used cars.
SPEAKER_01: So this is a trope.
SPEAKER_01: And the crowd's surprised because the good guy does not go home justified before God.
SPEAKER_01: He only goes home justified before himself.
SPEAKER_01: I want you to hear this.
SPEAKER_01: They both go home justified that day.
SPEAKER_01: Oh, I'm using the wrong word because the scripture says made righteous.
SPEAKER_01: Justified and made righteous are the same thing.
SPEAKER_01: In the Bible, somebody's righteous not because they pray more sincerely than you, it's because they practice justice.
SPEAKER_01: So sometimes we'll say, oh, that person is so righteous, like they cry and they sing praise songs, and they put their hands in the air and they're not embarrassed, and they wear a bonnet to church and look at all their righteousness.
SPEAKER_01: And look, if you're righteous before God and don't love your neighbor, you did it all wrong.
SPEAKER_01: I've met atheists that are more righteous than I am because they treat other human beings better than I do.
SPEAKER_01: And that's biblical.
SPEAKER_01: That's not my opinion.
SPEAKER_01: You know how you justify your margins?
SPEAKER_01: It means you make them right.
SPEAKER_01: The people who practice justice are righteous.
SPEAKER_01: And boy, this parable, you know, I was going to tell you, I don't know that it's wrong to pray like a Pharisee until we get to the end.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, here's the thing I don't think it's condescending to say to God, I am so grateful I'm not addicted to drugs and alcohol.
SPEAKER_01: And I am so grateful for that.
SPEAKER_01: The issue, I think, comes with we start saying, and I'm glad I'm not like you because you are.
SPEAKER_01: Now, there is this expression I've heard in church, there but the grace of God, go away.
SPEAKER_01: And maybe there's something to that, but I do want you to hear a couple of things.
SPEAKER_01: I can't help myself from sharing a little bit of like uh biblical criticism here.
SPEAKER_01: Our Jewish brothers and sisters to this day, they don't bow their heads when they pray, they look up.
SPEAKER_01: To this day.
SPEAKER_01: They look up because God's in heaven and they expect God to answer.
SPEAKER_01: So the Pharisee bowing, I mean, sorry, the tax sector bowing his head was not normal.
SPEAKER_01: Like, that's weird.
SPEAKER_01: We have this relationship with God who loves us, so we look up expectantly, we don't have to avert our eyes.
SPEAKER_01: So this is like weird.
SPEAKER_01: Other thing that's weird is we don't know what happens tomorrow.
SPEAKER_01: So don't you imagine?
SPEAKER_01: The Pharisee's telling the truth.
SPEAKER_01: He doesn't lie, he doesn't cheat, he doesn't steal, he doesn't give 10% of 10%.
SPEAKER_01: He gives 10% of everything.
SPEAKER_01: He fasts twice a week, and if you're Jewish, you only have to fast one day a year.
SPEAKER_01: Why does he fast twice a week to make up for the people who don't do that?
SPEAKER_01: He tried to carry the community.
SPEAKER_01: He could be telling the truth.
SPEAKER_01: The tax collector could go cheat every day and come to the temple and say, Have mercy on me a sinner.
SPEAKER_01: Come back the next day and cheat people and say, God, have mercy on me a sinner.
SPEAKER_01: If that was the pattern after a year, who do you think goes home made just before God?
SPEAKER_01: Now, this is phenomenal because we don't even know what's happening.
SPEAKER_01: But one thing I know that you may not know is that people didn't choose to be tax collectors, they were born into the tree.
SPEAKER_01: So strong, in fact, that there's a there's a major monograph that says, you know, St.
SPEAKER_01: Patrick got kidnapped from England, went to Ireland?
SPEAKER_01: Did you hear this term?
SPEAKER_01: The major monograph says, Oh, do you know what Patrick's death did?
SPEAKER_01: He's a tax collector.
SPEAKER_01: The major monograph said Patrick didn't want to do that, and he had to fake his death.
