Kaleo San Diego Church

TEXT

 

Luke 5:27-35: "After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, ‘Follow me.'  28 And leaving everything, he rose and followed him.  29 And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them.  30 And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, ‘Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?'  31 And Jesus answered them, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.  32 I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.'  33 And they said to him, ‘The disciples of John fast often and offer prayers, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours eat and drink.'  34 And Jesus said to them, ‘Can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?  35 The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.'" 

 

INTRODUCTION

 

In the Gospel of Luke there are nine different meal scenes with Jesus.  Not only that, if you add the various sayings and parables that speak about Jesus eating, you'd have even more.  We're going to spend the next nine weeks looking at each of these meals.

 

Eating is one of humanity's most basic practices, something everyone does, and Jesus transforms these occasions into an encounter with Him.  In sharing food and drink with His friends, Jesus was inviting them to share in the grace of God.  His mission was revealed in His eating meals with sinners. 

 

The Old Testament describes the blessing of God's future coming as a party.  One day God's people we sit with their King and join Him at the great feast of the Lamb.  One commentator said the Jesus was the consummate party animal.  Though that certainly is a provocative statement from an academic, it is fairly accurate.  Another commentator said that Jesus ate His way through the Gospel of Luke.  It's an important, and some would call a central, theme to this Gospel.  We're going to spend time learning from Christ just what it looks like to invite others to His party.

 

The way, why and how Jesus eats with people tells us quite a bit about Jesus' ministry and core message of His Gospel.  To understand these meals is really to understand the heart of God.  The communion He desires.  And the cost to bring us into His Kingdom feast.

 

Jesus is speaking about newness of life in the context of this passage.  This is the reason the use of new wine and new cloth are brought up at the end of the chapter and the healings are shown at the beginning and middle.  Jesus is showing us what a new life in a new Kingdom, at the table with a new King, looks like. 

 

The first thing we notice is that new life begins with a calling...

 

 

STUDY

 

I.  The Power of the Call

 

Verses 27-28: "After this he went out and saw a tax collector named Levi, sitting at the tax booth. And he said to him, ‘Follow me.'  28 And leaving everything, he rose and followed him." 

 

Caravaggio:  The Calling of St. Matthew

 

 

 

There are a few things Caravaggio brings out from the text in his painting.  First, look at the suddenness of the call of Christ to Levi to follow Him.  Jesus breaks into Levi's everyday business, when least expected, in the routine of life and suddenly calls him.  Jesus is shadowed and only a small halo is above His head to show His divinity. 

 

Look at how Levi responds.  He's stunned.  He's saying to Jesus "Who, me?"  Also notice the two men on the left, so busy counting their money that they miss the Lord of life.  Look at the two on the right, the younger almost hiding behind Levi and the other, with a sword, looking as if he's about to stand up and do something.  But Peter is there, pointing at the boy to keep him in place. 

 

Also, look at the attire of the men on the left.  They are wearing fairly expensive clothing that was common at this time, showing that Christ still continues to call us in our day.  But notice that Jesus' and Peter's clothing are more timeless.  They are barefooted and wearing clothing that was common in their day. 

 

Also, Jesus' feet are almost turning to leave.  He's so confident of the call of Levi to come, He's about turned to walk out. 

 

One incredibly beautiful feature of this is the hand of Jesus.  It is the same hand in Michelangelo's The Creation of Adam (c. 1511).  Except, the hand in this scene is not God's, but Adam's turned around.  The thought is that Jesus is the second Adam and comes to fulfill what the first Adam failed to do. 

 

This scene is one of heightened tension and we see in the passage we're looking at that in the next scene Matthew stands up, leaves everything and follows Jesus. 

 

New life begins with a call.

 

To be called means that you're no longer in control of your life.  Levi (Matthew) is called, and once he's called he leaves everything and follows Christ.  The call is so decisive, so overwhelming, that it changes his priorities, plans, and purpose for the rest of his days.  Of course we can't take one person's experience as the norm for all of us, but there are some common elements that these calls ultimately share.

 

There a few professions which have no off time.  Doctors, police, and firefighters are always on call even when they're off.  They can be called in at any moment.  Their life is not their own.  The Scripture teaches that every Christian has been called.  They are summoned by Christ to come and to follow Him full time.  Their life is no longer their own.

 

When Jesus becomes central to your life.  When Jesus moves from the fringes into the heart of your life.  When your relationship with Him becomes the most significant relationship to you.  When we take Him home with us in the most intimate of places in our hearts.  This is what the invitation of Levi meant.  It meant that Jesus was to be brought into the central place of our life.  Everything else has become second.  This is a call, a call of coming to him.

