Jesus Welcomes Us to the Table
Matthew 9:9-13
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.
10 While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
12 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.”
John 6:24-35 (GNT)
24 When the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they got into those boats and went to Capernaum, looking for him.
25 When the people found Jesus on the other side of the lake, they said to him, “Teacher, when did you get here?”
26 Jesus answered, “I am telling you the truth: you are looking for me because you ate the bread and had all you wanted, not because you understood my miracles. 27 Do not work for food that spoils; instead, work for the food that lasts for eternal life. This is the food which the Son of Man will give you, because God, the Father, has put his mark of approval on him.”
28 So they asked him, “What can we do in order to do what God wants us to do?”
29 Jesus answered, “What God wants you to do is to believe in the one he sent.”
30 They replied, “What miracle will you perform so that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? 31 Our ancestors ate manna in the desert, just as the scripture says, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”
32 “I am telling you the truth,” Jesus said. “What Moses gave you was not[a] the bread from heaven; it is my Father who gives you the real bread from heaven. 33 For the bread that God gives is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
34 “Sir,” they asked him, “give us this bread always.”
35 “I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “Those who come to me will never be hungry; those who believe in me will never be thirsty.
Reflection
Don’t you love how Jesus calls the disciples! He goes up to Andrew and Simon Peter in
Matthew 4 and says: “Come and follow me” and they drop their fishing nets and follow him. It’s much the same with James and John except the leave their father, Zebeedee, to deal with the nets and boat.
In today’s scripture passage Jesus sees Matthew (also called Levi in Luke) working away at his tax collecting and calls out to him “ Come and follow me!” and Matthew gets up and leaves.
It is exactly these kind of things that makes us scratch our heads in amazement – why would anyone at all just get up and out the door behind Jesus?
Maybe we think that kind of thing was more normal way back then but I doubt it. Usually disciple wannabe’s would literally have to beg to be taken on by a rabbi – sometimes having to prove their worthiness and commitment by being rejected by the rabbi two or three times before being accepted as a disciple. And the disciple would have to go to the rabbi- but here Jesus is walking around handing out opportunities. “Hey Matt- I want you to come and we’ll travel around the country together. We’ll meet lots of people, do a bunch of stuff: miracles, healing, we’ll talk to people, you will learn a bunch of stuff and change your life. I promise”
Matthew says “Sure” and invites Jesus home to a meal and to meet some of his friends.
Jesus is different, and he turns things around, we have to re-adjust our perspective and that helps us to see things in a new way – just like he did for the disciples. Jesus was shaking things up a little – I mean who has fisherfolk for disciples?, who has tax collectors for disciples?, what rabbi would ever eat a meal in a tax collectors house filled with other tax collectors and “sinners”? Who changes the rules for accepting disciples?
The Sanhedrin and Pharisees seems to have lots of questions for Jesus about what he did or didn’t do. They knew Jesus was different and I think that scared them a little. After all, the Sanhedrin and Pharisees were religious people, the ones tasked with making sure that people followed the rules. In an important way they were the people responsible for Judaism, for keeping it alive over the generations, throughout successive waves of domination by other countries and empires, other religions and other gods. They were the people who kept Jewish people Jewish.
And here is Jesus, whom they obviously respected, flaunting the written and unwritten rules about being a good Jew, a righteous man, a respected rabbi. Maybe they are just chastising him when they question Jesus’ disciples about his fraternizing with tax collectors and sinners and even more disturbing: eating with them thus making himself “unclean” as these sinners are. Or maybe they genuinely have questions about how he could do it, why would he put himself in that position? In their thinking Jesus is doing the unthinkable.
But Jesus wasn’t even thinking in their terms, he isn’t doing things just to do them, he isn’t rebelling against an unfair system, he’s got a whole new set of rules that he plays by.
Beginning with “Love God with your whole heart and your whole mind and your whole soul, he moves on to love your neighbour as yourself.” Jesus puts love at the center of the equation, it is love that holds the whole thing together and that love is poured by God on everyone.
Jesus knows his mission and it is not to perpetuate what he sees going on around him, he knows whom he is called to be with. Jesus sees everyone who is kept outside of the known “righteous” circle, at arms left and he wants them brought back in.
The blind, the sick, the lame, the women, the widows, the Samaritans, the sinners; anyone and everyone who had been pushed to the margins by birth or circumstance, Jesus wanted their hearts for God, he wanted them to know that they were loved by God, that they were good enough in God’s eyes, that they were blessed.
