Hi Frank,
 
In response to your 9/28 post at http://www.fivedoves.com/letters/sep2004/frankm928.htm publicans were also sinners just like everyone else.  However, the publicans in Roman times were also collectors of revenues and taxes, and they overcharged the people to line their own pockets.  Otherwise Jesus wouldn't have told the publican in Luke 3:12-13 to "exact no more than which is appointed to you."
 
Jesus also in Matthew 18:17 compares a unrepentant brother, who has transgressed against you, and who won't listen to you or the church, to a heathen and a publican.  So the key issue would be if the person has repented of their sins; and if they have repented, we should see the evidence in their fruits upon examination.  What a person really believes evidences itself in what they say and do, and what they say and do in their lives has to be based on what the Lord told us to do in the Bible as doers of his word.
 
As for your calling Abraham, a good guy and a publican, Galatians 3:16 tells us that "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him as righteousness."  When Christians believe God and what he has said in his word (the Bible), they repent of their sins and ask God forgiveness of their sins; and their change of heart is evident in the direction that their life takes which is a different direction than where they were heading.  The Lord becomes first place in their heart, mind, and soul.  1 John 1:9 also tells us, "If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness."  As you recall, it was the publican who humbled himself to the Lord by saying "God, be merciful to me a sinner" that was the repentant man.  The repentant man will admit the truth about his sins; the unrepentant man will not and remains unforgiven for those sins.  If a man truly repents of his sins, his life will bear fruit in his life that will glorify the Lord as a vessel of honor rather than a vessel of dishonor.
 
God bless,
Donna