1086. The Pharisee Acknowledged No Sin

The Pharisee Acknowledged No Sin

"The Pharisee stood and prayed thus with himself: God, I thank Thee that I am not as other men are, extortioners, unjust, adulterers, or even as this publican" (Luk_18:11).

The Pharisee sought approach to God upon his own merits. His hope was a spider's web weaved from his own body. The spirit of the Pharisee is running riot in the world to-day. Take for example, the world of literature. Whether it be biography or fiction, there is no such thing as the acknowledgment of sin. If such a thing does occur, it is altogether out of the general. Men boast in their own goodness. They boast in the goodness of their fellow-men. Literature, if it acknowledges sin at all, cries that the world is good at its heart. If it concedes that crime and vice are rampant, it confesses them as no more than an abnormality. In our institutions of learning, there is but little said about the heart being deceitful above all things and desperately wicked. Students are taught that they have within themselves the shining star stuff that produces the real man; that they themselves possess the spark that needs only to be fanned to bring forth Divinity. Society, as a whole, concedes no sin, deep-rooted in the human heart. Of course, society can not help but know that sin is everywhere. The daily papers are filled with the outgrowth of sinful hearts; but society will not acknowledge that sin is inbred, inherent, and incapable of human eradication. The world stands before God, boasting its own goodness. The gambler glories in the fact that he at least has some splendid qualities; the drunkard boasts that he harms no one but himself; even the murderer will contend that he at least was forced by circumstances, to take life.

The whole world tries to cover up its sins, or to excuse them or to belittle them.

Autor: R.E. NEIGHBOUR