 

II.  The Power of Contact

 

Verses 29-32: "And Levi made him a great feast in his house, and there was a large company of tax collectors and others reclining at table with them. 30 And the Pharisees and their scribes grumbled at his disciples, saying, ‘Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?'  31 And Jesus answered them, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.  32 I have not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance.'"

 

This call and new life is the cause for great rejoicing.  And it's right that we rejoice.  It only makes sense that we desire to gather together with a great feast to celebrate this new birth.  There is nothing to compare to this incredible miracle of God to change our hearts and make us lovers of His Son.  It's more important than being married, more important than graduation day, more important than a promotion, and more important than receiving some great wealth.  It is the new birth of a child of God who will live forever with Him.  It is the rescue and redemption of someone who was captured and enslaved.  It is the passage from death to life.  It is no less than the adoption into the very family of God.

 

The parable of the Prodigal Son ends with the father telling his son:

 

Luke 15:32: "It was fitting to celebrate and be glad, for this your brother was dead, and is alive; he was lost, and is found."

Calling and conversion should lead us into contact and communion with God and others.  This was the pattern of the tax collector.  He met Christ and then rejoiced by bringing Him home and feasting with Him as a way of introducing Him to others.  This meal was held in the attitude of celebration and rejoicing.  Matthew left everything!  What was his disposition after doing so?  Did he leave it all and walk home in depression?  Was he sad and upset?  No!  He left everything and with a heart of joyous celebration wanted to throw a party! 

 

This emotion of Levi will always find its place in the heart of someone called by Jesus into new life.  I would even say, very carefully, that one of the ways to know whether or not new life has come is that there is a care about the new life for others.  A heart that has been won by grace will be a heart that desires grace for others.  A soul called by God will desire that others experience that same calling.  A converted child of God never wants to enter God's presence alone.  They want to see as many as possible join them in the great feast with the King!

 

Notice that the Pharisees grumbled at His disciples.  It was Jesus who was invited and yet they grumble at them.  Because where Jesus went, His disciples followed.  Just as Matthew was called to "Follow Me," so the others were called to follow as well.  And where does Jesus bring them?  To a meal with tax collectors and sinners. 

 

Also notice who calls the others at the table sinners.  In v. 29 the group is described as tax collectors and others, but in v. 30 the Pharisees add the more invective description of "sinners."

 

Q-Are Pharisees grumbling against you? 

 

Q-If not, could it be that there is nothing for them to grumble about?  No sinners, no meals, no fellowship with the outcasts that cause them to complain?

 

This dynamic of gratitude and rejoicing moves us closer to others, not further from them. 

 

Q-How have you seen the Gospel of grace motivate you to gratitude and rejoicing so that you want others to meet Jesus?

 

Q-What do you think keeps us from wanting to rejoice and celebrate God's grace? 

 

Q-What do you think hinders us from wanting to invite others to come and feast in the grace of Christ together?  In other words, what keeps us from inviting others into community?

 

It isn't so much that Jesus joined in these feasts and simply plodded through them wishing they were over.  Instead, Jesus calls despised people like tax collectors and sinners to follow Him and then enjoys reclining at their table in their company. 

 

Q- Do we enjoy eating with broken people? 

 

Keeping undefiled

 

The Pharisees' biggest concern was to remain undefiled.  So it makes sense they were distant from sinners.  This is why they guarded themselves from eating with and associating with Gentiles.  Yes, the food laws were important to them, but most importantly they didn't want to become defiled by coming into close contact with someone that was defiled. 

 

To touch the unclean made you unclean.  They didn't want to be contaminated.  They wanted to keep themselves from sinners so they didn't "catch" sin. 

 

How do we do this?  What are the ways we choose not to associate with what we consider "unclean?" 

 

The Pharisees and religious leaders believed that the pure became impure by coming into contact with the impure, both physically and spiritually.

 

Here Jesus eats with the very people the religious tried so hard to avoid.  He comes into contact with them through a meal. 

 

In our Western culture we underestimate the power of community for character formation and development.  When we eat meals, we come into close contact with someone over food.  It is very relational.  This is why most business people realize that when you dine with a client, you don't get much work done, but you do get closer to them.  It's a place you relax and open up.  It's a naturally joyous occasion when you eat what you like and drink what you enjoy with another person who is doing the same. 

