In the sermon, Pastor Tzeng spoke about the prayer of the Pharisee which tried to use outward actions to gain righteousness before God. However, we cannot gain peace by our own actions compared to others. It may temporarily ease us to compare ourselves to others, but even the richest and most powerful people have anxiety and lack of peace. This is because our peace only comes from God.
The prayer of tax collector had radical sincerity in it. We can compare this prayer to the calling of Matthew, the tax collector, who Jesus reached out to with radical love. A sincere person will pray to God with a sincere posture like the tax collector did. Jesus himself prayed in this way, with struggling sincerity at Gethsemane. Whether it is the prayer of the Pharisee or tax collector, we find that we are all completely limited. Even in the heart of trying to be humble, we can be prideful at the same time. Therefore, it’s not as if we can resolve self-righteousness and pride on our own. We need the grace of God from above and that is accepting the love of Jesus on the cross. May we have the faith in God’s love that is completely beyond us and be sincere in our relationship with Him.0
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