In last week’s sermon we heard about two miracles recorded in Luke chapter seven.  Someone was healed without Jesus actually having to go to that person.  There was no laying on of hands, no anointing with oil, no loud cries to God, no long prayers, and no promises made to God in exchange for a favor.  The Roman centurion’s servant was healed. 

That same chapter includes Jesus raising a young man from death.  Jesus stopped a funeral procession on its way to bury a young man and brought back to life the only son of a poor widow.  

Jesus had power over distance and death, and now this week we see Jesus go to dinner in the house of a more than decent man.  There Jesus meets a desperate sinner.

In today’s scripture, Jesus is in the home of Simon the Pharisee.  Pharisees, those who practiced the strictest form of Judaism, usually had a grand lifestyle.  Most were successful businessmen.  They prided themselves in studying and obeying all the 613 Jewish laws.  They loved to parade their goodness for all to see. 

They loved to get together and tell stories of how they had entertained the rich and famous or some learned rabbi, and how they discussed God’s laws well into the night.  They loved to argue the minute points of the Law, solve problems in stories, case studies, and riddles.

Pharisees were usually very prominent in the business community.  Businessmen knew about borrowing and lending money.  The wealthy often lent out money to friends and the children of friends; in fact, some made their living lending money.  Perhaps Simon was a moneylender. 

Jesus knew that, when he was invited to dinner, it meant a test.  But Jesus looked at it as an opportunity, not to impress Simon but to help Simon learn something. 

In that part of the world, the doors and windows of most homes were opened during the day.  The wealthy households had rooms that opened out onto a courtyard, and a person walking down the street could easily see a party going on or a dinner inside the home.  That person walking by might be invited into the dinner, or he or she might just slip in.  

This woman who went into Simon’s house took a huge risk.  She was well known.  Everyone knew she was a desperate sinner, most likely a prostitute.  She had the money to buy expensive perfume and the beautiful, translucent, alabaster stone box container.

It is interesting to note that the woman was not instantly thrown out.  Perhaps she was allowed to come in as part of Simon’s way to test Jesus.  What would Jesus’ reaction be to such a person?

When she came into the dinner party, she was not interested in food or conversation.  She was interested in seeing Jesus.  She did not dare to address Jesus directly.  He was a rabbi, and she was a woman.  A rabbi didn’t talk to women in public.  A rabbi would not talk to his own wife in public.  

The woman heard Jesus had great compassion; perhaps he would forgive her.  She kissed his feet, and her tears began to flow. 

She had nothing with which to wipe her tears from his feet, so she used her long hair.

Simon was thinking, “Aha!  Just as I expected!  Jesus could not be a prophet, because a prophet would know in a minute this woman is a lowlife.  A real prophet would know this is probably her trick to get him to go home with her.”  Then again, she might have been hired by someone who was watching Simon and looking for an excuse to accuse him.

I like what Luke does next in this miracle chapter.  Jesus is not fixed on reading the woman’s motives.  He is not fixed on his own purity, which would demand that he tell the woman to get away from him, but he answers the thoughts of Simon. 

“Simon, I have a lesson for you.”  Jesus continued, “A moneylender loaned one man 500 silver coins (about two years’ wages) and another man 50 silver coins (about two months’ wages).  Neither could repay, so the moneylender forgave both debts.  Which debtor would love him more?”
 
Simon gave his answer, “I suppose the one who was forgiven more.”
 
The point Jesus wanted to make was:  Just as both debtors needed forgiveness, neither of them could pay back what they had used up.  The woman had sinned much and Simon had sinned little.  Both were sinners. 

Jesus said, “Don’t you get it, Simon?  I came into your home as an invited guest and you provided none of the common courtesies that would have made me feel welcome, but this woman has not ceased making me feel the most important person in the room.  This woman has taken a huge risk in coming here to your home and paid a great price to show she is sorry for her sins and grateful that she has forgiveness.

“But you, Simon, you think you are the most important person in the room and all the others of us are beneath you.  You see yourself as the moral standard for others to achieve.”

Jesus turned to her and said, “Woman, your sins are forgiven.  Your faith has saved you.  Go in peace.”

Luke is telling us the miracles of Jesus can happen at a distance.  The Roman centurion’s servant was healed without Jesus going to his house, but then the centurion deserved to be helped.  He was a good guy, more than a decent man.
 
The miracles of Jesus could happen in the face of death, but that was because the poor widow had no one else to help her.
 
