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Let’s Jump into today’s message.

If you are new to our church today, it would be helpful for you to know that we practice a form of preaching called “Expository Preaching”.

What that means, is we believe the Bible is best taught by taking books of the Bible and then breaking them down from beginning to end, chapter by chapter, verse by verse. Our goal, to better understand not only what God’s Word says, but what it means in our lives today.

We are currently walking through the NT book of Matthew.

So as we back up to Matthews Main Theme for this section of the Story.

He is establishing Jesus’ Power as the Promised King.

He will demonstrate Jesus’ ability.

Jesus’ Ability To Heal the Body

Jesus’ Power over Creation

Jesus’ Authority over the Spirit Realm

Jesus’ Authority to Forgive Sin

Matthew bookends this Idea of Jesus’ Authority to Forgive Sin with His Salvation Story.

There is nothing better than a redemption story and Matthew has one of the best.

Matthew 9:9–13 CSB

9 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. 10 While he was reclining at the table in the house, many tax collectors and sinners came to eat with Jesus and his disciples. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” 12 Now when he heard this, he said, “It is not those who are well who need a doctor, but those who are sick. 13 Go and learn what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice. For I didn’t come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Let’s dig into this story........

Matthew is a Publican or as we call it Tax collector.

There were to types of Publicans in this time period both were bad but one was worse than the other. There was the Income Tax Publican and the Customs Official.

Matthew was the the worse of the two He was a Customs Official.

This was a job that a person would bid on and the highest bidder won the position.

They worked directly for the Roman Government and received no pay for the position.

However, they were allowed to keep anything they collected over the daily quota.

This means that the tax collector would over charge his own people in order to make himself wealthy.

If this wasn’t enough to hate the guy the Jews this position was actually a forbidden profession with in the Jewish Laws.

Once a person chose to become a Publican they were ostracized from the Jewish community and was considered the worst of sinners.

The They were forbidden to associate with other Jews and were only allowed to be in association with other Publicans and Prostitutes.

In Fact the word on Jewish commentator stated that the word used in this passage for Sinner is a euphemism for Prostitute.

We will get there in a moment but Jesus was found eating with Tax collectors and prostitutes.

The Pharisees declared that it was vitually impossible for a Publican to come to repentance.

Publicans were so poorly viewed that they could not be Judges or witnesses in the court of law. They could not even count as a second witness in an indictment.

Both Luke and Mark tell the same story except they call Matthew by the name Levi.

This is not uncommon during this time period. It is most likely that Levi was his birth name and Matthew was his Converted name.

Mattai in Hebrew means Gift of God.

This should really speak to us all when it comes to Judging who Jesus can Call

So Jesus passes by Matthews Booth probably not for the first time. Matthew has probably heard Jesus speak, Jesus has probably passed by several times.

But on this day Jesus walks up and says

“Follow Me”

This is not a question or an invitation.

The words are written in the imperative format meaning this was a command.

Jesus commanded Matthew to follow him.

Then it tells us that Matthew got up and followed Him.

Matthew 9:9 CSB

9 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.

Luke 5:27–28 CSB

27 After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at the tax office, and he said to him, “Follow me.” 28 So, leaving everything behind, he got up and began to follow him.

This mean Matthew just walked away.....He walked away from the Romans, He walked away from his position, he was walking away from his wealth.

Not only that but out of all the Disciples he had the most to lose. The fishermen could go back to fishing but Matthew was giving up everything to follow Jesus.

But with it he was leaving behind his guilt and shame. I fact he was so happy to be called that he threw a huge party.

2. Is relationship with Jesus worth enough to you to walk away from everything?

Luke 5:29 CSB

29 Then Levi hosted a grand banquet for him at his house. Now there was a large crowd of tax collectors and others who were reclining at the table with them.

Think about this for a moment Jesus is reclined at dinner with extortionists and prostitutes.

Why doesn’t this make us feel uncomfortable but the thought of doing it ourselves does?

I just can’t hang out with people like that..................

This is where the Pharisees follow him into.

So here is where we see a shift back into the investigation that we talked about last week.

A group of religious leaders had been commissioned from all over Isreal to investigate and find out if Jesus was truly the Messiah.

Last week we saw that they were in the Observation stage of the investigation and could not interact directly with Jesus or His Disciples.

Here we see that they have entered into phase two of the investigation.

This stage is call the Interrogation Stage.

From here on out we will see this group follow Jesus everywhere he goes asking questions.

Now what do you think happened when they found Jesus reclining with Tax Collectors and Prostitutes.

This wasn’t just a casual lunch at a local restaurant. This was an intimate meal up close and personal. A celebration not less.

Jesus is eating with people that were considered unclean.

It’s no wonder the Pharisees where freaking out.

They had an idea of what the Messiah’s ministry should look like.

