Transcription
Good morning. It's good to be in the house of the Lord. Amen. Amen. Turn with me in your Bibles to Matthew chapter 9.
Now, if you've been following along, going through our series, "The 12," you might have noticed there is a schedule for this. So, anyone has a guess of who today's sermon is about? It's in the title: Matthew. Finally, we're our way down; we're getting closer and closer through the 12 to being done. We have a few more of these disciples left, but we come to Matthew, and I am excited to preach on this disciple. And I think it'll be an interesting story for us to read, and I think there's some themes that we'll notice that you might have noticed that say, "Hey, I feel like we've talked about this a little bit before." And you're right, because there's some themes that just kind of tie each other in to the rest of these disciples. But Matthew chapter 9, we're going to read verses 9 through 13:
As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, "Follow me." And he got up and followed him. And while he was reclining at the table in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came to eat with Jesus and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" Now, when he had heard this, he said, "It is not those who are well who need a doctor, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice, for I did not come to call the righteous but sinners." All right, so let's break this part and start diving on in.
So, Matthew is one of the few disciples who has written in, uh, has a recording written in the scriptures. So, obviously, the Gospel of Matthew is accredited to Matthew. Um, the only other disciples we really see, right, are John and Peter. And what we, um, in the other, in the other additions of this, or not additions, the other tellings of this story throughout the other gospels, he's often referred to as Levi. Um, so once again, as we kind of studied these disciples, we noticed they all have various names or nicknames or whatever. Matthew's other name is Levi. So, in, if you read the other parallels of this in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, you see him called Levi.
Um, when we think of the scandalist disciples, the disciple who has like a a red letter written on them, where we think of this kind of the disciple kind of on the outs, we always think of Judas in our mind. I'm not, I'm going to save our more longer conversation for Judas when we get to his sermon. But when we, as modern Christians, think of the the disciple who's got a mark on his name, we all think of Judas because we know what happens at the end of the story. But if you were amongst the disciples for those three and a half years, if you were thinking and guessing who was probably the disciple that would betray Jesus, the one who was scandalous and had issues with it, wouldn't have been Judas; it would have been Matthew. Matthew was a tax collector.
Now, for us, we none of us love taxes. It's tax season. I know it's the only time of year I enjoy, because with all those little dependents running around a home, is the only time of year I ever have money. But for most of us, taxes are an inconvenience and an annoyance, and sometimes even, um, a sense of anxiety. But we, I never go up to the the the town tax collector, and I have, I don't have them on a a dart board in my house, just throwing little darts at them, or, you know, writing hate mail to them or something like that, like to them. They're a civil servant that I really don't enjoy, but I don't have any personal hatred or anger towards. But that is not the case for tax collectors here in the in the the first century here in Jerusalem. When you were a tax collector, especially a Jewish tax collector, you were telling your people that you were willingly choosing to side for the enemy opposition. You know, in, you got to remember, in the Jewish mentality, Rome wasn't just like, "Ah, we got a democrat in office this year; that's annoying." That wasn't the same; that wasn't their thing, like, "Ah, Rome's in office this year." No, they were a persecuted, captivated, uh, captivated people who considered themselves enslaved and in bondage, and they were, they had an oppressive government over them. They were not just like, "Ah, shucks, Rome got into office this year." It's, they hated Rome.
Um, something we don't see in Biblical history, but we know in in in history, um, there's the maban wars, and there's a whole U rebuttal in fighting against this oppressive government over them ever since, um, Israel and J, uh, Judah were taken by Syria and Babylon, and then eventually Persia and Greece. We have seen God's people constantly wrestling with oppressive governments over them as they've been, uh, cast out, and the Kingdom of Israel was, you know, taken off the map for a little bit. Um, so they're, they're rejecting, and they're fighting against this culture. So, they hate Rome. Um, and then if you're a tax collector, you're not just like applying for a regular job on Indeed. This is you saying, as a Jewish person, "I don't care about my people and my culture, and that we're being oppressed, and what I'm, I'm going to go willingly side with the government and the people who are oppressing us, consider dogs and disgusting and abuse us and take and, uh, do it for money." So, in Jewish Society, if you were a tax collector, you were worse than human garbage, because you were a traitor to your people; you were selling out for for the dollar bill. I mean, at least Romans were born Romans; you willingly sold out your people, and you are now harassing them for money. So, if we were looking at disciples who would have had a black mark on their name in those three and a half years, years of Christ's earthly ministry, no one probably batted an eye at Judas. In fact, they gave him the job of Keeper of the purse; they gave him the money. Um, but Matthew would have been, if you were all looking at the disciples and like, "Man, that's the scandalous one," it would have been Matthew.
