And please turn in your copies of God's Word to the Gospel of Luke, Gospel of Luke chapter 16. And we'll read verses 14 to 18. This is God's Word. The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all these things and they ridiculed him. And he said to them, you are those who justify yourselves before men. But God knows your hearts, for what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God. The law and the prophets were until John. Since then, the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and everyone forces his way into it. But it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the law to become void. Everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. And he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery. So ends the reading of God's word. Well, let's pray and ask the Lord to bless our hearing of his word preached. Our Heavenly Father, even as we think of the response of the Pharisees to the words of Christ, first with criticism and contempt, and then with ridicule, we pray that our hearts would not respond in such a way, or give us hearts that would heed your word, that we might hear and receive the words of Christ, that are indeed to us words of life. Do this through the work of your Spirit in our souls. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen. Well, have you ever had the experience where you're feeling hungry, and so you go into the kitchen, and maybe it's one of your better days, where instead of going to the cookie jar, you go to the fruit bowl. And there in the fruit bowl, you see a nice, shiny, vibrant, red apple. And it looks delicious. It's flawless on the outside. And so you pick it up, and you take it in your hand, What you're expecting is a crisp, refreshing bite from the apple. But as you sink your teeth into it, instead you're met with a mushy, kind of grainy, disgusting kind of experience, a mouthful of mush. Well, it's quite the letdown, isn't it? You cut it open and what appeared nice and shiny and vibrant on the outside is really mushy and gross on the inside, something hardly edible, something that appeared Good was really hollow and spoiled beneath the surface. And this image of the polished apple that's really rotten on the inside is a picture of how we can be tempted to live at times. At times, we can invest so much energy into outward appearances, saying the right things, looking the right way, checking the right boxes, all to impress others with externals, even though our hearts might tell a very different story. Well, in Luke chapter 16, verses 14 to 18, Jesus confronts the Pharisees. And as you know, the Pharisees were men who had mastered the art of appearing pious and righteous on the outside. They were like those polished apples, impressive, shiny, flawless in appearance, but rotten to their core. Although they presented themselves as godly and pious, Truly, in reality, their hearts were filled with the love of money, although they pretended to be those who upheld God's word more than anyone else. In fact, they twisted God's word and they tried to justify themselves before others. Well, Jesus here doesn't mince words. For almost two chapters, he's been telling parables to these Pharisees, but now the parables stop and he speaks with words that are sharp. He exposes the Pharisees' hypocrisy, revealing that their hearts are far from the kingdom of God. While they prided themselves as being guardians of the law, keepers of the law, Jesus exposes them as men whose best works are really abominations in the sight of God. And this passage that we have here this afternoon is not just a critique of some ancient Israeli sect called the Pharisees. No, this passage is also a critique and a challenge to our own hearts, where we are so often tempted to live a certain way, to earn the approval of man, while our hearts may be far from God. God calls us not only to external works, but especially he calls us to love him with our whole heart, soul, strength, and mind. Certainly, it's not to downplay the external actions of serving God, but it is to challenge us that our externals match the internals of our hearts. As we look at this passage today, we'll consider how Jesus addresses this issue of self-justification in the Pharisees and, by implication, challenges us to examine our own hearts in light of his perfect law. And if you have one of the bulletins, you can follow the outline. Well, the first thing we'll consider is the motive for self-justification, the motive. Or in other words, what's the reason driving this self-justification of the Pharisees? Well, to understand the context, or to understand this, we need to remember the context. And the context, of course, is that Jesus had been eating and drinking with sinners and tax collectors. They were drawing near to him. They were responding to this message of the gospel of God's love and his rescue of sinners, bringing sinners to himself. But the Pharisees were scandalized by this. Jesus shouldn't be mixing with this sort of people, so they thought. And they were disgusted with Jesus, and they made their disgust known to him. Well, as a response, Jesus then told four parables, which we considered in Luke chapter 15 and 16. These parables, the parable of the lost coin, the lost sheep, the lost sons, and the shrewd manager, all highlighted God's love and his heart and his compassion for the lost, for the sinner, for the tax collector. And they also serve to highlight the pride and the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. Those who, though they were lost, didn't see it and deny they were lost. Well, the Pharisees have now heard all four of these parables, but instead of responding with repentance and faith, seeing, oh, Jesus is talking about me. Hey guys, we're the