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A Doctor in the House
September 5, 1999
Pastor Dan Baumgartner
The
context for our passage is several chapters worth of stories
about Jesus doing some amazing healing. In fact, in
two chapters, Matthew shows Jesus in seven separate incidents
of healing: leprosy, paralysis, fever, other diseases,
evil spirits, demons…and then forgiving sins.
Our
family has normally enjoyed very good health, and had minimal
contact with the medical profession. Four years ago,
however, we were preparing to leave New Jersey to move
to Minnesota, and the doctor told us Nick needed hernia
surgery. We were fairly nervous about it, and during
the week we were so grateful to get lots and lots of phone
calls from families we knew around the country, saying
they were praying.
One
family that called were our former neighbors. They
had lived in the apartment above us in Princeon, and they
had a little 3-year old boy named Taylor. Taylor absolutely
LOVED Nick…and his parents sat him down one night
to explain that they wanted to pray that Jesus would make
Nick all better. That didn’t totally make sense
to Taylor. He thought about it, pondered a few seconds,
wrinkled up his brow and then asked the key question: “Is
Jesus a doctor?”
Is
Jesus a doctor? The short answer, I guess, is “Yes…if
a doctor is involved with healing…then Jesus is
a kind of doctor. But an extraordinary kind…and
one whose healing power is not limited to just the physical
body, but extends to the whole person.
But
if we’re going to think of him as a doctor…then
who are the patients?
First,
it is very obvious that this story describes the disciple
Matthew as a sick patient. Matthew has a sickness
called “sin.” Actually, he has an especially
acute manifestation of this sickness, called “Being
a Tax Collector.” Our story says that Jesus
ended up having dinner with “sinners and tax collectors.” Tax
collectors merit their own category, apparently, because
they were SO despised by their Jewish neighbors.
The
Roman Empire at this point controlled the Mediterranean,
including Palestine. And the Romans used a rather
ingenious system of collecting taxes. They would essentially
accept bids from local natives on the tax “rights” for
a particular area. That individual would then be responsible
for paying Rome the bid amount of taxes. However,
there was no newspaper, no radio, no Internet posting what
these taxes were. The tax collector was free to try
and squeeze as much as he possibly could. Everything
he collected above his “bid” amount went directly
into his pocket. And so tax collectors were hated
for
- ripping
off their own neighbors, and
- partnering
with Rome, the hated occupier of their country
You
may have heard about tax collectors before…but I
tell you this because I want you to understand how
hated the tax collector was. I’m not sure we
have anything to compare. It’s just not the
same saying “sinners and IRS agents.” A
tax collector, in fact, “by Jewish law…was
barred from the synagogue (from worship)…was considered
unclean…and was forbidden to be a witness in any
(court) case.” The tax collector was the lowest
of the low. Ostracized by his society. Cast out
by the people of God. Alone. Sick. You can’t
get any lower. But Matthew found that no matter how
low…he wasn’t beyond where Jesus would meet
him. And so here comes Jesus and says to Matthew the
tax-collector… “come follow me.”
That
invitation puts Matthew in danger of catching a kind of
sickness... the “As-Soon-As” disease. Many
of us are tempted in different ways by this. “As
soon as…I finish this consuming work project, as
soon as I get even with the people who have wronged me,
as soon as I quit drinking, as soon as I’m done with
school, as soon as I become a better person…THEN
I’ll deal with God.” But with Matthew…the
call comes while he is STILL manning the dirty little tax
booth on the highway. Still ripping people off, still
despised, still a sinner. Jesus doesn’t tell
him to “clean up your life and follow me.” He
just tells him to follow. Now.
I
love this picture of Jesus. The worst of the worst,
the lowest of the low…and that’s exactly where
Jesus heads to hang out. That’s exactly who
he chooses to be with.
Not
teaching Sunday School, not hosting a Bible study of the
believers in his neighborhood. Jesus chooses to hang
out with Ralph, that awkward person at work who tells dirty
jokes. Jesus chooses to hang out with Sally across
the street who seems to be a terrible mom and keeps the
strangest hours.
So
that’s Matthew. But there’s another possible
patient in this story. The Pharisees. The pious,
religious folks…leaders, actually. They objected
to the company that Jesus was keeping. And well they
should have! They spent their entire lives perfecting
the art of holy living, following a very, very detailed
list of behavior which would identify them as God’s
people.
The
Pharisees often get criticized, but it’s important
that we understand…they took their faith very, very
seriously. They knew the scriptures…you can
see Jesus instantly connects with them by quoting Hosea. They
used every ounce of energy to keep themselves pure, to
remain separate and distinct from the ungodly. And
so, you can imagine they were very surprised when Jesus
began to do the exact opposite.
The
Pharisees sought holiness by staying away from people they
deemed “unclean.” Jesus sought the healing
of those unclean by being with them. The Pharisees
criticized Jesus because he hung out with those who were
morally sick. Jesus said that was exactly who he had
come to pay a house call on. And when the Pharisees
pushed him on it, Jesus said (as one writer paraphrases
it), “go back home and read your Bibles again.” Go
read about a God interested in merciful hearts, not routines
which take people further and further from those in need.