 

Friends and family eat together and when you eat with someone you are essentially bonding a kind of friendship and family in that moment.  It not only reminds you of the meals you had with your family, it looks forward to the Wedding Feast that we're anticipating when Jesus returns.

 

Jesus comes and smashes those dietary and communal laws.  It infuriated the Pharisees because they had a good point.  To eat with and touch them would normally make someone ceremonially unclean.  So what is Jesus telling us?  He's telling us that it's not the healthy who need a physician but the sick.  Jesus is saying that what a physician is to our body, He is to our souls.  He is the one to come and heal us.  He was willing to come in and touch the patients, but with a huge difference; Jesus never becomes contaminated. 

 

Jesus shows us in Luke 4 in the story of the leper, how Jesus comes to heal and have communion with the defiled, the broken, and the sick.  This leper comes to throw himself at Jesus' feet at says, "If you will, make me clean."  This is an amazing statement of faith.  He's not asking Him to perform a ritual upon him, to get close to him, or even to speak to him.  This man knew he was unworthy of asking anything.  Yet Jesus, in the strangest of responses, chooses to touch him.  He stretches out His sinless and undefiled hand and touches this leper, a man who perhaps had not been touched for quite some time.  A man completely cut off from embraces and fellowship now receives a touch by Christ's hand upon him. 

 

Jesus didn't need to touch him.  We know stories where Jesus simply says, "Okay, now go back and he's healed."  He speaks and Lazarus is raised from the dead.  Yet this man, at the place of his greatest need, receives not only the physical healing, but the emotional touch of God Himself.  Jesus says to Him, "I will, be clean." 

 

He touches the man, which was illegal because it was against the clean laws, yet He does it anyway and He's not infected and made impure.  This was the way it was through history.  When the clean come in contact with the unclean, only one thing happens, the clean becomes unclean, not the other way around.  Yet Jesus turns everything around.  For the first time, the clean touches the unclean and it becomes clean.  The pure touches the impure and is made pure.  The undefiled touches the defiled and makes it undefiled. 

 

Jesus is showing that when He comes to us there is no place, no history, no guilt, no shame, no stain in our past, no thing that can make Him unclean by touching it.  He comes to bring healing to all areas of our lives because His purity is contagious!  Jesus is saying, "You can't defile Me."  His holiness overcomes our sin.  Why?  Because He's not another moral leader or religious leader telling you how to make yourself clean.  He's the One to makes you clean Himself. 

 

When Jesus comes into contact with us, the clean begins to infect the unclean with cleanness.  It is the opposite dynamic of every world religion. 

 

Religion creates a fragile cleanness.  It's always on the edge and one touch away from falling apart.  Your holiness is always fragile.  So, you have to stay away from the defiled.  You draw lines in your life between you (the good people) and them (the bad people).  Jesus changes all of this.  He makes us clean in Him and this gives us a kind of impenetrable, unbreakable, purity that can never be taken away.  It is a love and grace that isn't fragile and is also contagious. 

 

No one can do this on their own because we all make villains of someone.  Religious people make the irreligious out to be the villains and the irreligious make out the religious as villains.  When I read comments by Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens I'm reminded of just how much everyone needs to have a villain.  For them, Christianity and religious people are the most wicked and evil people there can be.  For many religious people, the homosexuals and abortionists are the most wicked people they can think of so we villainize them.  We all do this in some way or another.  But Jesus comes in to turn things upside down and show us that we are doing this and that His Kingdom operates on a different kind of currency and is run by a different dynamic.  It no longer is how good you've been or how bad you've been; it's a realization that you've been avoiding Him.  Where does it come from?

 

How do you get the power to do this?  Where does it come from?

 

III.  The Power of Conversion

 

Jesus is asked a question about John's disciples.  We learn from the parallel account in Matthew 9:14 that the "they" are the disciples of John.  Jesus not only gets questions from the Pharisees, He also has to answer questions to those for him.  They're asking about whether they should party or fast.

 

Verse 33: "And they said to Him, ‘The disciples of John fast often and offer prayers, and so do the disciples of the Pharisees, but yours eat and drink.'" 

 

Jesus tells them:

 

Verses 34-35: "And Jesus said to them, ‘Can you make wedding guests fast while the bridegroom is with them?  35 The days will come when the bridegroom is taken away from them, and then they will fast in those days.'"

