The Pharisee valued fasting and giving tithes, but could not find value in his fellow sinner.
God is not a tool in our hands. He does not exist to serve our goals, our metrics, or our platforms.
The gospel isn’t for the strong but people who know they aren’t.

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Preaching the inseparability of Jesus and Jerusalem is to proclaim God’s Messiah and the fulfillment of the Scriptures.
Who we are buried with matters. But there is no need to go out and find a dead prophet so you can join him six feet under.
When you are stripped down to nothing, desperate, lowly, you will again know what she knows: the crumbs are enough, Jesus is enough, for you.
The Exodus always remains a continual and present reality for the people of Israel—it is always on their mind. It was and remained the big salvific event of the Old Testament, yet at the same time it points forward to what God will yet/continue to do to save His people.
Paul puts everything he has gained by his religious life and training (verses 4-7) onto the scales opposite life with Christ and finds a real bargain.
If there were ever any doubt about God's commitment to humanity, the incarnation removed that doubt. God became a man forever. And thus he is our brother, our kinsman redeemer, the God who would move heaven and earth to save us.
Sometimes it’s important to go far away to learn of holy places back home.
In this time of brutal war and divisive conflict, here we have an especially profound word of gospel.
The thrill of God’s grace fades and the slow march toward the cross dulls the heart. At such times, the former life beckons. Temptations to return grow strong. Which makes Lent such an important annual exercise.
In our preaching it is important to decide how to understand this. Are we going to preach the “now” or the “not yet”? As the people of Israel are living in their “now,” are they hearing the words of Isaiah as the “not yet” or, the “not yet of the not yet”?
Belonging to Christ means we have a place where we fit, a resting place where we are at peace because we know our Lord accepts us as His own.
Luther recognized that in the penitential psalms, God gives us the words to cry out to Him in our distress, lament our sins, and confess trust in the promise of His righteousness in which alone is our sure and certain hope.