Therefore, I tell you, her sins, which were many, have been forgiven; hence she has shown great love. But the one to whom little is forgiven, loves little.
Jesus is dining with a Pharisee, and a great sinning woman enters the home and begins to anoint Jesus’ feet with ointment, shedding tears on his feet, and drying his feet with her hair. The Pharisee announces that if Jesus were really a prophet, he’d know what kind of sinning woman she was. Jesus’ response is that the Pharisee didn’t offer water for his feet, kiss him in greeting, or anoint him. But this woman has not ceased doing these things.
Jesus sees the holy in this sinning woman, where all the Pharisee sees is the sinning woman. Jesus asks us to see the holy in the people around us, regardless of how they present. This is normally my take away from this story, and it’s a good one.
But today, I’m struck by the other notion Jesus leaves the Pharisee with. The woman had a great number of sins which were forgiven, and as a result loved greatly. He continues that those who are forgiven only a little, love only a little.
I have seen this in both instances. I’ve worked with people experiencing homelessness, who’ve had really rough lives. They feel extremely blessed, because of their conviction that they’ve been forgiven. Their sense of worthiness that comes from God’s grace spills out into their own acts of mercy and kindness towards others, similar to the woman anointing Jesus’ feet.
In contrast, I’ve seen people of faith who have a sense of righteousness, and right-living. They too have a sense of worthiness, but it comes from themselves, not from God. They have not bared their sinful souls to God. They have not received God’s amazing blessing. Their self-created sense of worthiness is not sufficient to spill into actions of love and mercy for others. Their worthiness light does not shine as brightly as the folks who gain their sense of worthiness from God, not from their own actions.
I have never been homeless. I would consider that my life has been pretty blessed. I fear that I would be in the category Jesus describes as ‘to those whom little is forgiven’, because I don’t generally sense that I have many sins to be forgiven. That is a scary sentiment, given Jesus’ warning to the Pharisee.
This morning, I’m thinking about my life and my blessings and the parts of me that need to be forgiven. I want to be someone who has much to be forgiven, so I have a great sense of God-given worthiness.
This isn’t about fabricating sins. Or looking back 50 years to the penny candy I MIGHT have stolen. Rather this is an honest and regular inventory of my life. I have a colleague who keeps an index card in his pocket and through the week, he writes down things he’s done that would be considered sinful. The unkind word, the apathy towards the hurting, the small slights to loved ones. During his daily prayer practice, he refers to that card when he confesses his sins, and also keeps it for the collective confession of sin on Sunday morning. He is steeped in his weekly sins, big and small, and he genuinely seeks forgiveness for these sins.
That’s what I need to do. I need to do a better job keeping track of the things that I do that are sinful, big and small. I need to have these in my consciousness, so that I can genuinely ask for forgiveness for them. I’m only a person without much to be forgiven because I don’t see all of the things that need forgiveness. That sense of God-given worthiness comes in direct relationship to the amount of God-given mercy I seek and receive. I need to be more attentive to my actions, so I can strive to be like the sinful woman, to whom much is forgiven.
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