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Good morning and welcome to Sunday School.
today we continue our series on the apostles.
· We said that the apostles could be divided into three groups of 12.
· We spent a great deal of time on the first group: Peter, Andrew, James, and John.
· Last week we looked at in the first two in the second group - Phillip and Nathaniel.
· We said that these six apostles knew each other, worked with each other, and basically got along well with each other.
As we begin today's study, we will be meeting the next 2 men Jesus called to be among the 12.
Unlike Peter and Andrew or James and John these apostles are not related.
And unlike Phillip and Nathaniel, we will see that they were not even close friends.
Well, we actually don’t know that for certain, because not a lot is revealed about the remaining six apostles.
· What we do know is that all 12 apostles, except Judas Iscariot, were from Galilee.
· the region was predominantly rural and composed of small towns and villages.
· the people who live there were commoners -- fishermen and farmers.
We also know that the religious establishment of the day practiced their own religion.
They had taken the law and run with it, imposing rules and regulations to suit their own needs.
We looked quite a bit when we discussed Jesus overturning the money changers tables.
We also know that the Jewish establishment did not recognize Jesus as messiah.
They saw him performing miracles but they could not equate miracle working power with the messiah.
It's not like they could deny the miracles.
They happened right in front of them.
They saw Jesus as an intruder.
He was the enemy.
In fact some even said that his miracle power came from Beelzebub.
He was out there are preaching against their false practices and from day one they sought to have him murdered.
(Luke 4:28-29)
Let me emphasize what irritated the religious leaders was not the miracles, in fact some were secretly cool with that.
What irritated the Pharisees and the Sadducees was being called sinners.
Remember Jesus came, just as John had come before him, preaching repentance.
He said that they were sinners, wretched, poor, blind, and lost, under the bondage of their own iniquity and needing forgiveness and cleansing.
It was his message they hated.
And because he would not renounce his message, they conspired to kill him.
Who do you think would be hated just as much as Jesus would?
probably his apostles.
They supported and believed what he said.
Today were looking at 2 apostles who believed Jesus and were willing to give up everything to follow him.
This morning will be looking at Matthew and Thomas
Matthew is also called by his Jewish name, Levi.
His father's name is Alpheaus.
Luke calls him Levi when he records his call and then Matthew when he lists the 12. Matthew is the gospel writer Matthew.
Now, you would think that we could tell a lot about him from his writing, like we did with Peter & John, But the truth is he was a very humble man, who kept himself almost completely in the background in his writing.
In fact he only mentions his own name twice, once when he records his call and the other when he lists all 12 apostles.
What do we know about Matthew?
Matthew was a tax collector and a publican.
· tax collectors in Jesus days were the most despised people in all of Israel.
· They were hated and vilified by all Jewish society.
· They were deemed lower than Herodians.
Herodians were Jews loyal to the dynasty of Herod.
· People actually hated them more than they hated the occupying Roman soldier's.
· Publicans were men who bought tax franchises from the Roman emperor and then extorted money from the people of Israel.
· They fed the Roman coffers and a padded their own pockets aw well.
· publicans often strong-armed money out of people with the use of thugs.
· They were despicable, vile, and unprincipled scoundrels.
Turn with me to Matthew 9
9 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.
/ Later/
10 While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and “sinners” came and ate with him and his disciples.
Luke tells us that it was an enormous banquet held in Jesus' honor.
Matthew had invited a number of his fellow tax collectors and other social outcasts to meet Jesus.
Why do you think Matthew invited these kinds of people to come and meet Jesus?
Probably because these were the only type of people who would associate with Matthew.
Matthew didn't know any of the social elite.
And no Pharisee or Sadducee would have anything to do with the tax collector.
that would be like associating with a prostitute only worse, of course.
Matthew’s occupation made him a traitor to his church.
As such he would have been forbidden to enter a synagogue.
We must of course remember that Matthew was a Jew.
Remember his Jewish name was Levi?
Matthew had be excommunicated, or thrown out of the synagogue when he became a tax collector.
11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?”
It should come as no surprise that the religious leaders of the day would waste no time criticizing Jesus and his apostles for associating with the lowest of the low, the tax collector.
Now tax collectors were hired by the Roman government to collect taxes.
There was an unspoken agreement between the tax collectors and the Roman emperor that said as long as Rome got what it required, the tax collectors could keep the rest.
Rabbit Trail: there were two kinds of tax collectors, the Gabbai and the Mokhes.
· The Gabbai were general tax collectors.
· They collected property tax, income tax, and poll tax.
· These taxes were set by official assessments.
· So it wasn't it easy to cheat the people if you were a Gabbai tax collector.
· Now the Mokhes collected taxes on imports and exports, goods for domestic trade, actually anything that moved by road.
· They set tolls on roads and bridges.
· They taxed beast on burdens and axles on your wagons
· they charged taxes on parcels, letters, and whatever else they felt like taxing.
· They assessed how much the tax would be.
Now there were two types of Mokhes - the Great Mokhes and the Little Mokhes.
· A great Mokhes stayed behind the scenes and hired others to collect the taxes for him.
· Zaccheus was apparently a great Mokhes because Luke described him as a "chief tax collector" (Luke 19:2)
· Matthew was apparently a little Mokhes because he manned the tax office and met people face-to-face (Matt 9:9)
Not think about it which one would you hate more, the guy behind this scenes or the guy right in front of your face?
What made Matthew more despicable to the Jews is that he was one of them.
We will always have tax collectors with us, Anybody know an IRS agent or have a relative who does your taxes?
Sure it hurts when you have to pay taxes, but when your friend or family member gives you the bad news you feel worse, like maybe they should have done something to help you out.
People hated Matthew more than they hated the other tax collectors.
After all, no self-respecting Jew in his right mind would ever choose to be a tax collector.
by doing so Matthew had effectively cut himself off not only from his own people, but from his God, because he was banned from the synagogue and forbidden to sacrifice or worship in the temple.
therefore he was worse off than a Gentile.
it must have been shocking to Matthew when Jesus called him.
It came clear out of the blue.
Jesus saw him sitting in the tax office and simply said, "follow me".
Matthew responded instantly and without hesitation.
He arose and followed him, abandoning the tax office.
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