SPEAKER_01: The only way you get out of being a tax collector is by faking your death.
SPEAKER_01: That's how he was a vicious and not a tax collector.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not a historian, so I can't adjudicate that.
SPEAKER_01: But it's a major monograph by a researcher, not somebody right on a social media platform.
SPEAKER_01: This is a tax collector, his choice could have been collect taxes or rotten shit.
SPEAKER_01: What would you pick?
SPEAKER_01: And maybe, I mean, we never know the context.
SPEAKER_01: But maybe he's saying, God, I want to do this.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want to collect taxes.
SPEAKER_01: What choice do I have?
SPEAKER_01: God have mercy on me.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm going to tell you because I mentioned humility, and like I said, I think both people went unjustified.
SPEAKER_01: It's just that the Pharisees decided to justify himself instead of being made just and righteous before God.
SPEAKER_01: And if I had to say the number one reason that church attendance is declining in America and the rest of the world, it's because we've decided that this is all about justifying ourselves.
SPEAKER_01: And I love justifying myself.
SPEAKER_01: I'm going to tell you this right now.
SPEAKER_01: I can think of a major incident almost every day, even when I'm on vacation, where I was doing something that wasn't quite in line with my values, and when I realize it, I'd like to justify it instead of repenting.
SPEAKER_01: And I'm really good at it.
SPEAKER_01: I'm really good at it because I think quickly.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, I want you to hear this.
SPEAKER_01: Humility from your priest.
SPEAKER_01: I think really quickly.
SPEAKER_01: I have a great memory for facts and things that I hear.
SPEAKER_01: I'm not bragging to you.
SPEAKER_01: It's how my brain works.
SPEAKER_01: I don't do well churning things over slowly in the background for a long time.
SPEAKER_01: I like to be rapid and slip shod, and my memory and my elocution lets me get away with.
SPEAKER_01: That.
SPEAKER_01: So I'm going to recognize that.
SPEAKER_01: I'm smart.
SPEAKER_01: It doesn't mean I'm smarter than my spouse who does this differently.
SPEAKER_01: It means we have different kinds of intelligence.
SPEAKER_01: And maybe this is where true humility is to be found.
SPEAKER_01: And I'll say this: I don't like being called down.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I don't mind calling myself down.
SPEAKER_01: I just don't like you doing it.
SPEAKER_01: When you do it, I'm faced with this thought of, like, oh my God, like, there's shame and there's threat.
SPEAKER_01: And you know, when I'm not living into my values, the one thing that I love to do more than anything is find somebody doing it worse than I am so that I can justify myself.
SPEAKER_01: Do you know that story or that life?
SPEAKER_01: Then this is a story for you.
SPEAKER_01: This is a story for you.
SPEAKER_01: And listen, I don't want you to think, oh my God, the priest said that I need to feel even worse about myself when I judge somebody.
SPEAKER_01: No, here's what I invite you to consider.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe Jesus is offering not that we need to judge ourselves more harshly because we like to justify ourselves, but rather what we could do is judge our own judgment.
SPEAKER_01: And you can judge your own judgment pretty harshly and come out with more life at the end.
SPEAKER_01: Maybe Jesus isn't telling us to judge less, maybe he's telling us judge more our thinking patterns.
SPEAKER_01: Because here's some good trick for you.
SPEAKER_01: If you've been abused, you're not your trauma.
SPEAKER_01: You're not your trauma.
SPEAKER_01: And here's another thing is you're not your judgments.
SPEAKER_01: You can judge your judgments without losing yourself.
SPEAKER_01: In fact, you can judge your judgments and end up somewhere way, way better off.
SPEAKER_01: So avoid driving is a way I like to self-justify every day.
SPEAKER_01: Anybody ever been on the road, especially in Houston, and thought, what is all this traffic about?
SPEAKER_01: And I hope you realize you're part of the traffic.
