Facing our Dust - Luke 18:9-14

Luke previously addressed the disciples’ prayer that the Messiah might come and the seeming delay of their request. Today’s parable is told in the context of varying attitudes toward righteousness, correcting those that are errant. It is a call about how to think about the Kingdom of God in contrast to the kingdom of the world, like the one Lot’s wife attached herself to, as explained in earlier passages. Today’s text is followed by two others that consider wrong attitudes toward children and goodness. All of these fulfill Luke’s purpose for this Gospel, to steady the God-lover’s wobbly faith and, in this case, to do so by differentiating attitudes of false righteousness from the true virtue of humility.