Now, um, I kind of, it kind of comes up as we've talked about the series, the television show, "The Chosen," and it's because I love how they present the possible interactions in the real world between these humans and what it would have been like following Christ. See, we kind of Sunday school-ify people in the Bible, you know. We, we, we've known their stories so often that they're just, you know, they're, they're people on a page, and we forget they were as flesh and blood as we are, encountering Christ in the flesh and being called to all of this firsthand. And the little pieces of history and notes we see through the the verses of scripture, sometimes we gloss over them, and we get the Sunday School-ified picture, and we forget these are real men and women following Christ and having real interactions. There would have been real dynamics. If you think modern-day church drama is intense, Sun, uh, Cindy brought the wrong potluck supper meal, or he wanted to paint the door red; how dare you! Like, we think that's dramatic. Imagine back then, um, there was drama and entanglements and frustrations as well, and that would have been the day they called Matthew. Must have been as scandalous and shocking to the disciples as it was to everyone else. But Matthew, obviously, as we know that he wrote the Gospel of Matthew, is going to become a vibrant follower of Christ. But that would have been a very shocking day.
Now, so here, let's, let's, let's pull this scripture apart. So, as Jesus went from there, he saw the man, a man named Matthew. He saw a man. Now, I said some of these would seem to kind of connect to some of our other sermons in this series, and this reminds me immediately of our Nathaniel sermon, of when, um, we talked about the story in Genesis 16:13, of one of my favorite names for God, El Roy, the God who sees me. I love that story, and it was the whole theme of our Nathaniel sermon. But here's kind of a point when he meets Matthew, that same interaction happens. He saw Matthew; he sees him, and he sees us as well. And here's the thing: Matthew was sitting at the tax booth. He saw Matthew sitting literally in his sins, and he still says, "Follow me." Jesus sees us; he sees us where we're at, and he confronts us where we are, and he brings us to where we need to be. If you're, if you're going to take a sentence from today's sermon, that's the line: He meets us where we are, and he brings us to where we need to be, and that's himself. But he sees Matthew; he sees him sitting in his sin, sitting at the tax collector's booth. He, he doesn't just scream to the, uh, to the courtyard; he doesn't just scream to the marketplace, "If anyone would like to follow me now would be the time; I have open auditions." He doesn't say; he looks at Matthew; he sees him, and he says, "Follow me." It was a direct invitation; it was a personal invitation, and it was a specific invitation. He, he immediately talks to Matthew; it's personal. The kind of some of the themes we've been talking about for the last couple sermons is that our salvation, our relationship with God is a personal relationship; it's a personal invitation. He looks at you; you are not some generic person he loves; he loves you personally. And that's when he says, "I saw Matthew." He sees you, too. We talked about that last week about how he'll leave the 99 to find the one, and you were the one. God knows you; he sees you. That's why his name, Elroy, the God who sees me, is so beautiful. But that, so it's a personal invitation, and it's direct. He doesn't just say, "Hey, Matthew, when you're done doing what you're doing, come find me at my address, and we, we'll, we'll figure out your discipleship plan." It's direct: "Follow me." Short, sweet, and to the point. The salvation message, gospel message, is not a complicated, uh, thing where you have to, "Hey, I have to go get my doctorate to figure out the invitations of the Gospel." It is simple: "Follow me; believe in me; call on me." It's always simple when it's described; um, it's easy enough for a child to understand. So, it is personal; it's direct, and it's specific. It's not, "Come and go; do this," or, "Hey, you know, if, if you want to follow me, here's some ways you can do it." It's, "Come, follow me." It is a specific path. We learn, uh, read earlier in this sermon series, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." This idea that we have, especially in modern times in Western culture, that all paths lead to to heaven, and if, if your way is as good as my way, and as, as long as we're all kind of good and put positive vibes into the atmosphere, it's all great. It's not what the gospel is. The gospel shows you the way, the truth, the life. So, it's, it's a specific message. He doesn't give Matthew, "Hey, whatever will work; it's fine." He tells them the specific way: "Come, follow me." And then he rose, and he followed him. The beginning of Matthew's relationship with Jesus did not start until he got up and he followed him. You can't sit still, sit in your sin, stay where you are, and have a relationship with