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Source: https://www.sermonindex.net/speakers/murray-mccandless/pharisee-and-publican/
Luke 18 verse number 9, and he spake this parable unto certain which trusted in themselves That they were righteous and despised others. Two men went up into the temple to pray. One a Pharisee the other publican.
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. I Fast twice in the week. I give tithes of all that I possess and the publican Standing afar off Would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven But smote upon his breast saying God Be merciful to me a sinner.
If I was to take a guess at it tonight, I would say that likely the most often read Gospel from this platform or any other platform is often the gospel of Luke. Luke gives us in his gospel things that are very unique to his writing as every gospel does.
But it is in Luke's gospel often. He pairs them in the twos. That's why we read in Luke. Luke tells us about two sons a younger son and an elder son and he tells us about two men a rich man and a beggar.
Tells us about two thieves already been referred to and here he tells us just about two men. Now you see in the in the ones that just the ones that I have cited there's others beside that. The world would have looked at them with a difference.
But the Lord didn't. Okay if you looked at the man with all his abundance and his riches and Luke chapter 16 and then saw the other man down at the End of his table you would look at the same. What a difference.
What a contrast. Here's this man and all his wealth and all his plenty and here's a man down here being taken care of by dogs. What a difference. But before the Lord Jesus tells us anything He just tells us about those two men.
When we come to the two sons Luke chapter 15, I mean he develops it there's a tremendous difference. But he just tells us her certain man had two sons. You see the point is this. That we start out the same.
But the end can be different. The end can be different. I Mean there was no reason why that rich man couldn't have been saved and gone to heaven. Other rich men were saved. Rich women were saved to. There's no reason why both thieves Couldn't have been with him in paradise and there's no reason why these two men couldn't have ended up the same way.
Both of them justified going to heaven. How about you tonight? You saved when did it happen? How did it happen? Where did that take place? This Bible records for us many conversions. I've had people come to me and think that you're almost caught with that.
Well, I don't read where so-and-so got saved. Where did he get saved? Well, I said, I don't read where he died either. Do you think he's still around? Come on, think it through. My friend but every conversion that is recorded answers to what I've already told you.
Now I just want to center in tonight on these two that went up into this temple to pray to pray. I'm not certain they that the one did that but that might have been the intentions. After the effect after the fact you read the story you find out one man went up to be seen.
The other man went up to be saved. Is it too personal is it too direct to ask you tonight? Dear young man, did you come to this meeting to be saved tonight to be saved notice? I did not say to get saved.
That's not your Bible. This Bible doesn't tell you how to get saved. That's a misnomer of language that we use as preachers. I would be as guilty as anybody. This Bible does not tell you how to get saved.
It tells you how you can be saved. That by believing in the Lord Jesus Christ thou shalt be saved. What must I do to be saved. You see my friend salvation is an act of God. Salvation is that which is provided by God.
But the tremendous barrier in my own experience and in yours tonight. It's like another man that Luke refers to. And he was just a Pharisee to. He is sitting in his house one day felt quite honored because the Lord Jesus was coming to his house.
But of all things in comes this woman. And she starts to go to the Lord Jesus and Starts as far as he is concerned just to make a fuss about him and left him out of the picture. And he said if this man had known that she's a sinner.
But you know almost you can see it ringing in his thinking. I'm just so glad she's here. This makes me look so good. I Have nothing to tell me in this passage that these men planned the trip together.
I don't think these two men kind of bumped into each other and said we're gonna go up to the temple. We're gonna go up there and pray. I Think these were roads that had just come together. Two men going up.
Now you may have come as one individual this meeting tonight may come as one of two or three or whatever. When it comes to salvation my friend. You come as one person. You come as one individual. Acts chapter 16.
There's a man that gets saved in his household. He does not say what must we do to be saved. What must I do to be saved? Is that your question tonight? You think you'll ever ask that? You see just as we have the twos here, I don't think I have to remind you we live in a world tonight of many countries.
