As a teenager, I wrote a song about how I wanted to NOT be a Pharisee. I did not know better at the time. As an adult, I see the error in my ways. As a kid I saw a lot around me that I did not agree with, both in the church and outside of the church. I did not know how to cling to Jesus but I could be better on my own. My approach was a self-help solution to be good. I looked around and said I don’t want to be like them. Here’s the song and my reflections after.
I am Not a Pharisee Song
Verse 1:
I am not a Pharisee, I pray I’ll never be
Drawing nigh with their mouth and honoring Him with their lips but their heart is far from me
Chorus:
I pray, I’ll never, get caught up in the swing of things
That I miss the main point, I’ll stay focused on Jesus
He is the author and the finisher of our faith
He is the glory of life
Verse 2:
Not for our wants or our needs but for His cause and His kingdom
I’ll draw nigh in my heart and prove not a hypocrite
Not to be seen by men but to please the Father in Heaven
Refrain:
Lord, I will continue to evaluate my heart
Keep you first in all I do and not lose sight of the mark
Never satisfied with where I am but always moving forward
Deeper I will search the riches of your word
Believing in My Goodness Rather than in Jesus
This song is a hope and a claim that I do not want to become like a Pharisee. It is genuine and it is true. I still don’t want to be a Pharisee. But in my claim, I am missing the point of salvation and who we are without Jesus. We are all Pharisees. Even after salvation, we can believe in our goodness rather than remember who God is and who we are.
Therefore, my posture should not be one where I desire to not be a Pharisee but one that I know that I already am. And that my tendency is even still to revert to being a Pharisee even now without the continuing work of Jesus. In this awareness, with Christ as a believer I am desperate without Jesus. It is an acknowledgment that I cannot do it myself, that God must save me and is still saving me.
Today, if I rewrote this, I would write something more along the lines of I am a Pharisee and to call out to Jesus for Him to change me. This is a habitual practice in desperation for Jesus to continuing the work of aligning my identity to one that is humbly submitted to God.
This understanding of who I am in Christ is a slight difference but it means everything. It means that I am lost and in need of Jesus, not clinging to my good works as a sign of my salvation and my faith. One is freeing and points me more to Jesus and another sulks in the condemnation of sin rather than turn from it in repentance and cling to the Savior. As the old hymn says “I need thee every hour”, even now Lord Jesus.