SPEAKER_01: Like you were part of that problem, right?
SPEAKER_01: But no, the problem is that not everybody else drives like you do.
SPEAKER_01: See if they just drove like you, there wouldn't be a problem.
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't this occur to you often?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, look, I live in this neighborhood and the speed limit's 25.
SPEAKER_01: And if you're going 23, boy, I got a lot of judgment.
SPEAKER_01: I got a lot of judgment.
SPEAKER_01: I was just in an international airport, but let me just tell you.
SPEAKER_01: Like, when the aisle's this wide, somebody's got their suitcase, and then they just stop and start looking around, and they move to the side! Stop in the middle! And I'm gonna tell you, because I'm so like tightly around on this, is not only do I say, like, huh, that's an interesting choice, I think you're not fully human.
SPEAKER_01: Like no human being just stop.
SPEAKER_01: If you're in Costco and you're walking with your family on that street, but you're five watt.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, really?
SPEAKER_01: Get in the car and like just like walking two lines.
SPEAKER_01: Don't walk in a road.
SPEAKER_01: You ever pass somebody on the road who's driving too slow or driving nuts?
SPEAKER_01: And you make sure you look at them so you know what kind of person is doing that.
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so this story's for you.
SPEAKER_01: This story is for you.
SPEAKER_01: And man, have you ever found yourself when somebody gets caught thinking you got what you deserved?
SPEAKER_01: Glad you got it.
SPEAKER_01: Man, I'll tell you, I've only had a friend who was an alcoholic say this.
SPEAKER_01: Because I didn't do that anymore.
SPEAKER_01: I just think, oh my God, have mercy on me.
SPEAKER_01: I love getting away with stuff.
SPEAKER_01: God, have mercy on me.
SPEAKER_01: I think it's one thing to say, God, I'm trying really hard, but you know, we're gonna talk about Veterans Day in a second, that my dad was a veteran.
SPEAKER_01: And he said two really interesting things that I remember.
SPEAKER_01: He already had five really good quotes.
SPEAKER_01: One of them was we think that we're different from everybody else, is the man we are just like everybody else.
SPEAKER_01: And because my dad is a combat actor against his will, because he was drafted, his definition of a contact was a man trying to take care of his family.
SPEAKER_01: What I perceive to be cruising.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know how you vote.
SPEAKER_01: I hope you do.
SPEAKER_01: And I hope you're an informed voter.
SPEAKER_01: But I'll tell you a Democrat is somebody trying to take care of their family, and I'll tell you a Republican is somebody trying to take care of their family, period.
SPEAKER_01: I don't think Jesus is telling us to throw accountability out the window.
SPEAKER_01: Actually, I think Jesus is telling us accountability only works if we recognize God's presence in one another.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, that's how the Constitution works.
SPEAKER_01: Because if you get a trial by your peers, even if I catch you in the act, right?
SPEAKER_01: We decided you're worthy of a trial, even if I know you're guilty.
SPEAKER_01: We decided we could have, I don't know if you've seen the movie, I haven't.
SPEAKER_01: This one about the Nuremberg trials.
SPEAKER_01: We decided we were gonna put Nazis on trial because they did not lose their humanity.
SPEAKER_01: We were gonna hold humans accountable for acts of inhumanity, but you don't give non-humans a trial.
SPEAKER_01: You don't.
SPEAKER_01: Please consider this.
SPEAKER_05: And maybe maybe this is the slip in the story.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if you've been to Al-Anon before.
SPEAKER_01: But then in Al-Anon and an AA, I mean, essentially what they tell you is sometimes you'd have to pick between being right and being happy.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you would be right all the time.
SPEAKER_01: Here's some news from your priest, you're gonna be alone.
SPEAKER_01: You would be living by yourself.
SPEAKER_01: Happy may not be the right word.
SPEAKER_01: In the parable of day, the choice is sometimes we choose between right and being righteous.
SPEAKER_01: Between being right and being righteous.