But we're going to another world that only has two countries heaven and hell heaven or hell. And everybody's going to one or the other. Which one for you? In order to depend on it will not depend on what role you sat on in this gospel hall.
It will really not even depend on how you reacted and responded to the preaching. It will totally depend on what you do with Christ. Because that's the one we're preaching tonight as one who could save you one who could meet your need.
Yes, you see this one man this Pharisee. He just couldn't get past himself in his supposed prayer, there's a 134 words 134 and he went down to his house justifying himself. Quite pleased with what he had done for himself.
The man that went down justified by God had seven words seven words. God God be merciful to me a sinner. Wonder how you're gonna leave the meeting tonight. The ones that I have quoted to you and mentioned to you tonight my friend.
We read about them and they're one of those two places we're talking about and you're gonna leave this meeting tonight and. And eventually you're gonna leave this scene and. You'll leave it for one of two places.
For heaven or for hell. My friend is a real thing to be saved. Don't you let anybody whatever people talk you into or talk you out of listen. Don't you let anybody talk you out of the fact that salvation is our reality.
I'm sorry that we don't present it better as Christians. I'm sorry that we do not live it more and I mean that nevertheless, it's a tremendous thing to be saved just. Last winter. I was visiting a young boys.
I guess he would be in his 40s. Kenneth would be in his 40s now and I was visiting him in a federal penitentiary. And Kevin had gotten saved in gospel. He's that mr. John Mika, excuse me, John Procopio and I had head in Labrador.
But because of something that happened in his unconverted days. He had to pay for his crime to society. And after a number of trials he ended up in one of our federal penitentiaries in Canada used to go to visit him.
It's a delight to visit him. Only one day only one day of all the days that I would visit him. He wasn't that far from where we lived. Did he have what I would call a down day? I walked in. I thought something's happened here.
I Says Kenneth everything. All right. Wait a minute. Now. He's too. He's only two weeks from release. Two weeks from release. He says I don't know if it's so much. What has happened? But What may have happened?
It's what's that? You know, he says just bother me all days. What if the Canadian judicial system? Through his computer system has lost track of me. And nobody knows I'm here. He started to tremble as he talked to me.
Nobody knows I'm here. My dear boy raised in a Christian family all the Christians here tonight. No, you're here. And God knows you're here. You're going to a place if you die as you are tonight in your sins.
Nobody will know you're there. Nobody the memory of the just is blessed, but the name of the wicked shall rot. Never to discover you're in this book will mean never to discover you're in what the Bible calls the Lamb's Book of Life.
Best I could. I tried to assure my sis Kenneth you're not forget. I says they haven't forgotten about you. He said that's all right for you. You walk out of here. I don't. Do you understand what he said you walk out of here?
I don't. It's only coming to my mind now being Here in Iowa not far from Charles City. Mr. John Meek and I were asked to visit a young man that was in prison there. And it was a rough visit. I'll never forget it.
Local sheriff had told my nephew was here. They said fellows when they get arrested said not Charles City. Is it not Charles City? Don't take me to Charles City. It's one of those old Midwestern jails where the hallways are about.
Three feet wide no wider. Pick up an old black phone that likely somebody's spit into as you talk to one of maybe six in there in a concrete cage. That's how we talked to the person. We were visiting while we were there.
While we were there a fella saunters up to the desk. He says me and my brother we're coming in here next week, and we want to sell together. He said Me and my brother. We're coming in here next week. We want to sell together.
That sheriff leaned over the counter he said man, this is jail it's not gonna happen. Oh, he says why can't I be with my brother? It's not gonna happen sir. He walked out you know somehow. As I tell people my day I've dealt with some pretty rough Characters and some big men men that could have put me down with one hand and buried me with the other.
I Have rebuked men for their blasphemy. I Didn't like it. I rebuked them anyhow. I thought you know. Somehow I somehow my thinking maybe it was wrong. Somehow I entertained in my mind those type of men in hell blasphemy in the name of God cursing Christ My Savior that's so precious to me.
