Radical Love

¹⁴ As He passed by, He saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting in the tax booth, and He said to him, “Follow Me!” And he got up and followed Him.

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. 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.” (Mark 2:14-17)

 

What would it have been like to have walked with Jesus? Jesus had invited Peter, Andrew, James and John to be with him. They were ordinary people who had normal, respectable jobs. They were your average sinner – nothing major. After being invited to hang out with Jesus, they must have felt pretty good about themselves. Jesus had healed Peter’s mother-in-law, eaten at their homes…

They got to be in on something big. Crowds were following Jesus, and they were His friends. They were in the spotlight because He was in the spotlight.

Then Jesus did something totally radical – more radical than touching a leper.

It must have shocked the disciples when Jesus invited Levi to join the group. Levi was a tax collector, a traitor and a thief. No one respectable wanted to be around people like Levi. And then, after Levi started following Jesus, all his scumbag friends started following, too. The word for sinners used here is the word for blatant sinners, obvious sinners; not people who just miss the bulls-eye of righteousness, but people who don’t even come close to hitting the target.

Jesus started to hang out with disreputable people. These social lepers wanted to be near Him. He ate with them. He drank with them. He went into their homes. I bet the food was not kosher. I bet they didn’t go through the motions of ceremonial washing.

The religious people followed Jesus, too. But they did not like Jesus. They kept themselves separate from “sinners.” They were good at hitting the target, and they couldn’t understand why Jesus would want to dirty Himself with such scum. It was incomprehensible to them. God is holy; we need to be holy. He is separate; we need to be separate.

Jesus used the indignation of the Pharisees to teach, not only the Pharisees, but the disciples who were with Him. “I did not come to call (summon or invite) the righteous, but sinners (scumbags) to repentance (a change of heart and mind.)”

The religious leaders got it half right. God is holy, He is totally other. But He is not angry at those who are not holy. He loves unconditionally. He knows that I can never be good enough. I can never keep all of the rules. I can never reach God through my own efforts. And so He reaches down to me. He makes me good enough. He was perfect in my place.

This is the gospel. The kingdom of God has come. We can not reach up to the kingdom. God has reached down to us.

And this is the job we are called to do-to preach the kingdom of God. We are not called to hang out with the respectable people. We are not called to sit in judgment with the religious people. We are not called to be the righteous who have no need of a physician.

We are called to have eye surgery. We are called to see others as Jesus sees them. We are called to love.

Wandering the straight crooked path, looking for opportunities to be radical.