Resting Like a Tax Collector

"All God asks is that we lay down our insistence on contributing to God's estimation of our merits and embrace Christ's record as our own. Nothing is to be added to or subtracted from this message of salvation in Christ Jesus our Lord."*
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Question: Is it possible that a shape can both be a triangle and not a triangle?
Answer: No. In logic, we call this the Law of Noncontradiction. The rest of us just call it Common Sense.

And He also told this parable to some people who trusted in themselves that they were righteous, and viewed others with contempt: "Two men went up into the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. The Pharisee stood and was praying this to himself: 'God, I thank You that I am not like other people: swindlers, unjust, adulterers, or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week; I pay tithes of all that I get.' But the tax collector, standing some distance away, was even unwilling to lift up his eyes to Heaven, but was beating his breast, saying, 'God, be merciful to me, the sinner!' I tell you, this man went to his house justified rather than the other. (Luke 18: 9-14)

The Pharisee: He rocks merit, and he knows it and wants God to know it, too.
The tax collector: He's got no merit and no hope of ever accruing any, and he knows it. His only hope is a merit from outside himself, an alien merit. One of them went away justified; we know that. 

But don't miss, on this Reformation Day, what else the Lord is saying: Both of them did not go away justified; one of them went away not justified.

A shape cannot be both a triangle and not a triangle.
Salvation cannot be by faith alone and not by faith alone. These two paths cannot be the same gospel.
The Savior cannot save completely by His own merit and not save completely by His own merit. These two persons cannot be the same Jesus.

There will not be in heaven a set of people who rested in Christ's merit alone and a set of people who did not rest in Christ's merit alone.  No matter what your faith community is, at least be intellectually honest and admit they cannot both be true.

So, mamas, what are we teaching our children? Are we being as precise as Jesus in the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector? Or are we teaching them that there's no fundamental difference between Grace and Grace-Alone?

"The only thing you contribute to your salvation is the sin that made it necessary." Jonathan Edwards**

Have we said that to our kids lately? Do they feel, like the tax collector, a hopelessness and a helplessness to fix their own predicament? Do we throw ourselves entirely upon the mercy of God and teach our children to do the same?
Or are we teaching them to think like a Pharisee, that as long as they are baptized and taking the Lord's Supper and going to church and reading the Bible then they are safe?

Salvation belongs to the Lord.
Alone.
It always has.

Salvation belongs to the Lord. (Psalm 3:8)

But the salvation of the righteous is from the Lord; 
He is their strength in times of trouble. (Psalm 37:39)

After these things I heard something like a loud voice of a great multitude in heaven, saying, "Hallelujah! Salvation and glory and power belong to our God; (Revelation 19:1)

The opening quote bears repeating:
All God asks is that we lay down our insistence on contributing to God's estimation of our own merits and embrace Christ's record as our own. Nothing is to be added to or subtracted from this message of salvation in Christ Jesus our Lord.

If I really believe that salvation belongs to the Lord, then I need to check my gimbals. How is salvation presented in my home? Either I am living like a Pharisee and raising little Pharisees, as we go through life accruing our own merit, or I am resting like the tax collector and raising children to rest like little tax collectors, embracing Christ's record as our only hope and salvation.

Glory and power to the Lord, who owns our salvation.
On this Reformation Day, may you and yours, like the tax collector, find Rest in the record of Jesus and go to your homes justified.

*Gospel Transformation Bible, 2008, study notes on Revelation 22:18-19 
**I've already commissioned my daughter to hand-letter this, and I'm going to hang it in a prominent place in my house. Thanks, Babylon Bee, for the reminder!