You know what I have a hard time with. I Have a hard time with a girl in hell. We have two girls. I've got some granddaughters. They're not even better than their brothers. I look at audience here tonight.
Trusting so respectfully. Come to a meeting like this. Listen attentively. I have a hard time Imagining you imagining you in hell dear girl with your long hair and not saved. I have a hard time Seeing that girl in hell.
No wonder that man in Luke 14 again. Luke's gospel so insistent that his house be filled. Why for the sake of the thing going on that if it's not filled we gotta stop. No no not at all. My friend for me it would cease to be heaven.
If I had to look at a place where my boy could have been. My girl could have been there. But she missed it. Will you be that boy or girl? Because heaven is insistent heaven is insistent tonight. God my friend is decreed.
Not that all men would be saved or they would be but heaven's gonna be filled. And so here's two men like I say one man went up. You know what he wanted. Whatever happened. He did not want to come down like he went up.
Now are you telling me tonight? You're prepared to get off this bench and go to this hall like you came in. Are you prepared to do that? Walk out into the lovely night air as if you heard nothing or Is something by God only by God getting through to you tonight said no.
No, I Justified. It's interesting the cry. Let me just give you the I don't like to spend a lot of time this man praying with himself. Do you know why likely reflects too much of my own human heart? Listen, I sat in gospel meetings.
I know where you're coming from tonight some of you. I sat in gospel meetings and there was one law in our family and it was this. You either sat with your parents or you sat ahead of them. Well, nobody we didn't sit mom and dad so we sat ahead.
And when I was growing up in fact the very night that I got and saved in the Sarnia conference there was likely 71st cousins in that meeting. 71st cousins besides all the folks from Lakeshore and that we just used to line those rows line those front rows.
Those were the days when all the Christians took their children to conferences. How we make it out. What a surprise if I told you that. Most of that 70 or 100 kids that we ran with they're all saved. Worth it.
You talk to them. But as I sat in that meeting that night my friend I Suddenly didn't know if I had anybody sitting next to me. In fact, I didn't really even care it had come to a point where I Just realized something I never realized before and it's not that I might be in hell or that possibly this could happen.
That's where I'm going. Like the prodigal he didn't say, you know, I could perish. I don't change. I'm gonna perish. He said I perish it's happening right now. Listen young man, you're well on your way.
So I was a young man came to our meetings wanted to talk to us after the meeting. Back there in Hampton. Hampton, New Brunswick. His father's a preacher of the gospel. I preached with him. I looked him in the face.
I said Luke 16 years of age. Two windows of opportunity have already slammed shut on you. I said that window from about 10 to 12 12 to 14. Boom. Boom. I said the next one will go faster. I Said man, if you don't wake up you're gonna be in hell.
How about you tonight? Think this will ever you think you'll ever be able not for the sake of being able to pass coin with other Christians. Do you think the day will ever come do you want it to come?
When you will be able to say I'm saved Christ is my Savior. I'm saved. I am not sure the language this man would have used going down, but he he knew definitely that something that happened. I have to tell people really I can't tell you how I got saved.
Okay, I can't define it any more than You can define natural birth because it was a transaction by God, but I can tell you things that Happen that surrounded it. It was simply a moment when I trusted Christ.
But you know what it used to make me feel good when we'd go back to our own little hall. Would be when somebody came in that couldn't even find Genesis in the Bible. Or maybe go a little further. Maybe I've been being a bit facetious and they couldn't find maybe Deuteronomy and I could pass my Bible over to them and they are.
I felt so good. They'd look. Oh, no, I Felt so good. I'd hope they get saved until I got saved. Then so I thought what they were supposed to get saved. I'm supposed to get saved. I May miss this thing.
I Hope I'm not speaking to anybody that misses it. But my friend I'm gonna tell you something at the reach you're going you're gonna miss it. You are not gonna make it. As I watch these two men going up in the temple I couldn't tell you which one was gonna make it which one wasn't gonna make it.
