Avoiding the Self-Justification
of the Pharisees
of the Pharisees
We must none of us be
pleased with ourselves, as people who have lived uprightly here, nor compare
ourselves with those who live bad lives,
The Father's will, Jesus said, is that all that he has
given me should not perish, but should have eternal life; and I will raise them
up on the last day (Jn 6:39). Himself on the first day, us on the last day. The
first day belongs to the head of the Church. Our day, the Lord Christ, you see,
does not end in a sunset. The last day will be the end of the world and its
age.
Don't say, "When will it come?" For the human
race it will be a long time yet; for each individual human being it will be
soon enough, because each person's last day is the day of his death. And
indeed, when you depart from here you will receive according to what you
deserve, and you will rise again to receive what you have achieved. Then God
will set the crown, not so much on your merits as on his gifts. Whatever he has
given you, if you have kept and preserved it, he will recognise.
So now, brothers and sisters, let our desire be directed
toward nothing but heaven, to nothing but eternal life. We must none of us be
pleased with ourselves, as people who have lived uprightly here, nor compare
ourselves with those who live bad lives, like that Pharisee who justified
himself, who evidently hadn't heard the Apostle saying, Not that I have already
received, or am already perfect (Phil 3:12). So he hadn't yet received what he
still desired. He had received a pledge; he said so himself: Who has given us
the pledge of the Spirit (2 Cor 1:22; 5:5). The thing which this was a pledge
of, that's what he longed to reach. A measure of participation - but at a
distance. We participate one way now, we will participate then in quite
another. Now by faith, by hope the same Spirit; then, though, it will be by
sight, it will be the thing itself; but the same Spirit, the same God, the same
fullness. He is crying out to us while we are absent, he will show himself to
us when we are present; he is calling us as we wander in exile; he will foster
and feed us in the home country.