older brother who in pride and arrogance is boasting in our works. This is us guys. Now, instead of repenting, and seeing themselves in all of these parables. Instead, they move from criticism of Jesus to ridicule, ridicule. We read that in verse 14. The Pharisees, who were lovers of money, heard all these things and they ridiculed him. Now, this ridicule isn't just harmless joking or jesting or sarcasm or something like that. No, this ridicule is an attempt to shame Jesus publicly. It's an attempt to discredit Jesus and, of course, his message. You know, it's incredible. These men who were not keepers of the law, ironically, are now in this moment fulfilling the law and the prophets. Psalm 22 speaks of how the Messiah would be ridiculed and scorned by men and rejected. Well here, in part, the Pharisees are beginning to fulfill this prophecy unbeknownst to Him, to them, the one that will be fulfilled on the cross. But Jesus here does not let their ridicule go unchecked. In verse 15, he speaks to them in a very straightforward way, no longer in parables. And he says to them, you are those who justify yourselves before men, but God knows your hearts, for what is exalted among men is an abomination. in the sight of God. So he charges them with justifying themselves. What does that mean? Well, justification means being righteous, being just according to the standard of the law. And so to justify yourself is essentially to say, look at me. You can hold me next to the law and I'm squeaky clean. I'm justified, I'm perfect. Look at all my works. That's what the Pharisees were doing. Now, the problem wasn't necessarily the actions they were taking. It wasn't necessarily their works per se. The problem was that their works were only done for show and not for God. These men were phonies, we might say. They were actors on the stage of religious performance, wearing masks of righteousness that hid the reality of their sinful motives. You know, it's interesting. that Luke charges them with being lovers of money. They ridiculed Jesus because they were lovers of money. And I say it's interesting because actually the Pharisees were known for being very generous with their money. The Pharisees were known for giving to the poor and giving to the temple. In fact, back in Luke chapter 11, Jesus spoke of how the Pharisees were so strict in their tithing and giving that they even tithed down to a tenth of the mint that grew on their windowsills. So even their herb plants, they would tithe those little pieces. In Matthew 6, Jesus also speaks of how they give to the needy, but he also points out the problem. He says, thus when you give to the needy, sound no trumpet before you, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and in the streets, that they may be praised by others. Well, here we see the real motive behind the Pharisees in their giving. Their love for money wasn't seen in how they hoarded money for themselves. You know, their love for money wasn't expressed in buying nice things for themselves all the time. Maybe our love for money is often expressed that way, where we go on spending sprees, or we hoard our money rather than being generous. No, their love for money is seen in how they use their money to buy favor in the eyes of man. They loved their money because they thought their money could buy them righteousness. We see that affirms twice in verse 15 where they sought to justify themselves before men and then exalt themselves before men. So just like the older brother in the parable of the lost sons, they were coming to the father in the temple and saying, father, look at all that I have done for you. Don't I deserve a goat if not the fattened calf itself? Look at my works. That's why they gave away their money freely, because it made them appear more righteous before others. They could buy righteousness with their money, and that's why they loved money so much. They gave their money in order to win man's approval. And the motive behind the Pharisees is not a motive that's unique to them, is it? No, this sinful, impulse for self-justification and self-exaltation is something that goes all the way back to the Garden of Eden when Adam and Eve first sinned and then tried to hide their sin and conceal their sin and make themselves look better in the eyes of God. And we are inheritors of that same sin. How do we sin this way? We do this very same thing whenever we seek to mask our sin and hide our sin rather than confessing it to the Lord. We do it whenever we serve or give out of a motivation that others will praise us and exalt us. Rather than serving humbly and to the glory of God, we put on a show hoping to receive the praise of man. Instead of serving quietly, always looking over the shoulder to wonder, who sees what I'm doing? I'm sure all of us have worked in some kind of a workplace where there was the kind of person, and maybe we were that person at some point, but where, you know, when the boss was away, you know, feet up, hands behind the head, reading a newspaper, but when the boss is on the floor, the manager, the CEO, it's frantic work, it's hammering away at things, or it's running around with papers, looking busy. So often, our service to the Lord can look that way, can't it? Where, when we are out of the eyes of man, and we think we're out of the eyes of God, we can live a certain way while we serve frantically before the eyes of man. Another way we can justify ourselves and our sin is by comparing ourselves to other people. Perhaps you've done this before where you come under the conviction of sin, maybe through a sermon, maybe through reading scripture, maybe the Holy Spirit is working in your conscience and you're aware of your sin. And what should you do? You should go to the Lord and you