Christ. We talked about this a lot last week with Thomas. For all of us to have a faith journey, it had to begin with us being, at some point, a doubting Thomas. Our relationship at one point began with us not believing and then believing. The gospel message is that we can't have a savior until we admit and acknowledge we need to be saved. You cannot go to Christ and say, "I, I'm pretty good; I'm all set; I kind of got it figured out, but I'll, I'll walk with you. I, I like some of what you're selling here, but I don't, I don't really need you; I'll figure it out myself." That's not the gospel story; that's not the truth of our reality that we are sinners, and sin deserves punishment, and we are in desperate need of a rescuer. You can't come to Christ and say, "I'm good; I'll figure it out myself," when the, when Jesus was on the cross, and there was the two men on his side, one is laughing at him, saying, "Hey, if you're the Christ, save yourself," and then the other man says, "Why do you mock him? We are here because we deserve it, but he is innocent. Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom." And Jesus has answered to him, "Love, like today, you will be with me in Paradise." The difference between those two men at the cross was one could acknowledge that he was in need of a savior, and the other couldn't bring himself to even admit his guilt and his sin. Matthew could not have started his relationship and his walk with Christ if he sat still at the tax booth. You and I could not have begun our relationship with Christ if we stayed where we were and said, "No, you know, Jesus, I hear what you're offering; I'm glad you love me; that's really sweet, but I'm okay right here; we'll figure it out; I, I, I got this." That's not like, you can't; it doesn't work that way. You can't be rescued until you admit you need the rescuing. The firefighter comes, and you're still sitting in the burning building; given that scenario, probably chuck you over the shoulder, but you can't be rescued until you admit you need rescuing. That's how faith walks begin, and that's what we're going to see is the theme of Matthew.
So, he goes on, and this is in, um, verses 10-11, as, as I love to chunk up my sermons, I always love to give them little titles for each point. So, the first points, uh, "Tax booths, dinner parties, and doctor's visits," is how we're chunking it up. So, if you like to take notes, we're, we're, we're going to a dinner party. So, in verses 10 through 11, it says this: While he was reclining at the table in the house, in the other renditions of this encounter, it, it specifies that it's Matthew's house. So, Matthew brings him to his house for a dinner party. And while he was reclining at the table in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came to eat with Jesus and his disciples. And when the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?" There is a very real issue, and I, I don't want to say it's specific to today, but I know it comes up very much today. I think it's something that's been an issue for all of faith time is this issue of the love of Christ meaning license or the struggle with loving a Christ in legality. So, here's what I mean by that: If you watched the Super Bowl, you might have known the Hot Topic commercial that every Christian under the sun and every church under the sun had had a comment about the next day, and that was this, this Super Bowl commercial that was emphasizing about Jesus washing the feet, and there's all of these very beautiful pictures, and I won't say that everything about the pictures weren't stunning, um, but the overall message people had a very strong reaction to, one way or the other, because you see all of these interactions between what you think are polar opposites of people and washing each other's feet, and the overall thought at the very end is, you know, "Jesus is love; he washes; he washed the feet of sinners; we should be loving people just like," and there was this real backlash after this commercial from both sides, one extremely excited about it and the other very upset about it. And, and this is the kind of conversation we're seeing here with Matthew having a dinner party with Jesus, Jesus and all of these other tax collectors and sinners, and the Pharisees walk in and they see this and they say, "How come your master eats with tax collectors and sinners?" And there is this constant pull today about the love of God, and does that just give license to doing whatever you want? "Hey, God is love, so judge not lest you be judged; don't judge me; don't, don't tell me what I'm doing is wrong; you know, God is love, so if you're telling people that they're sinning and that they're doing something wrong and that they need to be, you're being judgmental and awful, and love just lets everyone in." And we see those churches as we drive down the street, especially here in New England, and waving lots of flags and etc., etc., and there's this conversation of, "Jesus is love, man; we just got to love people; we can't judge them; we just want to share the love