The Call of Christ
Notes
Transcript
Intro
Intro
Across the days of your life you may face several key moments where you are faced with a call that could change your life forever.
Perhaps it is the moment when you received an offer from your employer. Perhaps it was when someone proposed marriage to you. Perhaps it was when you received your overseas deployment papers.
Perhaps it was when you saw the watch-fires of Gondor lit, or when you heard Susan's horn, or when you met Evangelist in the City of Destruction.
Today we’re looking at a life changing call on one man’s life.
An unexpected call.
An eternal call.
And the call that this man heard is a call that is extended to each of you today. It is the call of Christ!
In these few short verses there are three aspects to this call, and we will highlight each one in turn.
Answer the Call to Follow Christ!
Answer the Call to Follow Christ!
v27-28
The first aspect of the call is shown in the first two verses. It puts us into a scene in the middle of Jesus life and ministry in ancient Judea. So this is around 30 A.D. in what is now called Israel. It is a place occupied by the Roman empire. They were allowed a certain level of freedom, but there was a roman governor and many locally garrisoned roman troops to keep the “Peace” of Rome.
As empires and governments everywhere are want-to-do, they imposed taxes to support the state.
At this time, Rome engaged local men to to be their tax officers. This meant there were many Jewish men whose job it was to collect taxes on behalf of the empire.
Considered traitors to Jews & representatives of occupying Roman force
Tended to extort people, because they had to collect taxes they had an opportunity to take extra commissions, bribes, etc.
One such tax collector was called Levi a.k.a Matthew.
The traveling preacher and healer named Jesus saw him at his work one day:
After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, “Follow me.” And leaving everything, he rose and followed him.
Notice the progression here?
1. Levi called by Jesus
2. Levi Left everything
3. Levi Followed Jesus.
Levi answered the call!
It was not as glamorous as movies might represent the moment. We would expect a great build up to this scene to put the pressure on Levi. Instead this is rather ordinary. Just one day he’s at work, on the counter, and Jesus comes along and calls him.
We don’t know the internal state of Levi’s heart, whether he had been struggling with his job and convicted about his sin. But we do know what happened when Jesus called him. He heard and he answered the call.
A similar call goes to you today: Whether you be 8 or eighty or in-between. Whether you be an infant or incontinent. Whether you be male or female, rich or poor, church-goer or fist time in church today, the call goes out to you.
Follow Jesus!
Leave behind everything.
Why follow Jesus?
What does it mean to follow Jesus?
Become a disciple - a learner of Jesus. Submit to him as your teacher and copy him.
Become a servant - submit to him as Master and serve him.
Become a soldier - obey his oders
Turn away from representing evil, and represent Christ!
What does it mean to leave everything behind?
Leave behind your former way of life.
Leave sin - including sinful relationships, sinful jobs, sinful habits
Leave anything that would get in the way of following Jesus, even willing to let go of family relationships if they reject you for Jesus sake.
Could mean Leave behind wealth.
Answer the Call to Follow Christ!
Answer the Call to Serve Christ!
Answer the Call to Serve Christ!
v29
And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them.
Levi uses his resources to serve Jesus “made him a great feast”.
Levi introduces all his friends to Jesus.
Jesus meets with the questionable characters, the outcasts and the icky.
Jesus doesn’t come for the religious snobs..
Answer the Call to Serve Christ!
Answer the Call to Repentance in Christ!
Answer the Call to Repentance in Christ!
v30-32
And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”
Offended at the kinds of people Jesus would associate with.
There was a religious element to this - don’t want to be “unclean” bu this was a misapplication of the priciple.
It is true:
Do not be deceived: “Bad company ruins good morals.”
Make no friendship with a man given to anger, nor go with a wrathful man, lest you learn his ways and entangle yourself in a snare.
However, this is not Jesus insinuating himself with a bad crew, this is a feast in his honour, given by the outcasts of society, the bad guys, the traitors, the low-brow, the corrupt.
How do you think of as the worst in society?
Perhaps you think of the traditional takers - the drug-dealers, addicts, alcoholics, dole bludgers and those who refuse to help themselves.
Perhaps you think of Muslim immigrants who want a better life, but also want to bring in muslim ideology.
Perhaps you think of politician and bureaucrats who tyranise people with endless laws and taxes.
Whoever you think are the “scum” of scoiety, imagine one of them somes to Jesus, and then he gets all his mates together to share jesus with them. This is a good thing!
We could sit back and argue about how good their theology is, or whether or not they’re using the right evangelistic technique, or worry about whether or not they’re genuine...
or...
We could join them, praise God and proclaim the name of Jesus Christ!
The outcasts are often the first to accept Jesus, because they are often the people who know they need it. They know they’re sick. And jesus came to save the sick.
He tells the indignant religious guys that He came like a doctor to the sick:
And Jesus answered them, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.”
Levi “was selected for additional reasons, that he might be an example of Christ’s undeserved goodness, and might show in his person that the calling of all of us depends, not on the merits of our own righteousness, but on his pure kindness.” (John Calvin and William Pringle, Commentary on a Harmony of the Evangelists Matthew, Mark, and Luke (Bellingham, WA: Logos Bible Software, 2010), 399).
Is anyone surprised to find sick people at the doctors surgery?
Is anyone surprised to find overweight people at the gym?
Is anyone surprised to find beat-up cars at a panel beater?
NO!
Jesus came to save sinners, so you will find him with sinners.
Yes, those who outwardly show as sinners, and those who hide their illness.
It’s not as though Jesus was saying the Pharisees and scribes were good enough. They too needed saving - their religiosity wouldn’t save them. But they would need to be humbled to repentance too.
Salvation comes by repentance.
We need to be ready to accept all sorts walking through that door, sitting around our tables, in our discipleship groups. Jesus came to save sinners, even sinners who look like it on the outside.
But unlike the liberal churches who fly rainbow flags and deceive with gentle words - we still preach a message of repentance. We meet with sinners, we love sinners, and we love them enough to say: Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.
Children - repent!
For consider your calling, brothers: not many of you were wise according to worldly standards, not many were powerful, not many were of noble birth. But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are, so that no human being might boast in the presence of God.
Answer the Call to Repentance in Christ!
So What?
So What?
Answer the Call to Follow Christ!
Answer the Call to Serve Christ!
Answer the Call to Repentance in Christ!