In this part of Luke 7 we see a woman who is a desperate sinner.  She did not deserve to be helped.  She was not a decent person.  She suffered because of her own poor choices.  There were lots of forks in the road of life and she often chose the wrong turn.  She was far from God.  Why would God bother with her?
 
Simon was a good man, more than a decent man.  He had been the stellar example of obeying all the Jewish laws.  It was obvious to everyone that he was godly.  He even invited a preacher home for supper. 

Simon was such a decent person that he had an instant recognition of who was and who was not a good guy like himself.  Simon saw himself as the judge.  He judged the woman to be worthless because of her sin and Jesus to be a phony because he allowed such a vile creature to touch him. 

Jesus refused to judge the behavior of the desperate sinner.  Jesus did not have to judge her.  She knew she had been doing wrong.  She knew she was far away from God.  She did not need anyone to condemn her.  

She did not bring any excuses saying she was a victim.  She didn’t whine about not having equal chances with other women in the town.  She did not claim to be the victim of a society that had treated her badly.

She came only seeking forgiveness.  Jesus told her, “Your faith has saved you.”  The Greek Text gives us the verb “saved” in the perfect tense, which means it is not just a one-time event, but an ongoing process.  It would be more clearly translated, “Your faith continues to save you.”

A while ago we sang that wonderful old Hymn, “Joy to the World, the Lord is Come.”  Although there a variety of theories as to why the original text to that hymn uses the present tense “is” to talk about a historical fact of the past—that is, the birth of Jesus—I can see that thinking of the perfect tense, in a very real sense the Lord is constantly in the process of coming into our world.  He is constantly in the process of opening our eyes of faith, inviting us to grow in our relationship to God and our relationships to each other.

Jesus said to the woman, “Your faith is in the process of saving you.”  
 
Which one—Simon, the more than decent man, or the desperate sinner woman—needed the miracle of forgiveness?  According to Jesus, both!
 
While it was true that Simon’s sins were not as evident as the woman’s sins, Simon was not perfect and he needed God’s mercy.  Simon, the decent man, could not pay God the debt he owed, even though by his estimation it was small.

The woman, the desperate sinner, knew she could not call back her decisions.  She could not pay what she owed God in her wasted years.  She knew that.  But she was not going to remain in that state.   She found out where Jesus was eating supper and went there.  

With her tears of sorrow she washed his feet, and with her hair she wiped them.  Then she poured her offering on Jesus, not just the dab of perfume that was customary for the host to put on the head of each guest as he greeted them upon entering his home, but she poured the most costly perfume, all of it, on his feet.

Simon had been in the presence of Jesus for the whole evening and saw himself as a cut above everyone in the room, even Jesus. 

In reality it was Simon and not the desperate sinner who was far from God.  
 
What does Jesus want to teach us in this lesson?  The Bible is the Word of God because it serves as a mirror so we may see ourselves clearly and so we have the opportunity to make necessary changes in our behavior as we grow in our relationship to God. 

Where are we in this scripture?  Most of us stand not in the shoes of the desperate sinner, with such a terrible past making us feel depressed and without hope, but instead we are the religious, we are the decent folks, we stand in Simon’s shoes.  

This story is written as a warning to all of us.  We may be those who consider ourselves the good guy. 

We may be the ones who have made the right choices and we may feel we are a cut above those who can’t hold a job, dropped out of school, married the wrong person, are in trouble with the law, had too many kids, are always broke, never take a bath, and don’t mow their lawn the right way.

This lesson today in Luke’s seventh chapter is for us.

Today we learn Jesus had the power to affect the human condition with the love of God.  He had the power to work a miracle over distance, death, and desperate sin.  But perhaps his most difficult area to work a miracle in the human condition is among the decent.

We can’t imagine the joy the Roman centurion felt when his servant was healed, or the joy of the widowed mother whose only son came back to life on the way to the cemetery, or the joy felt by that woman who was condemned by everyone but forgiven by Jesus himself. 

Here we stand in Simon’s shoes.  What joy is there for us?  What happened to the decent man, the man who practiced his religion faithfully? 

Each of us is writing the ending to Simon’s story.  Can we see our need to change?  Can we see that even in our state of decency we can be far away from God?  Can our decency blind us from seeing our need for the Savior?

Here we stand in Simon’s shoes.  This Jesus has the power to do a miracle regardless of distance, death, desperate sin, and even our decency.

                                                          Amen.

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