of God with them." And it's great to want to share the love of God with people, but love and license are not the same thing, and that's, that's the struggle, that overused quoting of the scripture, "Judge not lest you be judged," people wave it as a flag of, "Hey, you can't tell me what I'm doing is wrong; don't judge me; go only God's my judge, and he's all about love, man," and that is not the message we're seeing in scripture. God's love is not licensed for doing whatever you want, and yet so many people have wound up in the, in the, in the the license side: "Hey, we want to share the love of Jesus; that means you can't tell people what they're doing is wrong; that means you can't confront people with their sin; that means you can't tell them that we live in a, in a very church age where we can't have church discipline, where we can't have confront people about their lifestyles, because, hey, God is love, man," and that is not the truth of love. Jesus confronts Matthew where he is; he is direct; he is sitting in sin; he directly says, "Hey, follow me." It's direct, but he still met him where he was; he still goes home with him. So then, there comes the flip-side conversation of, if you, if you reside and you, and you dine with these tax collectors and sinners, aren't you, aren't you affirming what they're doing? And that becomes a very big struggle for, for many Christians as well. If, if I show love and kind and compassion and interaction or, or even, um, fellowship with people who are living in sin, it might not just affirming what they're doing, and that becomes the bigger discussion, especially we talked about it a couple, uh, Sundays ago in Sunday school about the conversation of the LGBTQ, um, movement and all these things, is it's something we interact with on a daily basis, and we will have to continue to interact with it, and there's that constant pull of, "Man, if, if I do this, am I not just affirming and saying it's okay? I, I don't want to do that." So then, you shun them, or you, or you, we put up our signs and our Facebook messages and things like that, and it's this balance of, you know, Jesus had to talk to the Pharisees who were like, "How dare you sit with these people? You're, you're affirming what they're doing." Jesus, and Jesus over the scriptures calls them whitewashed tombs who care about what's on the outside but not what's on the inside. Um, he confronts them about, um, what is better to do on the Sabbath, to do good or to do evil, to save a life or to let someone die. He, he constantly confronts the legalism that is entrapped these Pharisees about who are more concerned with the letter of the law than the heart of the law; more concerned with, um, doing exactly every little doente te but completely missing the mark of the Gospel, completely missing the mark of the message of God's love. So, there's this back-and-forth pull: Do, does the love of Christ, do, do we show all that love, and we don't ever confront people, or do we, are we trying to stand close to the truth of God's word, and we, we're struggling with, if we sit in their presence, are we affirming what they're doing? Are we saying it's okay? And we see both of these groups; we see them all over in church, in TV, and Facebook, and just driving down the street. We've been burned by some of it, um, for in our personal lives of that legalistic culture or even that licensed culture, and it's hard. But the love of God, like I said, when he calls Matthew, it's direct; it's personal, but it doesn't neglect sin. When Jesus calls out sin, he meets them where they are, but he brings them where they need to be, and that's himself. He, he doesn't ignore sin. When he meets the woman at the well, he meets her; he meets her; he doesn't shun her; doesn't cast you out, "Oh, you vile sinful woman, uh, get away from me; I'm a holy man." He meets her; he talks with her, and first that shocks her and breaks down barriers, and he said, "Hey, go get your husband." "Well, I'm not married." "Well, you're right; you're not married; you, you're, you're on your fifth one, and he's not your husband." He acknowledges her sin; he doesn't affirm it; he confronts it head-on, but he still meets her with love. When he meets the woman who's caught in adultery, and they, they use it as a test to catch Jesus in this very conversation, and they throw him at his feet and said, "This woman was caught in adultery; says he's without sin, cast the first stone," and they trickle and fade away, and he looks at her and says, "Woman, is no one here to condemn you? And then go and sin no more." He's direct, because love is direct, but because it's love, it also confronts. If it wasn't love, it would let you sit in sin and die, but it is love; it is kind, and he, he's direct, and he addresses the issue, but he's still gentle and kind and personable with it, and that's what we have to see, um, in this conversation of loving isn't license, and love doesn't, like, you lead to legalism; it's sin, uh, God, the love of God meets you where you're at and brings it to where you need to be in that.