So when he answers the Pharisees question about why he sits at the table and eats with tax collectors and sinners, Jesus is not just declaring his intentions, he is declaring God’s intentions by quoting Hosea 6:6: “For I desire mercy, not sacrifice” Sacrifice being an exact exchange of forgiveness for a specific animal sacrifice at the temple, mercy, however, is forgiveness that requires a heart, and a compassionate heart at that.
Jesus knows that he is offering people something they will not get elsewhere, acceptance, a chance to give their lives over to something – someone in a new way that changes who they are at their very being. That is what he offered to Matthew, the tax collector –“Come and follow me” This is what he is offering to everyone he meets. Matthew’s friends, those other tax collectors and sinners are happy for Matthew. They are celebrating with him and with Jesus sitting at their table in Matthew’s house, breaking bread and drinking wine, they are participating in God’s kingdom in a way that they Pharisees outside have a hard time understanding. That God’s kingdom could be so large, so undemanding, so unrighteous, so accessible, so inclusive was too big a step for some Pharisees.
In the passage from John, the crowd is even larger than the calling of Matthew. These are some of the people who were part of the story of the Feeding of the Five Thousand and they want to be a part of the new thing, a part of the miracles, and the healing, their eyes and ears are full of what Jesus could do for them. But Jesus is not naive nor is he cynical, he knows some of the people who followed him across the lake just want to see what they can get and he knows some the folk gathered round him are truly wanting to hear what he has to say, they want to touch some of the goodness and mercy and blessing he is talking about, they want to know the love that Jesus says God has for them.
Jesus offers himself saying “ I am the bread of life, Those who come to me will never be hungry, those who believe in me will never be thirsty” Jesus challenges them to choose the living bread and the living water that will nourish and sustain them on their journey with and to God.
Sometimes it seems to me that all we have left of Jesus and his words are crumbs that have been left on the table long after the feast is finished- but I remember that after the feeding of the five thousand when they gathered up the leftovers from the five loaves of bread there were 12 baskets full – that’s a lot of crumbs!
Jesus is offering us a world of enough and more, a table where everyone is welcomed and God’s love and grace is poured out over all.
Matthew 9:9-13
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.
10 While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. 11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”
12 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.”
John 6:24-35 (GNT)
24 When the crowd saw that Jesus was not there, nor his disciples, they got into those boats and went to Capernaum, looking for him.
25 When the people found Jesus on the other side of the lake, they said to him, “Teacher, when did you get here?”
26 Jesus answered, “I am telling you the truth: you are looking for me because you ate the bread and had all you wanted, not because you understood my miracles. 27 Do not work for food that spoils; instead, work for the food that lasts for eternal life. This is the food which the Son of Man will give you, because God, the Father, has put his mark of approval on him.”
28 So they asked him, “What can we do in order to do what God wants us to do?”
29 Jesus answered, “What God wants you to do is to believe in the one he sent.”
30 They replied, “What miracle will you perform so that we may see it and believe you? What will you do? 31 Our ancestors ate manna in the desert, just as the scripture says, ‘He gave them bread from heaven to eat.’”
32 “I am telling you the truth,” Jesus said. “What Moses gave you was not[a] the bread from heaven; it is my Father who gives you the real bread from heaven. 33 For the bread that God gives is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world.”
34 “Sir,” they asked him, “give us this bread always.”
35 “I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “Those who come to me will never be hungry; those who believe in me will never be thirsty.
Reflection
Don’t you love how Jesus calls the disciples! He goes up to Andrew and Simon Peter in
Matthew 4 and says: “Come and follow me” and they drop their fishing nets and follow him. It’s much the same with James and John except the leave their father, Zebeedee, to deal with the nets and boat.
In today’s scripture passage Jesus sees Matthew (also called Levi in Luke) working away at his tax collecting and calls out to him “ Come and follow me!” and Matthew gets up and leaves.
It is exactly these kind of things that makes us scratch our heads in amazement – why would anyone at all just get up and out the door behind Jesus?
Maybe we think that kind of thing was more normal way back then but I doubt it. Usually disciple wannabe’s would literally have to beg to be taken on by a rabbi – sometimes having to prove their worthiness and commitment by being rejected by the rabbi two or three times before being accepted as a disciple. And the disciple would have to go to the rabbi- but here Jesus is walking around handing out opportunities. “Hey Matt- I want you to come and we’ll travel around the country together. We’ll meet lots of people, do a bunch of stuff: miracles, healing, we’ll talk to people, you will learn a bunch of stuff and change your life. I promise”
Matthew says “Sure” and invites Jesus home to a meal and to meet some of his friends.