I don't know that. But I know that the the one man cried out for what he needed. You know what he says as he cries he just beats upon his smote upon his breast and he said God be merciful To me a sinner.
Pretty simple language, wasn't it? God he said be merciful to me a sinner, you know, our Bibles teach us very clear. The psalmist says mercy and truth have met together. Righteousness and peace have kissed they have embraced each other now on the basis of the law mercy and truth Were enemies.
In fact, the word that is used met together as a one word in the Hebrew and it never has anything but a hostile environment. Were these two clash together? Mercy, but here's truth. During the reign of that man Napoleon.
There's one thing he couldn't take a lot of things he could take but one thing he didn't tolerate anybody that deserted his army. There was one young fellow there and he kind of liked the kid wasn't a bad sort of a soldier but he took off once.
Napoleon did something he had never done before he said my boy. This time, okay next time. You hang. Boy, we sure there wouldn't be a next time just as you thought there wouldn't be a next time when you'd sin, didn't you?
That happened again. Napoleon had had it. He was Filled with rage infuriated that after actually doing something for him. He'd never done for others that he would actually let him off. And let him down.
And he just decreased it that young man's gonna die. That boy's mother Made her way to visit that big Emperor and He looked down at her and he says lady. The second time he has deserted this army justice demands that he must die and die he will.
And she said sir, I Didn't make this trip to beg for justice. I Made this trip to beg for mercy your honor. He said mercy. He said he doesn't deserve mercy. Oh. She says sir, if he deserved it, it wouldn't be mercy.
He's off. Understand that's what you need tonight. You need mercy and you need truth. And the preacher of the gospel can stand on any platform and tell you those two have actually come together. That they've embraced each other.
How that happened if there hadn't been Calvary that we've been hearing about head. There hadn't been that finished work. We couldn't announce it to you tonight, but only because of Calvary. Only because of Calvary.
Listen, the Bible says the law was given by Moses almost go to the law was given by Moses. But grace and truth came by Jesus Christ that beautiful. When the Lord Jesus Christ died on Calvary He assumed the totality of the judgment of God against sin.
That cup that should have been pressed To my lips forever yours to filled with the wrath of God against my sin. He spoke of such judgment as being the cup which his father had given him and he said shall I not drink it?
And I want to tell you I'm like the psalmist. I know what you come to take now. He said the psalmist said I will take the cup of salvation and call upon the name of the Lord. Before me tonight is not a cup of judgment.
It's a cup of salvation. This man went up and he cries like the man does at the end of the chapter. Here's the blind man at the end of the chapter. What's he gonna cry for? I Want my sight? Not the Lord.
Ask him Jesus thou son of David have mercy on me. Have mercy on me. Never said what that is. That's God withholding for you from you something you deserve. I'm not telling us this to make you smile, but.
There's an old mountaineer the state of Oklahoma a number of years ago. He stole a horse. He'd never been in court before in his life, but he got caught he stole a horse. He wouldn't own up to it, but he got a pretty quick lawyer.
His lawyer stood he defended his case with excellence just superb in the way defended the fellas. The old mountaineer there with his long hair and his little hat on and so Judge dismissed the case. The mountaineer he didn't really understand what is but happening.
He didn't leaned over and just caught the eye of the lawyer said no. He said mister. The judges showed you mercy. He said do I still get to keep the horse? Luke 19, you know, there's a man says If I have taken anything if I have taken anything by false accusation, I Restore him fourfold.
I Am so glad just to do whatever it costs just simply to pay back. We've seen people get saved like that Lady got saved to me. He's not not that long ago, and I met her coming down the road. I said Linda, where you been?
She had been to see my sister. I Said she's your sister. Not. Well, she's we haven't spoken for six years. And she says when I got saved that I trusted Christ. I knew what I had to do. I had to pay back.
I'm sorry. Did you or something? Yeah, she said an apology. I Said I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Some of those are hard debts to pay off. But people that have been the recipient of mercy can shot. People that have received love can show it.