If
we look at what Jesus is doing here…surely it would
have a huge impact on how we view the church…and
our interaction with the world. There is a tension,
a paradox here. The people of God are to strive for
purity and uprightness. This is all over the scriptures,
Old and New. AND…the people of God are to be among
the people of the world…those who need a doctor. And
sometimes those two things are difficult to hold in tension.
There’s
something that scares me about the church in our culture. There
is now a “Christian sub-culture” within our
country. You can send your kids to Christian schools,
let them listen only to Christian music. You can buy
designer clothing with Christian logos. You can hang
out in Christian bookstores and coffeehouses, and go to
Christian concerts. You can join together with a group
of Christian families to build houses in the same development, insulated
from non-Christian neighbors. In and of themselves,
there’s nothing wrong with these things…but
the problem is that we can start out by seeking a lifestyle
that is an honest attempt to live righteous, godly lives,
and end up defining ourselves by how separate we are from
others. And as we do this…we are much closer
to the Pharisees than we are to Jesus.
The
Pharisees risk being infected with a couple of diseases
that are actually quite familiar to us. First, the “I
Can Do It On My Own” disease. Their whole life
was built on proving their holiness by their own behavior. In
Jesus’ day this had reached the point of absurdity. One
scholar estimates that the law code had grown to over 3,500
individual regulations which had to be kept.
Now,
in our day it sounds a little different…it sounds
like “I can do it. I can try harder. I
can pull myself up by my bootstraps. I’ll have
more quiet times, I’ll memorize more scripture, I’ll
get myself closer to God if it kills me.” And
it just might..until we realize that God has already come
near to us…in Jesus Christ. And longs for us
to just give in and acknowledge his presence. When
the author CS Lewis became a Christian later in life, he
described a growing realization of “the steady, unrelenting
approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet.” And
he eventually gave in, and acknowledged God’s presence … and
his need. We are not alone.
“I
can do it on my own” in our culture also comes out
like this sometimes: “I just need to get to
know myself, I need to figure out how to love myself…” then
things will fall into place. But we are not alone…and
God says “I’ll show you who you really
are, and why you’re lovable. Look to me.” Here’s
how John Calvin said it:
“…it
is certain that man never achieves a clear knowledge
of himself unless he has first looked upon God’s
face, and then descends from contemplating him to scrutinize
himself.”
The
last disease is the worst, and the most deadly. It
is the one, I think, that Jesus saw most clearly in the
Pharisees…in the religious people. It’s
the disease that says, “I’m
not sick.” Jesus told the Pharisees that he
had come for exactly those who were sick…and implies
that if the Pharisees felt no need for what Jesus offered: mercy,
grace, forgiveness, love, an identity…then
they were fooling themselves.
Jesus
is especially hard on the religious…and here we
sit. In the last book of the New Testament, the book
of Revelation, the word of Jesus comes to the church…TO
THE CHURCH…of Laodecia:
“You
say ‘I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not
need a thing.’ But you do not realize that
you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked.”
And
so, Jesus says…
“Behold,
I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my
voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with
him, and he with me.”
To
the church…to the religious, Jesus says these things.
Friends,
the most dangerous thing in the world is to not be able
to recognize our own sickness, our own need before God. Everything
in our world wants to tell us, “You’re okay.” Particularly
if you’ve achieved some success professionally, or
materially, the world says You’re Okay! Tell
yourself over and over, when you feel empty inside…You’re
Okay, You’re Okay.
But
the clear word of scripture is: We’re not okay. We
need God. Without Him, we are so inward focused that
our lives become a mess, no matter how they look on the
outside. We need Him to come and heal us when we meet
Him for the first time…we need Him after we’ve
followed Christ for years and years…and to one extent
or another, at different time…begin to believe a
lie…that we’re not sick. The church in
the ’90s has even begun to eliminate from our vocabulary
words that insinuate there might be a problem…like
sin, repentance, confession, forgiveness. Old-fashioned,
judgmental…after all, “I’m not sick,
and I don’t need a doctor.” And the more
we say it, the harder it is to hear the voice of Jesus
saying “Follow me.”
As
we read this story this morning, there is a huge pull to
see in each of these illnesses…danger for other
people…but not for me. We need to fight against
that. Other people look like tax collectors, I don’t. Other
people are self-sufficient, not me. Other people are
sick…but I’ve been a Christian for a long
time, and I’m healthy. So many times, it is
not until we get in a crisis…of health, or financially,
or someone we love is in trouble…that we cry out
and say, “God…I need you.” When
Jesus looks at Matthew…he looks at us…and
says, “I’m here. I love you. I
want you to follow me. I will heal you…all
of you.”
There’s
one other thing to think about as well. When we don’t
think we need God or just pay lip service to that, when
there’s no sense of dependence….then we have
little motivation to reach out to other people, to hang
around with tax collectors. If we’re not living
in dependence…then we don’t really believe
that God would have anything important to do with those
around us. The best evangelists among us are those
people who have found themselves flat on their faces before
God…and found that Jesus met them right there. They
know what it is to be healed, to hear Jesus say “follow
me, right now, right where you are.”
The
words of Jesus hang in the air:
“For
I did not come to call the righteous but sinners…I
did not come for the well, but for the sick.”
So
I want to ask you: How do you see yourself? How
do we see our church? And what about little Taylor’s
question? IS Jesus a doctor?
Amen.
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