SPEAKER_01: Now, the other scriptures do some really interesting things about this, right?
SPEAKER_01: Uh this almost contradictory hymn from Timothy.
SPEAKER_01: If you see this as a hymn, it's older than the author himself.
SPEAKER_01: If we endure, we'll reign together.
SPEAKER_01: If we deny Christ, he'll deny us.
SPEAKER_01: And here's some cognitive dissonance.
SPEAKER_01: If we're faithless, faithful he remains, for he cannot deny himself.
SPEAKER_01: Did you hear two opposite perspectives there?
SPEAKER_01: If you deny, he'll deny.
SPEAKER_01: If you're faithless, he'll be faithful anyway.
SPEAKER_01: And probably what's happening is there's like this cultural proverb being quoted.
SPEAKER_01: You've heard it said, if we deny Christ, he'll deny you.
SPEAKER_01: But I tell you, if you're faithless, God will be faithful.
SPEAKER_01: The New Testament uses this all the time.
SPEAKER_01: You've heard it said, slaves obey your masters.
SPEAKER_01: But I tell you, masters love your slaves.
SPEAKER_01: By the way, can you love somebody and keep them enslaved?
SPEAKER_01: I don't think so.
SPEAKER_01: I don't think it's possible.
SPEAKER_01: So, look, if you heard this hymn from Timothy and thought, oh my God, I've denied Jesus and my neighbor, and he's going to deny me, I want you to hear the conclusion.
SPEAKER_01: If you're faithless, God will be faithful to you.
SPEAKER_01: What does that mean?
SPEAKER_01: God can't deny himself.
SPEAKER_01: Well, uh, we were in this study group on Thursday, and I love these study groups because they just have these really thoughtful things in us.
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, the scriptures tell us we're children of God over and over again, children of God.
SPEAKER_01: And boy, there was this image like, oh, like we've got God's DNA.
SPEAKER_01: Anyone had more than one kid?
SPEAKER_01: I got two.
SPEAKER_01: Boy, it's amazing, isn't it, how like similar DNA can result in like really different kids, but vastly different kids.
SPEAKER_01: Like, oh my god, where did you actually come from, kind of kids?
SPEAKER_01: And what do you know?
SPEAKER_01: Like, the Trinity of Three has got like nine billion kids on the planet.
SPEAKER_01: And how amazing, isn't it, all the diversity that's in the Trinity of Three?
SPEAKER_01: And nine billion still doesn't cover it.
SPEAKER_01: About God's DNA and you and I, we're all really different.
SPEAKER_01: And God loves that.
SPEAKER_01: Because God loves you.
SPEAKER_01: And since we're children of God, uh, God can't deny God's self in you.
SPEAKER_01: Which means when we deny God and the tax collector, what have we done?
SPEAKER_01: What have we done?
SPEAKER_01: That's the hard truth, because look, I'm going to tell you, having just got back from traveling, a couple interesting things about Día de los Marcos and what about Mexico?
SPEAKER_01: If you know about Dia de los Marcos, a lot of people will go on a parade and they paint their face in a skull.
SPEAKER_01: That's a hundred years old, a tradition of skull.
SPEAKER_01: It seems to have come around during some socialist movements in southern Mexico, Latin America, South America.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if you know this.
SPEAKER_01: Turns out there's gross inequity in those parts of the world as a result of colonialism and enslavement.
SPEAKER_01: It's still a problem today, but even more of a problem 100 years ago, if you can believe that.
SPEAKER_01: So the people who started paying the face with the skull, they weren't rich people, they were poor people.
SPEAKER_01: And it was a social protest to say, behind all of your wealth and privilege, we all poop and we all have bones and we all die.
SPEAKER_01: So you're not coming out ahead.
SPEAKER_01: We all die.
SPEAKER_01: And it was this reminder from the poorest of the poor that our bones come from God.
SPEAKER_01: And that death comes to all of us.
