Worship Call 0669 Dinning with Jesus

Worship Call 0669

Monday June 13, 2022

Dinning with sinners.

In some lyrics in a song of Billy Joel it says

“I’d rather laugh with the sinners than to cry with the saints.”

There is some truth to the statement at least for me.

I’d rather laugh with the common folk than to sit around with a bunch of prudish religious types thinking that they are lofty above every one else. But that is what religion tends to do.

In its own little click people set up certain standards that let a certain people in but puts up no trespassing signs to every one else.

It is not say that one who is in Christ is to walk in the counsel of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners or sit in the seat of scoffers but to approach the approachable with the gospel that opens the door for others to come in.

And this is another fine day in the Lord.

There is nothing worst then to associated with religious prods

Mark 2:15 (NASB95) — 15 And it happened that He was reclining at the table in his house, and many tax collectors and sinners were dining with Jesus and His disciples; for there were many of them, and they were following Him.

Matthew 9:10 (NASB95) — 10 Then it happened that as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were dining with Jesus and His disciples.

Luke 5:27–29 (NASB95) — 27 After that He went out and noticed a tax collector named Levi sitting in the tax booth, and He said to him, “Follow Me.” 28 And he left everything behind, and got up and began to follow Him. 29 And Levi gave a big reception for Him in his house; and there was a great crowd of tax collectors and other people who were reclining at the table with them.

Note that it was only Levi who gave a party reception which leaves me not with ridicule but just in question. Why didn’t the fishermen have a get together with their fellow fishermen and invite Jesus to it.

There could have been reasons, but I was just wondering

ἁμαρτωλός [hamartolos /ham·ar·to·los/] [1]

sinners were not the average all around riff raff but common people who did not subscribe to the religious system of the Pharisees.

The designation was anyone that did not toe the religious line. They lived outside of the box of the religious community not in conformity with or tied to their religious convictions.

Mark makes a distinction between the sinners and Tax collectors. Maybe even placing the Tax Collector on a lower rung, being that low life tax collectors worked with the Romans against his people. While sinners may be looked down upon the tax Collectors were hated and despised.

Let’s note another observation. While no respectable pious religious type would be caught with the low life tax collectors, it was the common folk that non religious types that extended the grace to sit at the table.

I would rather laugh with the outside common folk than to sit all prim and proper with the pious religious folk. Not to disregard Piety before the Lord in respect to his sovereignty, but to be tied down to man’s self-restraining religion.

What church would you wish to join? One that speaks each week about the dos and don’ts of the Christian and how to be a good religious person? Or would you like a church that you hear the full council of God’s word.

What these people were getting around this table that Jesus say was far more than they were receiving in the local synagogue.

Religion is a system that over time becomes stagnant and then hardened to a set of religious expectations that it holds on to all people. And unless one toes the customary religious line and function within that religious system you are an outsider and irreligious.

But it was those who were outside of the religious system that Jesus would often approach.

Point of Doctrine

1. Jesus came to where people were

As Jesus did in the garden when it was that the Lord came to the sinners.

2. Jesus came to the woman at the well and then to the Samaritans in the city

3. Jesus came to the religious in the Synagogue

4. And now Jesus comes at a banquet of sorts where the religious would not want to be seen at.

In the Ancient world dining together was intimacy. Sitting and breaking bread together was a sign closeness with one another.

Ok they are sinners. But to not approach a sinner what is he to do. Be converted by his own determination and will power according to their own knowledge.

Jesus’ dining with them brings about the idea that it is he who draws near to them. And rather than laying out the dos and don’ts of some religious system he tells them the glories of the Kingdom. Which lays out the motivation.

We were not there to hear the conversation, but we must believe that the one’s who attended the party wanted more so to hear what Jesus had to say than to entertain Jesus with their stories of their carnal way.

Jesus spoke to the Samaritan woman at the well.

Jesus gets kicked out at the Synagogue.

Jesus told a man that his sins had forgiven him. Which was outside the box of the religious types.

“Only God can forgive sins!”

And Jesus healed the man on the mat in order to validate the claim that the Son of man has the power to do so.

Now the teacher is once again outside the religious norms as is association with those that no respectable teacher would bring himself to.

Mark 2:16–17 (NASB95) — 16 When the scribes of the Pharisees saw that He was eating with the sinners and tax collectors, they said to His disciples, “Why is He eating and drinking with tax collectors and sinners?” 17 And hearing this, Jesus said to them, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Jesus had come to meet the needs and there was a no greater need than a sick soul.

There is no greater need than one who is dead in Christ.

Religion becomes the aspirin that cures a headache. It tends to feed the carnal nature a different way.

Funny

One is a sinner let’s say in immoral degeneracy. They may religious and pious working in ministry and righteous deeds but when it done under the energy of the flesh they are still carnal.

but their religion becomes fig leaves to mask their guilt and their shame. To make them feel comfortable.

An aspirin may make one with a tumor in the brain feel better for a time but there still lies the tumor none the less.

So there were no distinction as far as sinners in that place where Jesus dined.

There were just Jesus and the sinners

Sinners that knew that they were sinners humbly coming to the physician for a remedy for their condition

And

Sinners who had covered themselves with fig leaves naked wretched and blind to their own condition.

Jesus did not come to cure those who were locked into their own religious ways but for those who sought help out of their own sinfulness.

[1]Strong, J. (1995). In Enhanced Strong’s Lexicon. Woodside Bible Fellowship.