“I Have Not Come To Call The Righteous, But Sinners To Repentance”

After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. “Follow me,” Jesus said to him, and Levi got up, left everything and followed him.

Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?”

Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.”

They said to him, “John’s disciples often fast and pray, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours go on eating and drinking.”

Jesus answered, “Can you make the friends of the bridegroom fast while he is with them? But the time will come when the bridegroom will be taken from them; in those days they will fast.”

Luke 5:27-35

Think of the team Jesus assembled: a rough Galilean fisherman; a zealot; and even a despised tax collector. This should remind us that God will pick the weakest of the lot and give them great things to do – in His name.

There is a lesson here for us. Sometimes we seek out the familiar, the influential, and the rich. And we tend to ignore people with less status or those with physical limitations.

Jesus put some of society’s less desirable people on His team – treating everyone the same. With the Spirit’s power and guidance, we too can honor all people equally.

There are no unimportant people in the body of Christ.

Our Daily Bread – March 8, 2013