should confess your sin, ask for his help, ask for his grace to fight that sin. But instead, we can be tempted to instead compare ourselves and our sin to other people and say, well, okay, you know, I have this sin, I'm not perfect, but at least I'm not that person. Maybe I'm not that brother or sister, oh, they have a sin problem. Or maybe it's the unbeliever or the person on the street begging for money at the corner of Walmart. We say, well, at least I'm not that person. I'm not that bad. We compare ourselves to others and downplay our own sin. And whether we do these things because we love man's praise or because we're afraid of losing man's approval, the fear of man and the love of man's praise are really the same thing. and they're two sides of the same coin. The root problem is the same. We value human approval more than God's. But of course, there's a problem with this kind of activity, isn't there? And that's the second thing we'll consider. The problem with self-justification is that we can fool some people some of the time but we can't fool God at any time. Why? Well, Jesus tells us why when he says, but God knows your hearts, for what is exalted among men is an abomination in the sight of God. Children, what does that mean that God knows our hearts? Well, of course, Jesus isn't speaking here of our physical hearts, that organ that pumps blood and oxygen around our body. No, when he says he sees our hearts, he's speaking of our inner person. Children, it's those thoughts that you have going on in your mind. It's that desire that you have within you. It can be a good desire, it can be a wrong desire, but it's that inner person, the will, the desire, the thoughts that you have, your conscience, All of that. And this is something that is unseen by human eyes. Now at times we can attempt to judge people's character, maybe by their actions, their words, those kinds of things, but ultimately we cannot see into the recesses of the hearts of man. And ultimately, even with ourselves, it doesn't matter how others perceive us, their opinions don't determine our eternal standing. What ultimately matters is not how man sees us or even how we see ourselves, but it's how God sees us. And he does see us. He sees our hearts, not just the image that we project. You see, man looks at the Pharisee standing in the temple and the Pharisee is there with his arms in the air and he's praying loudly and he's throwing his coins into the offering and they're clinking and clattering. And man looks at that and he says, wow, what a pious individual, what a godly group of men these Pharisees are. But God looks and God sees hearts that are motivated by a love of money and even a greater love for the praise of men. This theme of God seeing our hearts is a theme that runs throughout scripture. In Genesis 6, verse 5, we read how the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually. This, of course, is before the flood. And it's interesting here in describing the wickedness of the earth, instead of pointing out and highlighting the wicked acts, The murder, the violence, the rape, perhaps. Instead of pointing out those things, no, instead it points out the wickedness and the intentions and the thoughts of the heart. And that's because our sin originates from our hearts. As James says, sin is first conceived in the heart, and then it's born, it's birthed in sinful actions and words and deeds. I remember when the prophet Samuel was sent by God to anoint one of Jesse's sons. He was told, go to Jesse's house, anoint one of his sons. That's all he knew. And as he's there sitting on the sofa in Jesse's living room, Jesse has all his sons paraded before him one by one. And with each one, Samuel says, oh, this is the one. OK, if not him, well, this is the one. He's sure. He's already got the bottle off his, or the cork off his bottle of oil. He's ready to go. But remember what the Lord says. Do not look on his appearance or on the height of his stature because I have rejected him. For the Lord sees, not as man sees. Man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart. God could see something that Samuel couldn't. Samuel was impressed where God apparently was not. And that's because God sees beyond the externals that we are so often impressed by. God sees our hearts. And what that means is that we cannot hide behind an image that we try to project of ourselves. We may be able to impress other people, or we may be impressed by the shows of other people. But when their just shows, God is not impressed at all. In fact, not only is he left unimpressed, but Jesus says something much stronger than that. Jesus says that man's attempts at self-justification and self-exaltation, those good works that exalt a man in another man's eyes, Jesus says, is an abomination in the sight of God. That word abomination is very strong language. It's language that's used throughout the Old Testament, and especially in the book of Isaiah. In Isaiah chapter one, it speaks of how Israel has gone after other gods. They are idolatrous. And then it calls what Israel is doing an abomination. And what's interesting is that it's not their idolatry per se that is referred to as the abomination, but what is it? attempts at good works, their worship in the temple, their Sabbath observance, their giving, their celebration of these special feast days. That's what God highlights is an abomination to him. You see, when our actions are driven by self-glorification, no matter how good they are externally, no matter how much the dollar amount in our giving or the time we spend giving to something else, While our hearts are idolatrous, they are not things that please the Lord. They are an abomination to Him. You know, one of the things that you often hear people say at