"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.
While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. 13 But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.”" See context
Matthew left his job to follow Jesus. He didn't work out a period of notice. His encounter with Jesus was enough to knock him off the normal course of his life. Bless him, he was a tax collector, in those days fairly despised individuals known for their corruption and for taking an extra cut from those that they were collecting from. He was by his tax collectors booth! This was a portable construction that was set up where he was collecting his tax. All a bit more vulnerable than we at first think. He must have been challenged by Jesus to leave this and also torn. Do I hang on to the money or follow the Holy Man? Well he became one of the twelve - so he must have opted for the life changing option to follow Jesus. What would we do I wonder?
To encounter Jesus at that time was something that knocked people off the normal course of their lives. I believe this was because Jesus personality was so arresting that you had to stop in your tracks and say to yourself. Who is he? Is he for real? What is he offering?
Well what Jesus offers is something that is contrary to the material world's values. The Good News is something for our spirit, something for the inner man or woman. That lifts us up and alters our lives and changes them for the better. To live outside Christianity is to live a life without hope. To live as a Christian implies a commitment to change.
Yes, Jesus comes to sinners, tax collectors and prostitutes to the shock and dismay of the Pharisees, but it is so that he can bring the healing power of God's love. As he says he comes as a doctor into their lives. He doesn't feast with the Matthews of this world to pick up tax collecting hints. He doesn't feast with prostitutes in order to pimp. He is at the feast because he has something of real value to give he is offering rescue.
To the Pharisees he says 'Go and learn the meaning of the words what I want is mercy, not sacrifice.'
The irony is that the Pharisees were sinners too. The difference between them and the others were that they didn't know it. They were too busy looking at other peoples lives to assess their own.
If you look at the gospel again you will see that Jesus is ministering to everyone including the Pharisees.
This is why his ministry is so effecting. It speaks to everyone and to us - even now across time. The quote he offers the Pharisees is from the Bible. From the book of Hosea, which says 'What I want is love, not sacrifice; knowledge of God, not holocausts.'
That is interesting isn't it? In Old Testament times, before Jesus came, they used to try and appease God by killing and burning animals as a sin offering in the hope that this would put them right with God. But even then the Prophet Hosea says that God doesn't want this kind of material response. He wants us to change so that we love more. This requires a change of heart - are we ready?
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