Jesus Calls Sinners: Leave the Booth and Follow

When Jesus calls Matthew, listen, he doesn't stay in the booth. He doesn't stay there. Listen. He can't stay in the booth and follow Jesus at the same time. But while he's in the booth is when God called him. He doesn't stay in the booth and we don't stay in our sinfulness. Verse 14 says, he rose and then followed him. He had to leave that life behind. He had to leave what he was doing. He had to walk away from what his life was and he says, okay, I'm going to follow Jesus. Meaning, Jesus doesn't require anything from him before he calls him, but Jesus requires him to walk away from the old life. To follow him. [00:39:20] (61 seconds)  #LeaveTheBooth

Jesus calls to Matthew while he was where? In the tax booth. Think of that. Matthew is in the tax booth. And in that little sentence, maybe the greatest illustration of God's amazing saving grace of all the bible. Why? Because Matthew had betrayed his upbringing. Matthew had betrayed his family. Matthew had betrayed his God. Matthew was literally, follow me, in the act of cheating and robbing and stealing for personal gain. In that moment, he was in his sin, and Jesus in his tax booth says, you follow me. Get it? [00:31:29] (65 seconds)  #GraceInTheBooth

When you follow Jesus, you can't keep your old ways. When you follow Jesus, you can't stay in the booth. When you follow Jesus, you can't stay in your sin. And if you try to follow Jesus, and you can't stay in your self righteousness. Either he paid for your sin or you're still working on it. Both cannot be true. One is the gospel and one is false. He says, you can't stay where you are. It won't work. It will burst. You'll lose the precious wine and you'll lose the one who came to save you. [01:04:32] (32 seconds)  #AllOrNothingFaith

Jesus is saying in that moment, your sin is actually against me. Jesus is saying, only I can forgive sin because only I will die for your sin. You see, Jesus says, I'm going to go to the cross. I'm going to pay the penalty for sin. I'm going to pay the wrath of God that you deserve upon you so that you can be forgiven and I can forgive you. And so only Jesus will take upon himself the wages that sin deserves. [00:22:17] (34 seconds)  #JesusPaidItAll

Jesus is looking at these religious men and he's saying, you can't take new and force it in the old. The old structure won't be able to bear it. Listen, Jesus is not condemning the old testament. He's not condemning the law of God. He's not condemning the traditions. But rather, he's condemning the religious self righteousness and the self healing that is fabricated in those traditions. Jesus says, don't you see? I've come with good news. Your king is here. Your savior has come. Your physician has come to heal you and take away your sin. And here's what Jesus is saying, you can't deal with a king if you don't make room for him. [01:02:49] (55 seconds)  #MakeRoomForTheKing

He's saying it's not just sick people who go to the doctor, but people who are sick and know they cannot heal themselves. It's not just sick people. It's it's sick people who know that they need some outside help in order to to get healed, to be fixed. Listen. You don't go to the doctor because you're sick. But rather you go when you realize you can't fix yourself. You realize you need something outside of yourself that would somehow make you whole and better. And the scripture clearly teaches that every one of us is sick with sin. And the only ones who come to Jesus as the great physician are those who deeply realize that I can't save myself. [00:49:38] (71 seconds)  #CantSaveMyself

Let me tell you what that means for us friends. That means it doesn't matter who you are. Hear this. It doesn't matter what you've done. The bible tells us that Jesus does not wait for you to clean yourself up. Jesus does not wait for you to finally get things right. Listen to me. Jesus does not expect something from you before he calls you and before he saves you. He doesn't look at you and say, if you would only do these six things, then you'd be worthy to be my disciple. [00:34:07] (55 seconds)  #CalledAsYouAre

And so listen, Mark wants you to see how scandalous this was. He wants you to understand that Jesus walked up to a tax booth. He looked at Matthew in the face, a Jewish tax collector and said, follow me. Now that is as unthinkable as anyone could ever imagine. Just before this, Jesus touches a leper and heals him, but now Jesus engages with a Jewish tax collector and then calls him to follow him. That is as as a scandalous as Jesus physically touching a leper, which is even more scandalous than he would invite a social leper, a social outcast to be his disciple. [00:30:21] (60 seconds)  #ScandalOfGrace