The story of the Pharisee and the tax collector praying in the Temple offers us two men with opposite spiritual dispositions: one, full of pride and the other, full of remorse. But it is the caution that Jesus gives that needs our attention: "For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but the man who humbles himself will be exalted."

Lest we think that God will bring down the proud, it is more likely that their own pride will bring them down. In the Pharisee's perceived self-sufficiency, he sees prayer as a way to justify himself before God as well as to assure himself that he is still at rights with God. Being sanctimonious affords him a false security that all is, and will be, well. Come any crisis or tragedy, he will depend on his own wits because he has lost the ability to trust in God. If things fail to be better, he will blame God for abandoning him.

The tax collector has nothing to offer God; no achievements save the realization of his sinfulness. It is his genuine contrition that pleases God. He surrenders fully to God and his exaltation is one of hope in God. Such is the attitude and disposition of those inheriting the Kingdom of God. Thus, the words of Jesus are now better understood as this: "For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled by his own pride, but the man who humbles himself will be exalted by God."