Jesus calls Matthew

Reading 

“When the crowd saw this, they were filled with awe; and they praised God, who had given such authority to man. 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. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples.” - Matthew 9:8-10

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Reflection

What's fascinating about the call of Matthew is that he's sitting in the in-between in a radical way. He's a Jew, and there's this oppressive regime called Rome, who's in control of everything that they do. And Rome hires tax collectors from the Jews to collect taxes for them. And so the spot where Mass Matthew is sitting is one where.

He's going to his people and collecting the money for Rome. And oftentimes there would be a little extra in between for the tax collector. And so he's not accepted by his own people, and he's not fully integrated into the people who he's working for. And so he's caught in this no man's land of total isolation. And oftentimes

By virtue of the position that we are in, we don't feel worthy to follow Jesus. Yet a call comes from Matthew's life. And Jesus says, as he's walking by, he says, Come follow me. And he doesn't just say, Come follow me, he ends up in one of the most sacred places, is eating with them, sharing. A sense of communion with them at a meal in the innermost sanctuary of a home.

And that's the place that Jesus invites each and every one of us to. It doesn't matter the place where we might find ourselves as an outsider. We might find ourselves in places where we're doing things that we're not proud of, where we're maybe stuck in careers that we feel are not connected to our sense of who we're supposed to be. Maybe that's relational situations or

Anything that might happen in that vein. But Jesus still says, Come and follow me.

It's the look that Jesus would have had in his eyes that gave Matthew the courage to say yes to a call from Jesus.

And that look that Jesus has in his eyes is the same one that he has for each and every one of us, no matter what place we're finding ourselves in right now.

Jesus wants to come in and eat with us, to be to be in the intimate place with us. And so from that knowledge, let's pray.

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Jesus, search me and know me. The parts I love about myself and the parts of shame, regret, anger, or bitterness. Your perfect love is big enough for all of it. Help me in my unbelief.

I lay down those things before you. I come before you as simply me. I choose to follow you.

Please give me the strength. In your name I pray. Amen.