 

The first thing Jesus does is describe Himself as a bridegroom.  Last week we learned that a wedding feast lasted seven days.  There were seven days of festivities in which you wouldn't work, but instead, eat, drink and rejoice.  It would be absolutely absurd to ask wedding guests to fast during such a festive occasion.  In fact, one was not permitted to fast or engage in acts of mourning or labor during a wedding feast.   

 

The Old Testament commanded many more feasts than it did fasts.  It only required fasting on the Day of Atonement, however, Pharisees began to fast twice a week and it became a widespread Jewish practice.  There is nothing wrong with fasting, and it is even quite good to join it with prayer and repentance.  But, Jesus is showing us that what He brings is a fulfillment of our fasting.  He calls us not only to repent but also to live primarily out of faith, so He is calling us to see that our fasting is to lead us to feasting.  To not celebrate with Christ, to only fast and only stay broken seems very holy and very religious, but it isn't the gospel.  The gospel is good news that the Groom has come for His bride and we're to celebrate the occasion!

 

Now, it might be argued that since Jesus has been taken away from us we shouldn't feast but instead fast.  Yet when Christ rose from the dead and broke bread and promised His Spirit, He was promising His presence.  This is how He could promise that He'll never leave us nor forsake us. 

 

The Groom is on one hand gone in that He promises His full return, but He's also here, now, with us.  He dwells with us by His Spirit and desires that the feast that is coming in fullness at His physical return is celebrated now with us by His Spirit as His bride rehearses this great feast together today.  We are to be a rejoicing people that call others to join us.  Right before an important and upscale restaurant opens, it usually throws a party and invites others to come and taste the food.  The restaurant shows what the full feast of its menu will look like tomorrow by giving you a taste of it today.  So we are to give each other and the world a taste of what's to come when the Groom comes to consummate history.

 

Jesus answers them with this beautiful imagery of Jesus as the Bridegroom.  When Jesus refers to Himself as He does elsewhere as the "bridegroom" we have to realize that it is full of instruction and insight to how Jesus saw Himself.  It teaches of the deep and tender love Jesus has for His bride, who believes in Him.  What affection and care does a good groom have for his bride?  This is the closest and most intimate union that exists between a man and a woman and it is the closest Jesus could come to describe the union we have in Him. 

 

It's more than a king and his subject, a master and his servants, a shepherd and his sheep.  It is the closest of all unions, the union of husband and wife.  And just as the husband gives to his wife his name, makes her joined in all of his property or home, he also takes on her debts and liabilities.  Jesus does this for his bride.  He takes on Himself all her sins.  He declares that she is now part of Himself.  How does he do this?

 

So on the one hand we look forward to His coming and celebrate His return today, but we also look back at when He was taken away for us. 

 

Jesus tells them the bridegroom will be taken from them.  He's calling them back to Isaiah 53:8 which foretold of one who would come, God in the flesh, a Savior for His people, a Husband for a bride, who would be cut off from the living.

 

Isaiah 53:8: "By oppression and judgment he was taken away; and as for his generation, who considered that he was cut off out of the land of the living, stricken for the transgression of my people?"

 

The answer to this whole question is given to us by a simple statement of Jesus who was willing to be taken away, to be considered cut off and cursed, willing to be stricken for our transgressions.  He was sent out of the city for us.  He became the leper, He became the paralytic, He became the excluded for us, so that we could be healed and welcomed in through Him. 

 

Our holiness comes to us from Him and can never be taken away because this exchange is a permanent and eternal one.  This means that we can certainly be affected by others, we can be influenced by others, we can even be tempted by others, but they can't make our hearts stray and they can't make us unclean.  We no longer have to have a fragile holiness that keeps us away from others.  We can move out into people's lives and welcome them into ours, into our homes, into our lives to eat with us as Jesus did with the tax collectors and sinners.  C.S. Lewis says:

 

All sorts of people are fond of repeating the Christian statement that 'God is love.' But they seem not to notice that the words 'God is love' have no real meaning unless God contains at least two Persons. Love is something that one person has for another person...And that, by the way, is perhaps the most important difference between Christianity and all other religions: that in Christianity God is not a static thing - not even a person - but a dynamic, pulsating activity, a life, almost a kind of drama. Almost, if you will not think me irreverent, a kind of dance...what does it all matter? It matters more than anything else in the world. The whole dance, or drama, or pattern of this three-Personal life is to be played out in each one of us: or (putting it the other way round) each one of us has got to enter that pattern...Good things as well as bad, you know, are caught by a kind of infection. If you want to get warm you must stand near the fire: if you want to be wet you must get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them. They are not a sort of prizes which God could, if He chose, just hand out to anyone. They are a great fountain of energy and beauty spurting up at the very centre of reality. If you are close to it, the spray will wet you: if you are not, you will remain dry. Once a man is united to God, how could he not live forever? Once a man is separated from God, what can he do but wither and die?

