Latest / Beliefs, Ballots, And BullDawgs / Tuesday August 18, 2026
Transcript
- Greg: What's up, everybody, and welcome back to the latest episode of Beliefs, Ballots, and Bulldogs. Today is Tuesday, August 18th, and I'm your host, Greg Miller. ⁓ yesterday we ⁓ we tried to come at things from a little bit of a different perspective, and we ⁓ we came at the the story of Joseph as if we were able to sit down and and have coffee with him and and just ask him, you know, through all the ups and downs in Joseph's life, and even though God had promised Joseph a certain path, you know, when did Joseph really know? that hey God was working in this life and and everything that God had promised would come to fruition. Just kind of a different perspective of of a story we're all familiar with. And today we're gonna take a ⁓ we're gonna take kind of a similar approach. We're gonna we're gonna do something like that just as as a way to kind of freshen things up. Today we want to imagine we're we're sitting at a dinner table about 2,000 years ago. ⁓ the host is a respected religious leader and the guest of honor is is Jesus himself. Everything is going pretty much as expected until someone walks in the room. Nobody invited her, but everybody knows her. And suddenly this becomes one of the most uncomfortable dinner parties in the entire Bible. But here's what I want to watch for today. We're not going to make the story directly about the woman and her behaviors. Don't watch her. Watch Jesus and more importantly, watch Simon. I think there's something hiding in this story that maybe some of us have missed. We're in Luke chapter seven. Verse 36 says, one of the Pharisees asked Jesus to eat with him, and he went to the Pharisee's house and reclined at the table. The Pharisee's name is Simon, and the fact that he invited Jesus over for dinner is interesting. I don't know if he was curious or if he was skeptical. Maybe he's just trying to figure things out. Luke doesn't tell us exactly why here, but Jesus accepts the invitation. And remember now they're not sitting around a modern dining room table like we do. People reclined around a low table, feet extended. You know, keep that picture in mind. Suddenly, someone enters the room. Luke tells us a woman in the town who was a sinner found out that Jesus was reclining at the Pharisee's house. That's how Luke introduces her to us. No name, just a reputation. But apparently everybody in town knows who this is and knows her story. And and she knows that they know. She is aware that she has that reputation. Think about the courage it took for this woman to simply walk through that door and risk the judgment. ⁓ she bring the and Luke tells us she brings an alabaster jar of perfume and she approaches Jesus. It says she approaches Jesus from behind, and then she begins to cry, and not just a couple of tears, enough that Luke tells us in in the gospel that it began wetting Jesus' feet. She lets her hair down and then wipes his feet with with her tears, essentially. She kisses them, then pours the perfume on them. Imagine being Simon. Imagine being everybody else in that room. Nobody in that time would know what to say. You could you could almost just imagine the awkward silence. And Luke lets us hear what Simon is thinking. ⁓ verse 39 tells us: But when the Pharisee who had invited him saw this, he said to himself, If this man were a prophet, he would know who is touching him and what kind of woman she is, that she is a sinner. Don't miss this. Now, Simon doesn't say this out loud. He thinks it. And if Simon's conclusion, it seems perfectly logical to him. That's how things were back then. If Jesus really knew who this was, he would not let her near him. Simon thinks he knows something here that Jesus doesn't know. But Jesus as always knows exactly who she is. And apparently, Jesus also knows exactly what Simon is thinking. Word of note here. He always knows what all of us are thinking. His next words here are to Simon Agrace. He says, Simon, I have something to tell you. Whenever Jesus says that you might want to buckle up. Jesus tells him a tiny little story here. Two people owe the same lender. One owes 500 denari, and the other owes 50. One debt is ten times larger than the other here. And then Jesus says something incredibly important. Neither could pay. So the lender forgives both debts. And then Jesus asks Simon, now which of them will love him more? Simon answers, as I think most of us would. I I suppose the one who had the bigger debt forgiven. And Jesus tells him, Yes, you have judged correctly. Simon walked directly into it because the story here is never really about money. It's about all the people sitting in that room. Luke records a fascinating detail. Jesus turns towards the woman, but he speaks to Simon and he asks, Do you see this woman? I mean, the whole everybody sees the woman. The whole place is staring at the woman. The whole engagement here has been about the woman. Kind of a strange question. He'd literally been staring at her the entire time. He saw her walk in, he saw her crying, he saw her. Touching Jesus. He saw her reputation. He saw all of the sins she had committed. He saw her