times is, well, you can't judge me. The Lord knows my heart. God knows my heart. Someone who's living in some kind of sin, a young man living with his girlfriend. Contrary to Scripture, he might say, well, you can't judge me. The Lord knows my heart. Even though I might be living contrary to God's law in such clear and obvious ways, the Lord knows my heart. He's my judge. But the sobering reality that Jesus teaches here is that, yes, the Lord does know your heart. That's not a good thing. That's not a good thing. That's a sobering, frightening reality. Because apart from Christ, the human heart is wicked. And as such, it stands under the just condemnation of God. As Jeremiah 17, 9 and 10 says, the heart is deceitful above all things and desperately sick. Who can understand it? I, the Lord, search the heart and test the mind to give every man according to his ways, according to the fruit of his deeds. You see, it'd be one thing if God only saw the heart and didn't have the power to judge the heart, but scripture teaches not only that God sees the heart of man, but he also judges and gives accordingly. And those whose hearts are deceitful, those whose hearts are still under the condemnation of sin apart from Christ, will receive the fruit of judgment. This is the problem with all attempts at downplaying our sin. or comparing ourselves to others and masking our sin, or putting on shows of righteousness. It might make us feel better about our sin, it might make us feel better about ourselves for a time. It might even fool other people, our spouses, our pastors, our congregants, whoever. But it doesn't fool God. Whatever the way we attempt to justify ourselves and cover our sin, it's a futile effort because the Lord sees the heart of man. While Jesus has pointed out the motive of their self-justification, he's also shown the problem. Well, now third, he provides the response to their self-justification. And he does so by giving them a lesson in the law and the gospel. He begins in verse 16. The law and the prophets were until John. Since then, the good news of the kingdom of God is preached, and everyone forces his way into it. So here, Jesus is giving a brief overview of what we might call redemptive history. Jesus is distinguishing between two periods of time, the Old Covenant, which is the period of the Law and the Prophets, and the New Covenant, the period in which Christ has come and fulfilled the Law and the Prophets. The Old Covenant was a time of promise. The New Covenant is the time of fulfillment. And so now Christ is here, he's standing before the Pharisees, the kingdom is present and the good news is being preached. And there are similarities and differences between the old and new covenants. Jesus highlights one key difference, that is how one enters, how one enters the covenant. You see under the old covenant, entry into the covenant was by birth and then circumcision. It was a covenant based on national identity. And so membership was relatively easy in one sense. You just had to be born. And Jesus doesn't deny that the Pharisees are Jews and they're members of the old covenant. But notice how Jesus does deny that they're members of the new covenant. As he says, the good news of the kingdom of God is preached and everyone forces his way into it. This language of forcing one's way into the kingdom is language of violence, forcing one's way. And what he's saying is that the Pharisees are not members of the kingdom, but they're trying to violently force their way into the kingdom. How are they doing that? Well, given the context, they're trying to do it through their good works. Trying to enter into the kingdom, trying to earn God's favor through self-justification is an attempt to violently enter in a way that God has not opened. And this goes against everything Jesus has been saying, really, since Luke chapter 4 with the beginning of Jesus' ministry, but especially in light of the last couple of chapters. How do we enter the kingdom? Jesus has taught very plainly and very clearly that we enter the kingdom not by works of the law but by faith. We enter like those who are brought to the banquet feast, the lame, the crippled who can't walk there themselves, but are carried by Jesus in. We get there just as the lost coin gets found, not by their own efforts, but by the effort of the widow. We get there just like the lost sheep is recovered, not through his own cleverness or ingenuity, but by the shepherd gently taking him on his arms and leading him home with rejoicing. Well, in verse 17, Jesus underscores the impossibility of entering through self-justification. He says, but it is easier for heaven and earth to pass away than for one dot of the law to become void. In other words, in order to earn our way into the kingdom, in order to try to enter into the kingdom by works of the law, You need to keep all of the law. And Jesus says here that the law isn't going to lower its standard. Not even a cross of a T or a dot of the I is going to be removed. No, the law will stand. As Paul tells us in Romans 3, it's impossible for fallen sinners to keep the law and be saved. He says, for by works of the law, no human being will be justified in his sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin. And Galatians 3, which we read earlier, which is drawing from Deuteronomy 27. For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse, for it is written, cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law and do them. You see, the law is like an impenetrable door that remains closed to sinners. The sinner walks up to the door, they try to gain entry, the law evaluates them and puts up a hand and says, no, the door is closed. The law doesn't serve to provide a way for sinners to enter, rather it only