detestable values

Sometimes I want to protest when I read scripture. Sometimes the reality of the immense gulf between God and people is just too much. 

I had that reaction again this morning, reading from Luke 16. Jesus has just made his well-known statement that you cannot serve both God and money, and then this, in verses 14 and 15: "The Pharisees, who loved money, heard all this and were sneering at Jesus. He said to them, 'You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts. What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight.'"

What people value highly is detestable in God's sight. Really? Is that true? I accept that it must be, because I accept the infallibility of scripture, but I don't like it. I value my family, my church, the quiet community I live in. What's so bad about that?

I want to think that God only detests what the Pharisee valued, but that's not how the verse reads. Jesus seems to be moving from the specific example of the Pharisees' love for money to a general truth about humankind. So what does this mean?

It may be that the problem with human values, with my values, is that they are so self-centered. Even my most pure love, that for my wife and children, is tainted by my own desires for those relationships. I tend to value church and community because of the ways they enhance my own life. And of course there are all those other loves, of money and leisure and too much food and drink, that too easily become something unhealthy. 

All of that is another way of saying it's human nature to value one's own interests most highly. I can see why God would detest that. That's the opposite of what I'm called to. I should value service to others, the blood of the martyrs, the souls of the unsaved, the wellbeing of the widows and orphans. I should value truth and justice. All these things should mean far more to me than myself. 

Jesus said another thing in these verses: "You are the ones who justify yourselves in the eyes of others, but God knows your hearts." God knows all my tainted motives. 

In then end, it makes me once again so grateful for the blood-price Jesus paid for me. Without him, there is no way I could ever be anything but detestable in God's sight. But when God looks at me, he sees Jesus' righteousness imputed to me - what an amazing act of love!