“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.” Luke 5:27-28 Why would a tax collector follow Jesus so quickly? What did Jesus see in him and what did Levi seen in Jesus? How had Levi ended up a tax collector to begin with? Was he just an average man struggling to support a family and somehow the opportunity had presented itself and he felt like he had no choice? Maybe he was looking for and waiting for a way out. Whatever the reason, he followed Jesus. He was ready for a change.
“Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them.” Luke 5:29 Levi found something exciting and immediately wanted to share it with his friends. He knew they needed to meet this Jesus too. How exciting for Jesus to have the opportunity to share God’s love with these ‘outcasts’ of society.
But the Pharisees who liked to separate everything into clean and dirty and keep it that way were not happy with what was happening. So they were complaining to Jesus’ disciples who apparently were eating with the tax collectors as well. “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.’” Luke 5:31-32 While on the surface, this may appear to be saying that the ‘righteous’ don’t need him, I wonder if what Jesus is really saying is that only those who understand their need for Jesus can respond in repentance. Those who believe themselves to be righteous by their good conduct cannot understand their need for Jesus. The tax collectors knew that they were in need of help. The Pharisees needed Jesus just as badly, but they didn’t know it.
The new rabbi on the scene does not follow the old rules. And day by day, the Pharisees are getting more and more upset with him. They ask questions trying to get Jesus to define his ‘new rules’ and they usually don’t like his answers but don’t have much to say in response. When questioned about fasting, Jesus has two responses. First, “Can you make the guests 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 5:34-35 Jesus is referring to himself as the bridegroom possibly referring back to Isaiah 61: “I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.” No mourning or fasting was allowed at a Jewish wedding. The Pharisees would understand that, though, they may not have understood or believed that Jesus was the ‘bridegroom’ or that he was going to be their salvation.
Jesus also went on to tell them that you can’t pour new wine into old wineskins – that it would burst the skins if you tried, but that you need to pour new wine into new wineskins. Luke 5:36-39 So what does that have to do with Jesus eating with tax collectors and his disciples not fasting?
Jesus didn’t fit into the religious framework they way they wanted him to. He kept going after the heart and motive rather than just the knowledge and he didn’t abide by their interpretations of the law which they had spent lifetimes refining and carrying out. Jesus is trying to tell the Pharisees that a new age has come. The old rules won’t work anymore. Times have changed. The Messiah has come and this ‘new wine’ is going to burst through the old network of rules and regulations and make holes in it. And patching it won’t work either. This calls for a new ‘container’ and this new ‘container’ is the Church – the Bride of Christ. Jesus is changing the order of things from only the High Priest meeting with God once a year to everyone having daily access to the Father through him. This is a huge change for the religious leaders especially and they are very uncomfortable with the way things are going. “And no one after drinking old wine wants the new, for he says, ‘The old is better.’” Luke 5:39 There is a comfort in things not changing – even if the change would bring about good things.
But Jesus is all about change. He rescues us from our self-destructive comfort and causes us to change for the better. “Yet, O LORD, you are our Father. We are the clay, you are the potter; we are all the work of your hand.” Isaiah 64:8
Thank you, Lord, for not giving up on me. Thank you for pulling me out of my comfortable ruts and breathing new life into me. Keep changing me until all people see is you when they look at me.
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