So, he goes on, and he says, um, and this is in verses 12 and 13: Now, when he heard this, he said, "It is not those who are well who need a doctor, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice, for I did not come to call the righteous but sinners." Those who are well don't need a doctor, but the sick do. I told you earlier that we've got to be talking about this as we, we dive in, but a, a doctor can't heal those who don't first come and admit they are sick; who don't admit and consent to treatment. Christ can't save those who won't admit and confess they are in need of a savior. The people who live in self-righteousness and say, "You know, I'm, I'm fine; I'm doing great; I don't need that," how can he cure them? How can he save them when they can't even admit they are in need of a savior? "I desire mercy and not sacrifice." Talked about that legalism versus license and all those things in between. Jesus does love the word of God; he is the word of God. So, I'm not saying that, you know, we're going to ignore scripture, but we also get to the heart of scripture, not just the letter of the law. So, when he says, um, "I desire mercy, not sacrifice," you see stories of the scripture like Samuel and PSAL. There's a story of the prophet Samuel who was late in coming to a meeting between him and King Saul before they were going to go off to war, and Saul wanted to have a sacrifice before they went off to battle, because that's what they were supposed to do, and he still had no Samuel. So, he said, "Well, I'm, I'll make the sacrifice, and then I will have appeased that need," and he has the sacrifice, and just as he gives the sacrifice, Samuel appears on the scene. He says, "You doing?" He's like, "Well, you were late," and Samuel says, "Does he desire sacrifice over obedience? Does he desire lambs over, uh, over obedience?" What kind, what God wants wasn't the letter of the law, but the heart behind it, which is obedience and faithfulness. And it's the same thing here with, as he's talking to tax collectors and sinners and these Pharisees, he's like, "You guys, you guys are all entangled and stressed about the letter of the law, but you completely neglecting the heart of the law, which is follow me, love me, uh, submit yourselves to me." But he says, "I, um, I desire mercy, not sacrifice." He wants obedience, not just the letter of the law. You know, the letter of the law can get difficult sometimes, and we have people entangled up and, and weighed by that, but he wants us for the heart of the law as well. All right, and he goes, "For I care not to call, I, for I came not to call the righteous but sinners." And like I said, you can't, the Savior can't save those who don't acknowledge the need of a savior. You have to have the, you have to first know you are a sinner to be saved. The doctor came to heal the sick; you can't get healed if you don't first admit and know you need of that sickness being healed, that savior coming into your life. So, the story of Matthew is the gospel story. He meets you where you are, in your sin, in where, in everything. He knows all of you. We've read in first, uh, Psalm 139 last week about that we are wonderfully formed in our mother's womb, that he knows us, that we, we can't escape from God, from the highest depths of Heaven, um, highest heights of Heaven, the lowest depths of hell, that he knows our thoughts and our desires, that he knows us so impeccably, and he knows where we are. He meets us where we are, but he doesn't leave us where we are; he brings us to himself. And that is the gospel story is that Christ met us, and he brings us to himself. But we first need to admit, just like the sinners on the, the man on the cross, we need to confess our need for saving, so he can save us. He can't save us unless we're first confess that we need to be saved. So, that is the story of Matthew. Let's pray.
Heav, God, Father, I just thank you for this morning, and I just thank you that you meet us where we are, but you don't leave us there; you bring us unto yourself. I pray, Lord, that we would just remember that we are in need of you, that we wouldn't try to be self-sufficient, self-righteous in our own strength, Lord, but that we would wholly and completely trust in you, and we know that you see us where we are and you bring us to where we need to be. Thank you, Lord, for your love. It's in your Son's name I pray. Amen. Amen.