S - Gospel of Mark Pt. 8 (Mark 2: 13-17)M
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13 Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them.
14 As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.
15 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him.
16 When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Why was the book of Mark written?
To prove that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, who suffered, died, and rose again as Lord.
What was Jesus’ plan?
His plan is to save the world from its sin through His death and resurrection.
Do you guys know what a tax collector is? Many of you guys don’t think much about one if you don’t pay taxes. But I pay taxes and I’m gonna be honest for a second, I DO NOT LIKE PAYING TAXES!! I feel like it’s so much money. And right we are in tax season so my wife and I were looking at how much we paid in taxes this year I was getting so mad. It was so much money that was taken out of my paycheck! Now imagine you live in Jesus time. And you get paid 150 bucks a week. And you had to pay your taxes. Now you know the amount of taxes you have to pay. Let’s say that where you live you had to pay $25 bucks out of your 150. That’s not too bad right? But when you went to pay, the Tax collector, someone who is your neighbor, says: You owe 50 bucks, and if you don’t pay you have to go to jail.
That’s frustrating right? But that’s not why people hated tax collectors, people hated tax collectors because the tax collector would charge extra so that they could keep the extra money. How would you feel after you found that out? I would be angry, especially when I found out that person is my neighbor.
Well, that is the person Jesus calls to be his follower. Let’s read together and then we’ll pray:
13 Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them.
14 As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.
15 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him.
16 When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Man, we’ve seen Jesus call a couple of different guys to follow Him right? he’s called Simon, Andrew, James, John and now He’s calling this dude Levi. Levi is his Greek name, maybe you guys know him by his Jewish name: Matthew. For today whenever I say Matthew: I mean Levi. But Let’s read what happens before that:
13 Once again Jesus went out beside the lake. A large crowd came to him, and he began to teach them.
14 As he walked along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” Jesus told him, and Levi got up and followed him.
Jesus is doing what He loves: Teaching. He was sharing the Gospel with people and I love the first 2 words Mark uses: Once again. Like, take a look at Jesus, there He goes again, doing the same thing over and over. Teaching people. Once again, a large crowd came to Jesus and He began to teach them. Later on Jesus is walking and verse 14 happens:
Jesus is walking along and He calls Levi, or Matthew, to follow Him. Can you believe that? In the eyes of a Jewish person Tax collectors were worse than murderers. Tax collectors weren’t allowed to come to church! They were the worst kind of people. And Jesus looks at Levi and says: follow me.
How do you think the other disciples felt in that moment? How do you think the people around Jesus responded? I can’t imagine the uproar. People must have thought Jesus was crazy. I want to show you a video of what it could have looked like: Show the Chosen Video.
Jesus Asked Levi, Matthew to follow Him. And Matthew just does it right? I wonder how many times did Jesus call on me to follow Him before I did? But I also wants us to recognize that Matthew was rich, and for him following Jesus meant to leave all of that behind. The Roman soldier says: No Jew lives the way you do. And he was right! Matthew had it all! Except Jesus. And Matthew knew that following Jesus is worth more than all the money he had. Following Jesus was way better than anything this world has to offer why?
Jesus offers you a place with Him in heaven.
The gift of salvation is bigger than all the money in the world. And when I think about Matthew, Matthew was not a good guy. Matthew was hated for a good reason, so if you think to yourself, Jesus would never choose me, you are mistaken. Jesus came to earth for you specifically.
Jesus extends His gift to everyone but especially to those who aren’t loved by anyone, or cared for by anyone. If you live in a place in which you feel like no one cares about you or no ones loves you I want to tell you this morning:
God loves you, chooses you, and wants to be in right relationship with you. You are worth it to God. And this morning God is looking at you from heaven above and He say: “follow me”. How will you respond?
Let’s keep reading:
15 While Jesus was having dinner at Levi’s house, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with him and his disciples, for there were many who followed him.
I think this is a crazy picture. Not only does Jesus call Matthew, Jesus invites other people like Matthew so that they can spend time with Him. So that Jesus can teach them too. Not only does Jesus love these people from a distance, Jesus wants to spend time with them! Jesus wants to spend time with a sinner like me? Yes He does! This a beautiful picture of who Jesus is right? And if we were reading a fairy tale then this would be the happily ever after but this is what happens next:
16 When the teachers of the law who were Pharisees saw him eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they asked his disciples: “Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
17 On hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”
Man, last week we saw a group of pharisees angry at Jesus because Jesus claimed to be God right? I’m starting to think these guys are just following Jesus around on purpose. And instead of saying: Hey, can we come in? Can we have some food and chat with you guys? They ask: Why does Jesus eat with tax collectors and sinners? A couple of things are going on here: It reinforces what we said earlier about Tax collectors being evil. A tax collector is such a bad person that they don’t call them sinners, they are in their own category. But I also realize that so many of our churches are like this too. Remember, the Pharisees are church leaders and they don’t welcome people like this into their church. They mistreat them and it’s not that when these people come to church they feel unwelcome, the church didn’t allow people like Matthew to even come to church.
Imagine if we were like that? Imagine we said we didn’t let certain people in because of the sins they’ve committed? I’m gonna be honest, if this church didn’t let “sinners” in, then I wouldn’t be welcome. Because I’m a sinner too. So I am thankful that this church isn’t run by these Pharisees.
Jesus makes this distinction between:
People who follow God’s law because they want God’s approval
People who follow Jesus because Jesus makes them righteous
What is a righteous person?
A sinner that God has cleaned from their sin. A righteous person is not a person who isn’t a sinner, but they have been forgiven by God of their sins. And people that follow God’s law without recognizing that Jesus is God, they are not saved. It is possible for you and I to do all the “right things” like go to church, pray, be kind to people, and still not be righteous. We can get baptised, participate in the lords supper, never miss a sunday or a wednesday but if Jesus isn’t the Lord of your life all you are is a “good person” and not a righteous person.
good rules produce: good people
But God produces: Righteous people who are saved and righteous people behaved in a godly manner.
In other words: These pharisees were well behaved people, but they were far from God because their god is their behavior. But heaven is going to be filled with all sorts of sinners that follow Jesus. But I want to make something very clear to everyone here: When God calls you to follow Him, He also calls you to put your sin down.
I want you to think of your sin as the most disgusting garbage bag. And everyone on this earth is carrying one. And what happens to trash if you don’t toss it in the dumpster? It starts stinking. And people are walking around with it and adding more and more trash in it. Then Jesus comes around and He says: follow me. And if you decide to follow Him, then He takes your trash bag and carries it himself.
When I decide to follow Jesus, I am supposed to put that bag down. I can’t follow Jesus and keep carrying this bag around. If you remember that video Jesus calls Matthew, Matthew can’t believe it but what does Matthew do? He drops what he was doing! Matthew leaves behind the life he once had. He can’t bring it with him where he’s going. When Jesus calls you to follow Him, He is also calling you to give up your sin.
But I do love the image that video gave us earlier. Jesus looks at Matthew and He says: follow me. And Matthew says “Me?” like, are you sure Jesus? You want me? And when Jesus called me, I asked Him the same question. God are you sure you want me? When I said that God looked at me like: did I stutter? God is calling each and every single one of you in this room, the question is: What are you going to say when He calls?