Jesus is different, and he turns things around, we have to re-adjust our perspective and that helps us to see things in a new way – just like he did for the disciples. Jesus was shaking things up a little – I mean who has fisherfolk for disciples?, who has tax collectors for disciples?, what rabbi would ever eat a meal in a tax collectors house filled with other tax collectors and “sinners”? Who changes the rules for accepting disciples?
The Sanhedrin and Pharisees seems to have lots of questions for Jesus about what he did or didn’t do. They knew Jesus was different and I think that scared them a little. After all, the Sanhedrin and Pharisees were religious people, the ones tasked with making sure that people followed the rules. In an important way they were the people responsible for Judaism, for keeping it alive over the generations, throughout successive waves of domination by other countries and empires, other religions and other gods. They were the people who kept Jewish people Jewish.
And here is Jesus, whom they obviously respected, flaunting the written and unwritten rules about being a good Jew, a righteous man, a respected rabbi. Maybe they are just chastising him when they question Jesus’ disciples about his fraternizing with tax collectors and sinners and even more disturbing: eating with them thus making himself “unclean” as these sinners are. Or maybe they genuinely have questions about how he could do it, why would he put himself in that position? In their thinking Jesus is doing the unthinkable.
But Jesus wasn’t even thinking in their terms, he isn’t doing things just to do them, he isn’t rebelling against an unfair system, he’s got a whole new set of rules that he plays by.
Beginning with “Love God with your whole heart and your whole mind and your whole soul, he moves on to love your neighbour as yourself.” Jesus puts love at the center of the equation, it is love that holds the whole thing together and that love is poured by God on everyone.
Jesus knows his mission and it is not to perpetuate what he sees going on around him, he knows whom he is called to be with. Jesus sees everyone who is kept outside of the known “righteous” circle, at arms left and he wants them brought back in.
The blind, the sick, the lame, the women, the widows, the Samaritans, the sinners; anyone and everyone who had been pushed to the margins by birth or circumstance, Jesus wanted their hearts for God, he wanted them to know that they were loved by God, that they were good enough in God’s eyes, that they were blessed.
So when he answers the Pharisees question about why he sits at the table and eats with tax collectors and sinners, Jesus is not just declaring his intentions, he is declaring God’s intentions by quoting Hosea 6:6: “For I desire mercy, not sacrifice” Sacrifice being an exact exchange of forgiveness for a specific animal sacrifice at the temple, mercy, however, is forgiveness that requires a heart, and a compassionate heart at that.
Jesus knows that he is offering people something they will not get elsewhere, acceptance, a chance to give their lives over to something – someone in a new way that changes who they are at their very being. That is what he offered to Matthew, the tax collector –“Come and follow me” This is what he is offering to everyone he meets. Matthew’s friends, those other tax collectors and sinners are happy for Matthew. They are celebrating with him and with Jesus sitting at their table in Matthew’s house, breaking bread and drinking wine, they are participating in God’s kingdom in a way that they Pharisees outside have a hard time understanding. That God’s kingdom could be so large, so undemanding, so unrighteous, so accessible, so inclusive was too big a step for some Pharisees.
In the passage from John, the crowd is even larger than the calling of Matthew. These are some of the people who were part of the story of the Feeding of the Five Thousand and they want to be a part of the new thing, a part of the miracles, and the healing, their eyes and ears are full of what Jesus could do for them. But Jesus is not naive nor is he cynical, he knows some of the people who followed him across the lake just want to see what they can get and he knows some the folk gathered round him are truly wanting to hear what he has to say, they want to touch some of the goodness and mercy and blessing he is talking about, they want to know the love that Jesus says God has for them.
Jesus offers himself saying “ I am the bread of life, Those who come to me will never be hungry, those who believe in me will never be thirsty” Jesus challenges them to choose the living bread and the living water that will nourish and sustain them on their journey with and to God.
Sometimes it seems to me that all we have left of Jesus and his words are crumbs that have been left on the table long after the feast is finished- but I remember that after the feeding of the five thousand when they gathered up the leftovers from the five loaves of bread there were 12 baskets full – that’s a lot of crumbs!
Jesus is offering us a world of enough and more, a table where everyone is welcomed and God’s love and grace is poured out over all.
