Luk 7:38…And she began to wash His feet with her tears, and wiped them with the hair of her head; and she kissed His feet and anointed them with the fragrant oil. 39 Now when the Pharisee who had invited Him saw this, he spoke to himself, saying, “This Man, if He were a prophet, would know who and what manner of woman this is who is touching Him, for she is a sinner.”
There are circumstances that reveal the true conditions of the heart. The 36th verse reads “one of the Pharisees desired him that he would eat with him”. Did the Pharisee need to be close to Jesus or did he think it would help his reputation to have such a great guest at his table? Remember the centurion, he declared his unworthiness to have Christ’s company in his own house. Did this Pharisee imagine he was worthy of Jesus’ attention? He calls Mary a sinner but not himself. According to him, if Jesus was a true prophet, he would not let such a woman tend to Him. We always grapple with our purpose for coming to Christ. Was He worthy of our worship or did we come of our own merit? Do we think we deserved His attention or feel that we are better than others?
Simon, the Pharisee, represents the unloving and self-righteous. He represents those who are ignorant of God. Those are the people God has a heart for. They may be respectable in life but rigid in morality. He despised the woman, and now, Jesus, who received the woman. He was quick to judge others than himself. “A Pharisee is hard on others and easy on himself, but a spiritual man is easy on others and hard on himself.“, A.W. Tozer.