Confident In Christ’s Righteousness: Luke 18:9-14

As we continue moving forward through Luke’s gospel, we arrive at an illustration Jesus shares that is powerful for us to pay attention to, and in this illustration, Jesus shares a key to having a prayer life that works. In this event, we discover a powerful truth that should impact our prayers to God if we have been feeling our prayers are ineffective.

Let’s read our passage and then unpack some big things we can learn from what Jesus shared. Our passage is found in Luke’s gospel, chapter 18, and we will read from the New International Version of the Bible. Starting in verse 9, Luke tells us:

⁹ To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable: ¹⁰ “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. ¹¹ The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. ¹² I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’

¹³ “But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’

¹⁴ “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

In this passage and in Jesus’ illustration, we discover a powerful truth about prayer. Within the picture of these two prayers, we see two different ways of perceiving what God wants. In one prayer, we see someone directing God to look at how good they are in relation to the standard they have in their mind. In the other prayer, we discover someone who simple acknowledges where they are and that they need God.

However, too often we disconnect these two prayers from the reason Jesus shared this illustration, while also disconnecting the lesson Jesus shares from the parable itself.

Our passage opens with the clear reason Jesus shared this parable. Verse 9 opens this event by saying, “To some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else, Jesus told this parable”. The specific context for this parable was Jesus witnessing some people who were confident that they were righteous while looking down on others.

We should look at this parable through this window. However, as I wonder about this, which piece of the picture Luke describes is the negative? In Jesus’ eyes, was it wrong for the people He shared this parable with to be confident of their own righteousness, or was is simply wrong to look down on everyone else?

This is an interesting question. While we all could easily agree that it was likely wrong to look down on others, is it wrong to live confident of our own righteousness?

From the context of what Jesus shares in the parable and key point Jesus shares afterwards, I suspect that both looking down on others and being confident of our own righteousness are equally wrong in God’s eyes. This is because the best we can do and be isn’t enough. Even if we lived perfectly sinless from this point in our lives forward, there would be enough sin in our past to cancel out our current perfection.

Jesus finished this illustration off with a truth at the end of verse 14: “For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” While it is easy to take this truth and disconnect it from the parable Jesus shared, let’s instead keep this truth attached to the context of Jesus’ prayer illustration. While it is easy to say this statement is a universal truth that is applicable to every area of life, Jesus’ shared this truth in Luke’s gospel with a very specific, very narrow context – specifically in the context of our prayers.

In the context of this passage, we can conclude that exalting ourselves before God in prayer will never end well. Praying prayers that emphasize how good we are might be asking for God to humble us.

In contrast, when we come before God with a humble spirit, God promises to lift us up and to bring us glory. The powerful truth of this entire parable is that we should never be confident in our own perfection because we are not perfect. We have sinned, and because of this, we have fallen short of God’s perfection.

While there are some who say that since no one can achieve the standard we should all either move the standard lower or give up on trying, God gives us a different solution that doesn’t lower His standard, but one that gives us a glimpse of hope.

To solve the dilemma of sin, Jesus stepped into the world. Jesus lived the perfect life we could not live because we have sinful hearts and minds. Jesus proved that God’s demands were not impossible, impractical, or unwise. Jesus showed us God’s ideal for our lives through how He lived.

Jesus also showed us how much God loves us. Jesus could have written any type of death into prophecy before the creation of the world, but He chose a death that was humiliating, painful, and very public. Jesus did not deserve death, because His perfect, sinless life contained nothing that deserved death.

However, Jesus offered His life up in death so that we could accept His life as a gift in exchange for ours. God offers to trade us our sinful, sin-filled lives for Jesus’ sinless sacrifice. When we trade with God, accepting Jesus’ gift, we have a clear change of focus. With Jesus’ sacrifice as God’s gift to each of us, we should live confident in Jesus’ righteousness instead of our own and 100% aware of our continual need for Jesus to be our Savior.

Being confident in our own righteousness is never wise, because it tells God that we don’t need Him or Jesus. If we push Jesus away believing we don’t need Him, we ultimately will die because of our sins. Instead, we should humble ourselves, accept the gift God offers us through Jesus’ life, and live confidently in what Jesus has done for us and continually thank God for taking our sin-filled lives and giving us a Savior to take the punishment we deserve! When we accept Jesus’ life in place of our own, we have the assurance of eternal life, and the eternal life God gives us through Jesus’ life is one that extends into eternity!

As we come to the end of another podcast episode, here are the challenges I will leave you with:

As I always challenge you to do, intentionally seek God first in your life. If you have not humbly accepted God’s gift through Jesus’ sacrifice, I invite you to do so today. Choose to humbly come before God and ask Him to take your sin-filled life and your sin-stained past and replace it with Jesus’ life. When we intentionally trade lives with Jesus, we have the assurance of salvation.

Also, continue to pray and study the Bible for yourself to learn and grow closer to God each and every day. Filter everything you hear, see, and read through the lens of the Bible to discover whether it is something that is truly worthwhile from eternity’s perspective. God has shared the big picture with us in the Bible, and He has kept His truth safe for thousands of years. If we trust God to keep us safe for eternity, trust also that He will keep His message of salvation safe through a few thousand years of sin-filled human history.

And as I end every set of challenges by saying in one way or another, never stop short of, back away from, chicken out of, or wander away from where God wants to lead you to in your life with Him!