past. But apparently he never actually saw her. And I think that's the question Jesus is really asking here. He says, Simon, do you see a person or do you only see a sinner? And this is where things get a little uncomfortable. And Jesus says here, I entered your house. You gave me no water for my feet, but she has wet my feet with her tears and wiped them with her hair. And then he says, You gave me no kiss, but from the time I came in, she has not stopped kissing my feet. And he goes on to say, You did not put oil on my hair, she has poured oil perfume on my feet. You see what Jesus is doing here. Simon invited Jesus to his house, but this woman is the one that welcomed him. Simon had the respectable reputation amongst town. She had a scandal, scandalous reputation amongst for everybody. Simon knew all of the religious customs and traits. She knew she needed mercy. And suddenly we we begin to see it all come together here in this story. But maybe the person we're supposed to be worried about in this story isn't the woman, isn't the known sinner, isn't the one with the bad reputation. Maybe the person we're supposed to be worried about in this story is, in fact, Simon. The woman's brokenness was obvious. Everybody knew about it. But Simon had a different kind. His brokenness was hidden behind his respectability. It was hidden behind his religion, the reputation, the good behavior. And boy, let me tell you, that is dangerous. The woman walked into that room, knowing desperately that she needed grace. I'm not sure that Simon realized that he did. Remember Jesus' story? There were two debtors here. One owed more, one owed less. But the one thing they had in common was neither could pay. And that's us. Look, some of us have messier stories than others. Some of us have sins that have become public. Others of us have sins that are easier to hide. But none of us walk into the presence of a holy God and says, Hey, don't worry, I've got it covered. We all need grace. And look, man, let me tell you, we're we're all good at being Simon. We know everybody's business. Social media these days makes absolutely sure of that. We know if somebody's going through a divorce, we know about everybody's addictions, arrest, bankruptcy. Political opinions can't be kept quiet. Any scandal in the neighborhood, the worst quote, the worst decision. Sometimes we learn somebody's worst moments before we've ever even shaken their hand and met them face to face. And then sometimes we're inclined to do exactly what Simon did. We take one piece of somebody's story and we decide that that's who they are. And look, I'm not saying that sins don't matter. Jesus never said that. I'm saying something different. I'm saying a person's sin. Is never the only thing that God sees when He looks at them. So maybe Jesus' question here in this story belongs to us too. Do you see this person or do you only see what they've done? Is something I remind myself of. You know, you be careful looking down on somebody just because their sin looks different than yours does. It's easy to condemn sins that you've never struggled yourself with. It's easy to feel morally superior when someone else's failures are more visible than yours. But Jesus, you know, Jesus' story destroys that illusion. 550 different debts, same problem. Neither could pay, and they both needed forgiveness. That's the gospel. But we don't come to Jesus because we have successfully cleaned ourselves up. We come to him because we can't clean ourselves up. We don't negotiate our debt. He paid it for us. And that's why grace is supposed to change people. Jesus eventually tells the woman, your faith has saved you. Go in peace. Think about how she entered that house. Everyone knew her past. She probably could feel every eyeball in the room on her. But she walked out having heard something infinitely more important to her than what that room and the people in it thought about her. She heard what Jesus said about her. She was saved. She was forgiven. Go in peace. And that's great. So today I don't want to ask you whether you've ever been the woman in the story. We all have. I want to ask something harder. Have you ever been Simon? Have you ever known enough about someone's mistakes that you stopped seeing them as a full person? Have you ever secretly thanked God that your sins weren't quite as ugly or public as somebody else's? Have you ever been close enough to Jesus to invite him into the house while forgetting how badly you still needed his grace? That's the uncomfortable truth that we all must face. The woman walked into that room knowing she needed forgiveness. Simon may have walked away still believing that he didn't. And maybe that's the person in the story that we're supposed to pay attention and worry about. So today, look, before you reduce somebody down to their worst moment. Remember that dinner table. Remember the woman. Remember Simon. And and hear what Jesus asked. Do you see this person? Every one of us is carrying a debt we could never pay. And every one of us needs the same savior. That's it. Have a great day. And as always, give your Bible, say your prayers, love one another and tell the truth. God bless.