But how is he to be united to God? How is it possible for us to be taken into the three-Personal life?...He came to this world and became a man in order to spread to other men the kind of life He has - by what I call 'good infection'.

We are to live as a people looking back and what He's done gives us humility and reminds us of our sin and what we deserved.  It shows us that Jesus had to die for us and this gives us a heart of incredible sobriety and gratitude.  We also live as people looking forward to His return when the Groom comes for His bride to fulfill history.  We know that it won't always be this way and we can't wait till His Kingdom fully comes.  This gives us hope for our future and a rejoicing over what's to come.  To be the people of God we must look both ways.  This empowers the present for us.

It's no wonder that Jesus condemned the fasting of the Pharisees-the glum look so that everyone might see how holy they are (Matt. 6:16).  Jesus wants our mourning turned to joy, not because we have to fake it, but because Jesus is the center of the party.  Jesus is our new joy. 

We are to remember we're sinners and be quick to repent, but also remember Christ is our Bridegroom and be quick to rejoice.  And when both perspectives are side by side, working together, something strange happens.  We begin to live as a called people, converted by grace and into contact and community with one another by the power and rights of the Groom. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Application for Missional Communities:

 

1. Think of the last person you invited to have a meal with you. How would you describe your relationship with them? Think of the last time someone invited you for a meal. How did you feel?

 

 

In the culture of Jesus' day - and to some extent in our own culture - it embodies acceptance, inclusion, belonging, friendship.

 

• Eating is a common occurrence in Luke (at least nine stories plus other sayings and parables).
• Eating with people is very significant - it embodies the central message of Luke's Gospel.

 

2. Look at Isaiah 25:6-8 and Isaiah 55:1-2.

 

How does Isaiah describe the future that God promises?

God's future will be like a great feast to which all people are invited.

 

3. Why does Isaiah describe God's future in this way?

 

A feast represents provision and enjoyment.

A feast represents acceptance and friendship.

 

4. What is Jesus doing in vv. 27-28?

 

Jesus is feasting with people.

 

5. What message does Jesus give by eating with Levi and his friends?

 

Acceptance and friendship. God's feast is coming.

 

6. Who do the Pharisees think should be invited to God's feast?

 

Good people. Religious people.

 

7. With whom is Jesus eating?

 

Tax-collectors and sinners.

 

8. What was wrong with tax collectors?

 

They colluded with the Romans occupiers - that made them traitors to the nation. They cheated the people. But they were also traitors to God. The Jews were expecting God to defeat the Romans and re-establish his kingdom. So it was not just Jews verses Romans, it was God verses Romans. And the tax-collectors had opted for the Romans.

 

• Now the traitors of the people and of God are partying with God's messiah.

 

Jesus is eating with the wrong sort of people. The Pharisees were looking for God's banquet - they had no problem with that idea. Their problem was with the guest list. The problem is who is invited.

 

9. What does Jesus say he has come to do (v. 31)?

He has come to save sinners. What is a sinner?
With whom do you expect doctors to spend their time? The sick.

With whom do you expect a Savior to spend his time? Those who know they need help.

 

10. Why don't religious people want sinners to be invited to God's feast?

 

It undermines their sense of self-righteous and their religious effort.

 

11. The Jews fasted to call on God to come. Why don't the disciples of Jesus fast (vv. 33-35)?

 

Because God has come. The bridegroom is with them. The feast has begun (vv. 34-35). Now is the time for partying.

 

12. What does Jesus say in vv. 36-39?

God is doing something new. The new way cannot be added onto the old way. It is radically different.

 

13. What are the differences between the old way and the new way?

 

Old Way	New Way
religious	gracious
separate	inclusive
unwelcoming	welcoming
fasting	feasting
grumbling	rejoicing
self-righteous	admitting need
rejecting the Savior	accepting the Savior

 

 

14. Take a moment or two to look at the two lists. Are you living as someone who belongs to the new way?

 

It may be that you want to admit you need a Savior and accept the invitation of Jesus to a new way of life.

 

It may be that you have become part of Jesus' new way, but there are still habits from the old way in your life - grumbling, unwelcoming, self-righteous.

 

The Application was used from Tim Chester's study on An Invitation to a Party.  It was adapted to be used for Kaleo.

 

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