serves to reveal the failure of sinners. Well next, in verse 18, Jesus uses divorce law as an example to illustrate the strictness of the law. He says, everyone who divorces his wife and marries another commits adultery. And he who marries a woman divorced from her husband commits adultery. Now, there are some who will maybe be looking for texts on marriage and divorce, and they'll land on this passage, and they'll say, well, look at this verse. Clearly, there are no exceptions for divorce and remarriage. There are no options. But of course, when we read this in context, we see that to do that would be to rip these verses from context. You see, Jesus is not suddenly shifting from everything he has been talking about now to just having a sidebar conversation about the ethics of marriage and divorce. No, that's not his point. He's not really teaching on marriage at all. Rather, he's just laying down a general principle of the law. He's not dealing with the exceptions or the what-ifs or the cases. Well, what if this happens or that happens? It's as if he were to just say, well, you shouldn't kill. The law says you should not kill. Well, we would take that at face value, and we'd also know, well, there are exceptions to that. For example, if someone came and tried to kill our children, well, may require us to take the life of the person trying to kill our children in defense. And so even the fulfillment of the Sixth Commandment may require the taking of life. So all of that to say, Jesus is laying down the general principle, not giving an extensive discourse on divorce or remarriage. And just to fill that out, there are biblical exceptions for divorce, such as adultery, Matthew 5, 32, Matthew 19, nine, or abandonment. 1 Corinthians 7, verse 15. And of course, Jesus is not addressing these things here because that's not his point. Again, his point is simply to give the standard of what the law in all of its strictness calls us to. Jesus is, rather than going back to Moses and the law which does allow for divorce, he's going back to Genesis 2. before there was any sin, where there was one man, one wife, no divorce, therefore no remarriage. And he brings this up because the Pharisees were known for having a very lax approach to divorce. They allowed divorce for apparently very trivial reasons. And so what they were doing was treating the law very lightly so that it would be easier to keep. But Jesus is illustrating what he said a moment ago, that the law will not change in jot or tittle. It will not change at all. The law does not lower its requirements. Rather, it simply condemns all who fail to meet its demands. And that's his overarching principle, that any attempt to justify ourselves by works of the law is trying to force our way into the kingdom. It's trying to force our way through a door that will not budge, no matter how violent we are. Well, I was a police officer back in Ireland. There was one night where we had to try to gain entry into a building through this heavy metal door. And there were three of us. And we began by each of us taking turns trying to kick in the door. As each person got tired, the other guy would take over and we tried to do that a few times. We weren't effective at all. Then one of the guys remembered that in the patrol vehicle, he had a sledgehammer that he had taken from someone earlier that day who was probably doing something he shouldn't be doing with a sledgehammer. And at that point, all three of us took turns with the sledgehammer laying into this door. We tried to hit it at the hinges. We hit it low and high, in the middle, all sorts of places until we were puffing and panting. We could not break down the door. We couldn't even get it to rattle. The door was so strong and secure, no matter how violent we were, we could not enter. And this is an illustration of what it's like trying to break into the kingdom of God through works of the law. The law is a door that will not budge. The law is a standard that we cannot meet no matter how we try to dress ourselves up, no matter how much we throw ourselves at it. The door of the law, like my own door, serves only to show our own failure, weakness, and inability. Well, all attempts at self-justification are futile. But fourth, and finally, there is an alternative. The alternative to self-justification is the free justification of God for sinners. Although Jesus doesn't speak to it directly in these verses, he has told four parables now which all show how we enter into the kingdom by faith. And that is the answer. You see, the answer for the Pharisees is not that, well, you need to give more. You were giving a bit before, but you need to give more. Or you were doing a bit, but you need to do more. No, the answer is not that they need to try harder to obey the law, and maybe then they'll get through the door. Maybe then they'll be righteous enough. No, the answer that they need to hear is that all of their attempts to justify themselves are abominations. They are like filthy rags, or scubalon, dung, as Paul calls it in Philippians 3. Oh, you do not need more works. What you need is to repent of your sins and of your works, and you need to trust and rest in the works of another. For where the law leaves us condemned and locked out, The gospel of Christ opens the door to his kingdom by grace. You see, there are two ways to be justified. The first is by obeying the law perfectly. We refer to it as perfect, personal, and perpetual obedience. And this requires having never sinned and having always fully obeyed the law. Only Adam had this opportunity, and he failed. And so for us, this option is closed. But as Paul says, there is a righteousness that is received apart from the law, a righteousness revealed to faith. Justification