SPEAKER_01: We choose to live with our privilege and our power in a way like the Pharisee and the story, and we are not like other people who are actually living under the shroud of death already.
SPEAKER_01: It's an interesting thought.
SPEAKER_01: And look, I gotta tell you, I love traveling and going to other countries, and this thing drives my wife crazy.
SPEAKER_01: When I'm talking to people who have a different accent, I usually adopt what I perceive to be their accent.
SPEAKER_01: I don't even try, I just do.
SPEAKER_01: So when I talk to German people who speak English, I usually do something like Swiss.
SPEAKER_01: And I don't, it's not like a plan.
SPEAKER_01: And my wife says to me, Why are you making fun of those people?
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, I'm not doing that.
SPEAKER_01: Like, I can't help myself because I love trying to communicate with people like they communicate.
SPEAKER_01: And let me tell you one thing I can't stand is when people try to charge me to go to the bathroom.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I'm gonna tell you particularly, as a like, would you rather urinate in the street or pay the 50 cents?
SPEAKER_01: Like, I just sort of have this American value that I have a right to use the bathroom without having to pay.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know where it came from, but I hold on to it really strongly.
SPEAKER_01: So, look, I'm in Mexico and there's this bathroom, and normally there's an attendant there, and you have to give them 10 places to go to the bathroom.
SPEAKER_01: It's like 50 cents.
SPEAKER_01: And we're getting back on this bus, and you know, like I don't see the attendant, I don't really have to go, but I'm like, oh, this I'm not gonna have to pay, so this will be fine.
SPEAKER_01: I go in and use the restroom, and I'm trying to come out and the attendant's return.
SPEAKER_01: And I wasn't really quite listening.
SPEAKER_01: I just hear her saying, senor, and like I'm walking to the bus, and she grabs my back.
SPEAKER_01: Because I violated the culture.
SPEAKER_01: Now listen, I'm really trying to respect other cultures, but not when she grab my back.
SPEAKER_01: I was like, no way.
SPEAKER_01: And I was like, no.
SPEAKER_01: And went to the bus, and oh my god, why did I do that?
SPEAKER_00: Over 50 cents?
SPEAKER_00: And of course, that was her wage.
SPEAKER_00: That was how she lived, was cleaning the restroom.
SPEAKER_01: But I don't think that we should have to pay that soon.
SPEAKER_01: So there I was, right?
SPEAKER_01: And like I get that it's funny, and it's like it's a little shattering to think I could justify myself like I just did before you.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, what if you can't pay for the back?
SPEAKER_01: I mean, I don't know what they do for those people, but I sure could.
SPEAKER_01: So it's not like I was taking a stand for justice.
SPEAKER_01: I was taking a stand for my own convenience.
SPEAKER_01: And I was surprised.
SPEAKER_01: And once I got on the bus and it started moving, I couldn't go back and pay.
SPEAKER_01: God, I wish I had.
SPEAKER_01: 50 cents?
SPEAKER_01: You ever find yourself doing this over 50 cents?
SPEAKER_01: Pennies on a dollar, just keeping mouth closed, which costs us nothing.
SPEAKER_01: I mean, these are the stupidest things that I do that cost me nothing, so that I can go home justified by myself.
SPEAKER_05: God, have mercy on me, a sinner.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if this tax collector really cheats people.
SPEAKER_01: We don't know them.
SPEAKER_01: I don't know if the Pharisee does what he thinks he does.
SPEAKER_01: But I do want to invite you, along with the invitation I hear from this story, to maybe judge our judgment a little bit more harshly.
SPEAKER_01: I don't want you to feel bad than you judge, because actually that's not going to correlate to you changing.
SPEAKER_01: We don't change because we're ashamed.
SPEAKER_01: We change because we see there's something better than our shame.
SPEAKER_01: And the thing that can be better than our shame is here I am.
SPEAKER_01: Trying to be better than you and somebody else have mercy on me.