Do you know what about that tonight? Ever had an experience like that. To realize that I will never have to suffer for my sins. Now you can go one of two ways tonight. You can continue on as you have it now make it clear.
You are one of these two men in the meeting tonight, even though we listen. They knew where to go give them some credit. They went to the temple other places. They could have gone. They knew where to go.
You know where to go to hear the gospel preach, don't you now? Listen, don't go out of here and say that McCandless said the only place they preach the gospel is in the gospel hall. That's not what I said.
But if you really wanted to be saved, you know where to come. Don't you did you come here for that? These men in their darkness at least they knew where they were to go. What did they do right to the temple and give them some credit, you know?
They may have known just a little bit more about praying than other people do. Not one of them dared call God their father. Just at God. That's the only relationship they had was with a Creator God, but a God that was willing to show them mercy and.
So the one man goes up and he says I thank that not as other men are and on and on he goes. But my friend just come to what the words of this this last word here. And he says God. Be merciful to me a sinner.
It's something he didn't have to ask it twice. What's what's what's the Savior tell us. I tell you that's a very strong affirmative language. I tell you this man. Went down to his house justified. Rather than the other.
How are you gonna go to your house today? Could I just maybe phrase that a little different how would you like to go to your house tonight? You see I have lived long enough to learn that you do something long enough.
You'll be good. You'll get good at it. I am looking into the faces and I'm not preaching at you. I'm preaching for you tonight. I'm looking the faces of people have heard this long enough. They can take it.
Doesn't matter what you fire their way. It's like bring it on preacher. That's fine. The company when nobody will bring it on. They'll come a day when you'll want to hear it says the prophet Isaiah. You won't hear it.
Think of this man. Nothing about his condition nothing about what he merited. See. God's truth would say punish the sinner. But God's mercy would say pardon the sinner pardon them. You see when I trusted Christ as my Savior I was talking to a man not too long ago and He was telling me that He was saved, but he had lost it or whatever.
He didn't believe a person could have eternal security. Calling him by name. I said listen. When God saved me he did not put me on probation. He pardoned me. He didn't save me and say no listen my boy.
This is it, but you look after things. You mess up. Deals off. That's not the way God works. The Bible says that he will abundantly pardon pardon him. After pardon, whatever it takes. Totally cleared.
I can't think of a better way to leave the meeting tonight. And there isn't a believer here tonight that could think of a better way for you to leave the meeting tonight. Then saved pardon. Not just so you wouldn't have to hear a preacher thump into your experience in a gospel meeting.
Maybe you're looking away at the clock and thinking three minutes to go and I'm out of here. Might be the last three minutes. You'll ever hear preached. And somebody else's keeping time, that's God. His records are unerring.
So is his timekeeping? The Bible says it's appointed unto man once to die. And after this the judgment. This man here had absolutely no fear of it. No fear of it at all. Justified since forgiven. Heaven would be his home.
Wouldn't matter what he was buried in a $28 ,000 prothenium casket. Like Michael Jackson was even though I hate to mention his name. That's what his casket cost built by the baseball casket company. Or whether they slip you into a pine box like they did Mrs. Billy Graham.
Ruth Graham that was built by the prisoners in Alabama cost 194 bucks. I'm gonna tell you something tonight. I Think I'd rather die like mrs. Graham died. How about you as they surround that open grave?
I've been there. And the Christians physically are trying to hold your mom and dad up from falling into it. The emotion and the grief is so overwhelming. See there are people in this meeting tonight that hardly know how they would live.
If something happened to you tonight. They don't know how they would live. If I lost my cousin tonight, my brother died. My granddaughter text her mother from school the other day. The school was canceled.
And a boy that she goes to high school with right where we'll hold our conference in two weeks in Sussex. Out on his motorbike. Out on his motorbike last Thursday night. Don't ask me what but something went wrong and they were burying him today.
Serious business. Would you come for I? Hardly, think you really came here to be seen. Let me ask you did you come to be saved. Shall we pray?