They were the keepers of the law and outwardly were the very appearance of Holiness.

The fully expected Jesus to be a Super Pharisee and Here they find him and his 6 disciples eating with ONE OF THOSE.

3. This should resonate with some of us. When is comes to what we think Ministry should look like.

Jesus turns and answers them with three things.

Matthew 9:12 CSB

12 Now when he heard this, he said, “It is not those who are well who need a doctor, but those who are sick.

This is something that the Pharisees and Jesus can agree on.

The Pharisees are well.

The Publican is sick.

You see Jesus sees it differently than the Pharisees when it comes to the solution to the problem.

The Pharisees.

The Pharisees had concluded that God had no mercy for such people

They believed God showed mercy to those who were righteous, those who kept the Law of Moses and the oral law of the rabbis

Naturally, the Pharisees saw themselves as perfect candidates for God’s mercy, while tax collectors and prostitutes were beyond reach

Jesus Reminds them how Doctors work.

Jesus was acting like a doctor, bringing the medicine of God’s mercy to those who needed forgiveness the most

That’s why Jesus favored these sinners over the Pharisees

Jesus says He came to call the sinner to repentance, not the righteous

After all, why should God bring forgiveness to those who believed they had done nothing wrong?

I think it would be good for all of us to remember that Jesus is the Doctor and that we are all at different stages of treatment.

Some people may take longer to respond to the treatment than you did.\

The second question comes with Homework.

Matthew 9:13a (CSB)

13a Go and learn what this means: I desire mercy and not sacrifice.

Jesus is quoting Hosea 6:6

Hosea 6:6 CSB

6 For I desire faithful love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

The Pharisees believed the Lord delighted in their sacrifices,

Whether animal sacrifice in the temple, or the many personal sacrifices they made, these were the things they thought united them to God’s mercy.

They did not realize that the sacrifice was and act of atonement and restitution required for those who had sinned.

If your making sacrifices, it means you’s still a sinner.

Hosea 6:7 CSB

7 But they, like Adam, have violated the covenant; there they have betrayed me.

It is not that the sacrifice was bad.

It is that God desires faith and sacrifice. Following the rules without faith is empty.

Relationship comes out of need.

Go figure out what this means.

Matthew 9:13b (CSB)

13b For I didn’t come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

This is a confounding statement to me..........

I have heard so many people declare their righteousness in my lifetime.

What they don’t know is that they are declaring their self-righteousness.

Self-righteousness is thinking ourselves worthy of God’s approval on our own merits, conveniently forgetting how bad we truly are

It’s a self-deception that overestimates our virtues, while underestimating our faults

The Pharisees could look down their noses at tax collectors and prostitutes, because they saw themselves as righteous

They could judge others, because they saw no need to judge themselves

We know the Pharisees were not righteous, because the Bible says there are none who are righteous, no not one.

But are we much different?

Ask yourself this.

Would you have walked into that house with Jesus?

Self righteousness is seductive and you can fall into it without even knowing it.

In the beginning, we all come to Jesus repentant.

We readily acknowledge we’re a sinner in need of a Savior, the spiritually sick patient in need of a doctor to grant healing.

Then somewhere in the midst of that we start seeing ourselves as Spirit.

We stop remembering the compassion we felt when we came to Christ.

We start trusting in our own sacrifices.

The way we sacrifice time for God at church,

or our sacrifices of money

or the way we police our behavior

Then from there we start looking down our noses as those dirty sinners everywhere.

You know those who............

The question we must ask ourselves is:

Do I see the Sick as people in need of a Doctor?

Or am I like the Pharisees waiting for them to cure themselves.

Do you think people need to clean themselves up before they come to Jesus, forgetting that you came to Him a filthy sinner?

Here’s the deal.

We pass by Matthew’s everyday.

Men and women who sit by the side of the road, so to speak, living under a cloud of shame and rejection

They watch the privileged of the world passing by them every day

And they never dream that they too could be called a child of the King

If only someone would stop long enough to take note of them and call them to follow Jesus, they’re so ready to leave everything behind

The guilt, the shame, the hopelessness, the deprivation, the rejection and the pain.

They’re ready to celebrate finding purpose and hope in Jesus, and they’ll be the first to invite their friends to follow.

Remember, the Lord expects our lovingkindness to Him in this covenant we have by our faith

And lovingkindness requires we represent Christ’s interests to the world, just as Jesus did Himself

If we’re going to be useful to God in reaching sinners, then we have to be willing to rub elbows with them.

We have to remember we were once just like them

We may not have shared their lifestyle, but we were no more righteous than they were

And we certainly shared their eternal fate were it not for the grace of God

Only by His grace were we made a child of God, by the same Gospel you can bring them

Go and learn this:  Compassion is what God is asking us to demonstrate – the compassion He showed us first