Friend of tax-collectors & sinners? Matthew 9: 9-13

 With thanks to Susan Durber for the "church meeting minutes from the early church" in this sermon!

         

When I was growing up in Merthyr we had lovely next door neighbours: Ed & Elma Evans. They made us very welcome when we moved in, had children about the same ages as us lot, and the 2 grandads used to enjoy talking over the wall. So I was baffled to find so many references in the New testament to what a bad person the gentle dad next door, Ed, was – because he worked in the tax office – he was a tax-collector.

 

There it is in our gospel reading today – the Pharisees ask Jesus’ disciples “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”.

 

As I grew up, I realised that the tax-collectors of the time of Jesus and the tax-collectors of today are very different.

Tax, in Jesus time, was not the money everyone paid to help society run better – it was a charge laid by the Roman authorities on the people of the lands they were occupying.

 

To be a tax-collector then was to work with the occupying army to oppress your own people. It also seemed that at least some of the tax-collectors charged people more than they should, in order to line their own pockets.

 

If we want to understand how people felt about tax-collectors in Jesus’ time, we should not think of our own tax officials at all, but at something more like the people who run dodgy businesses like some vape shops, sweet shops or barbers.  According to recent reports, these may sell illegal goods, often employ people in an unregulated way, and may be being used to launder one billion pounds of criminal money each year.

When you hear ‘tax-collectors’ forget tax officials you know.. and think instead ‘exploitative criminals’.

 

And then look at how Jesus treats people who are tax-collectors, and may be dodgy.

 

First, in today’s gospel story, we hear Jesus calling a tax-collector to follow him. Matthew is sitting in his tax booth at the time – so Jesus definitely knows what he does for a living – but Jesus has no hesitation in saying to him “follow me”.

And then Jesus goes to have dinner at Matthew’s house, (just as he does with Zacchaeus, another tax-collector, when he gets down from his tree).

 

Jesus reaches out to the one who in an outcast, the dodgy dealer, and invites them to follow him – then he goes with them to their house, and surrounds himself with other people who are considered ‘dodgy’ – and labelled by the Pharisees as ‘Tax-collectors and sinners’.

 

If this doesn’t sound shocking and amazing, it might help to employ a little imagination… imagine for a moment that I’ve found the minutes of the meetings of that early church –  it was probably in Antioch, in the later part of the first century. And there’s already trouble ..

 

From the Minutes of the Church meeting:

A matter concerning one of the members was brought to the meeting by the Elders. They explained to the assembly that one of the brothers had been committing sin. He had been approached by one, and then by three of the elders, but to no effect. They now brought the matter before the whole church. The brother in question, being present at the meeting, was asked to change his ways. He refused to listen, became very angry, and left the meeting abruptly.  The Elders who were asked to make a study of Matthew’s Gospel to see what the next step should be.

There was a brief pause for prayer and reflection. Then the meeting returned to the suggestion, previously made, that the church might consider changing the time of the meeting for worship on Sunday. A heated discussion followed, but no conclusion was reached.

 

Minutes of the Elders meeting; the following week:

The main item for discussion was the issue of this brother. Thomas shared a papyrus he had prepared on the subject of church discipline and Matthew’s Gospel. From a close examination of the text he argued that the church had acted in accordance with the Gospel in bringing the matter before the whole church meeting. It was quite clear from the text that, since the brother concerned had not listened even to the congregation, that he should be treated as a Gentile or a tax-collector. So it was agreed that the sinful member of the church should be from henceforth treated as a pagan or a tax-collector.

The Elders were about to move to the next item, a discussion about the best purveyor of wine for communion, when Eunice, an Elder at her first meeting, asked to speak. She said that she was embarrassed to be asking what might be a very silly question, but she wanted to know how Christians were supposed to treat Gentiles and tax-collectors. One Elder said that the answer was obvious, that sinners, Gentiles, pagans and tax-collectors should be expelled from the church, that a decision really did have to be made about the communion wine, and could the meeting please press on. But others among the Elders agreed that Eunice had raised an interesting question. Eunice was asked to study the Gospel and to bring a proposal next time. Then, after a long debate, the Elders voted to order sweet wine from Samos for the celebration of the Lord’s Supper.

Minutes of the next Elders’ meeting;

Eunice reported that she had made a full study of Matthew’s Gospel. She had searched the whole Gospel to see exactly what Jesus’ approach to tax collectors and Gentiles had been. She had made an astonishing discovery. And she had discovered that he did not cast them out of the community at all, and that if anything he had worked harder than with other folk to keep them in! She had found many stories of him eating at table with tax-collectors (and being criticised for it too!). She had found stories of him talking to Gentiles, even at his birth receiving gifts from them, and later even taking theological advice from them. And after the resurrection Jesus had told his disciples to take the Gospel to all nations. So she concluded that if Jesus said we should treat sinners like tax-collectors and foreigners, then that didn’t mean they should be excluded, but that we should work all the harder at including them and welcoming them and offering them friendship. And she wondered whether this final bit in the story might be a kind of warning to the church to worry less about keeping the community pure and think more about sharing the love of God with all who need it. There was a full and frank exchange of views. The discussion ended when one of the Elders read out these words of Jesus  in Matthew’s gospel:

“Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have come to call not the righteous but sinners.”

 

 

Jesus comes to call the dodgy and the broken and the struggling. He comes to call us all.

Jesus comes to join us in our homes and our lives – in every part.

And he comes to include and heal and save the outcast and the dodgy and the sinners – he comes to heal those parts of us which are not whole, not right, not just.

 

This is the good news, which changes us. This is the good news we are sent to share.

In the name of Jesus Christ, friend of tax-collectors and sinners. Amen