comes, therefore, not through our works or striving, but through the perfect obedience of Christ on our behalf. As Paul explains in Romans 3, we receive a righteousness that is not our own, but one provided by God. The same God who looks at our sin and even our good works, not done in faith, and says, abomination. This same God provides freely for our forgiveness and for our healing and restoration of soul. This is the good news of the kingdom that is being proclaimed, just as Christ has said and which was foretold by the law and the prophets, that he has come and he has fulfilled all righteousness. He is the only one to whom the door of the law will open. He is the only one who can stand at that door of the law and say, look at me, I am righteous. And that door freely opens to him and he enters. And that's because throughout Christ's earthly life, he obeyed the law perfectly. He never sinned in word, in thought, or deed. Not only his external actions, but even the desires of his heart were pure constantly. This is why the father could speak of him at his baptism and say, this is my beloved son with whom I am well pleased. Jesus never lived one way before the eyes of man and another way before the eyes of God. No, God could search his heart and say, I am well pleased with my son. Psalm one tells us that the righteous man deserves blessing, does he not? Deuteronomy 27 tells us that the lawbreaker deserves the curse. And yet, the only truly righteous man went to the cross and became a curse for us. He wore our abominations upon himself so that we could receive his robes of righteousness. This is the alternative to self-justification. justification that comes through faith in this one, in Christ. And all who trust in him are saved. And God sees them now as righteous, not because of anything they've done, but because of what Christ has done. This is why the gospel is good news. It proclaims to sinners that there is a way into the kingdom Not through a law we have kept, but even as we have not kept the law, there is a doorway in through faith, following in the footsteps of Christ, who has gone in ahead of us. And having been justified, not only are we heirs and members of the kingdom, but we are freed from so many things. We're freed from the crushing weight of living for the approval of others. If you've ever lived under the fear of man, it can be a terrible snare. It's something that plagues so many churches, where you feel the heavy, weighty expectations to live a certain way and to look a certain way, to maybe have your children schooled a certain way, to eat or drink a certain way, all to conform not to God's standards, to which we ought to be conformed, but all to conform with the traditions and human standards of righteousness in order to be accepted. But no longer, no longer, that is not the way of the kingdom. Dear Christian, you have been set free from the tyranny of man's opinions and his traditions. You are no longer on the hamster wheel of striving for the praise of others, even as these Pharisees were. Now in Christ, your justification is secure. and you have his approval. With this freedom, you now also follow God's law. It's not that we throw out the law. We don't follow the law in an attempt to justify ourselves, but now we follow the law as those who are not slaves serving in fear, but as sons and daughters serving in love for our father. And now, having been justified, we are also enabled to serve, because now he gives us new hearts, regenerated hearts, hearts that now long to serve him and obey him, hearts that are, when we do sin, convicted of our sin, hearts that are not ruled by selfish pride and ambition, but in loving service, desire to love one another and serve the master, And although imperfect in this life, we have the Spirit working in our hearts, conforming them more and more to Christ. And having been justified, We are also free now to confess our sins rather than to hide them. Rather than maintaining a false image, we can now go to the Lord and confess our sins freely before him. Rather than going like the Pharisee who is boasting in what he has done, we can go like the sinner or the tax collector and say, woe is me. I am a sinner, and in Christ we find a ready Savior who readily forgives us of our sins. Rather than maintaining a false image of perfection before our brothers and sisters, we can go to one another, trusted brothers and sisters, and share our struggles, our weaknesses. our fears, our doubts, our anxieties, and we can comfort one another. We can pray for one another. We can help one another. You see, justification is such a wondrous doctrine on so many levels. It removes the need for masks because it reminds us that what matters is our hearts. And in Christ, our hearts have been justified and are being made more and more conformed to his image. Well, beloveds, the law condemns what Christ saves, so cling to him and you will find in him a righteousness that never fails. Let's pray. Our Heavenly Father, we ask that you might forgive us for all of our attempts at self-righteousness, all of our attempts to Live like the Pharisees, men who were known to be clean in their outward appearance, but like filthy cups on the inside. Lord, would you clean us inside and out? Even as the apostle asks, would you clean us, not only our feet, but from head to toe? Would you cleanse us of all unrighteousness? And Lord, help us to live out the implications of our justification. Cause us to be those who do not throw out your law, but having been justified to serve for your pleasure and a desire to express our love and our gratitude for all that you have done for us. Do this to the glory and praise, not of man, but to your own glory and praise. We pray these things in Jesus' name. Amen.