The Calling of Matthew (and you)
Matthew 9:9-13, NIV - As Jesus went
on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth.
“Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s
house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples.
When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher
eat with tax collectors and sinners? On
hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the
sick. But go and learn what this means:
‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but
sinners.”
One
of the most effective pastors I know was a drug dealer before he became a
Christian. God has used his ministry to
reach hundreds of folks who have had similar experiences. Another man I knew years ago had served time
in prison for violent crimes and before becoming a Christian while incarcerated. He began a ministry upon getting out of
prison that continues now long after his death. They help inmates and recently
released convicts find a path to a better life. And for the last two months, we
have been working our way through a gospel in the Bible written by a man who
exploited his fellow Jews to get rich collecting taxes for the Romans. It is more than a little curious to see who
God will choose to serve in his kingdom and yet, it is deceptively simple. God will choose anyone. God chose me and God chooses you.
When
asked why he ate with “tax collectors and sinners,” he quotes Hosea 6:6 in his answer: “I
desire mercy, not sacrifice.” We may
miss Jesus’s edgy intent here, but the Pharisees would not have missed it. The prophet Hosea was calling out his people
for observing proper sacrificial rituals, but conducting them without the heart
of love of God and neighbor that was supposed to be the reason behind those
rituals. Jesus, in quoting the prophet,
was accusing the Pharisees of doing the same.
The Jews were a people that were set apart by God beginning with Abraham
in Genesis 12. But they has long
forgotten that they were set apart so that “all peoples on earth will be
blessed through [them]” (Genesis 12:3). They
got the “set apart” part right, but they were not seeking to bless those who
needed it the most.
Matthew
wants to remind us that it is very easy for us to make the same mistake. We can deem others (or even ourselves)
unworthy of God’s blessing and isolate them from the community of believers. In my lifetime, I’ve personally seen this
happen to divorced people, unwed mothers, people of other faith backgrounds,
and many other would-be “tax collectors and sinners.” Ironically, the very Gospel quoted to
legitimize such exclusion was written by a reprehensible tax collector. When we do this, we forget two essential
truths: (1) we are “sinners” and (2) God
and God’s people sought to bless us anyway. There is no category or label we can put on
someone that, in God’s eyes, excludes them from a place at the Lord’s dinner
table. Think of the most disgusting,
repugnant person you know. Seriously,
conjure up that person in your mind and then picture this – Jesus having dinner
with them. Because I assure you - Jesus would do just that. As soon as we begin to think that we deserve
a place at Jesus’s dinner table, we have, at the same time, begun to presume
that there are people that don’t deserve it.
This is
not Jesus-like thinking/acting. When we
catch ourselves thinking/acting like that, we are already on the right
track. It’s people who don’t ever
consider that their exclusionary thinking/acting is exclusionary that are
departing from Jesus’s ways. Awareness
of what’s not like Jesus in us actually makes more space for Jesus in us. As the old saying goes, recognition that there
is a problem is the beginning of a solution.
Question: Do you ever catch yourself thinking you are
more “deserving” of blessings than others?
Prayer: Lord Jesus, help us see our desperate need for
Your mercy. And then, help us to see
others’ desperate need for the same and offer it to them. Amen.
Prayer Focus: Pray for God to help you see un-Jesus-like
patterns of thought in you.
Song:
Jesus, Friend of Sinners – Casting Crowns
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