In the name of the Father and of the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.

 Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory to God.

When we hear about tax collectors in the Gospel, we think the worst. They are really scum of the earth kind of things, tax collectors—"publican" is another word for the same job. They are employed in ways that are not justifiable for anything except earning loads of money. It's all that you get out of it because everyone's going to hold you in contempt, and with good reason, because the way that this whole system works is basically inherently corrupt.

To be a tax collector in the ancient world, you don't actually have a salary. Instead, what you do is you collect the taxes, and then everybody understands that you're going to squeeze some extra money out of each person and keep that for yourself. And there's no correct amount. So it's just whatever you can intimidate or whatever the person is giving you. And so tax collectors are infamous. They're not well loved in our own time. They're infamous at this time as thieves and corrupt swindlers.

And of course, on top of all this in Judea at this time, they are the agents, the ones right up in your face all the time, representing an unloved foreign power that is ruling the people. And so all those who hated injustices among the people cried out to God for mercy, for salvation, that He would send the long-promised Messiah to restore His kingdom and to establish righteousness for all generations.

And now when that promised Messiah has indeed come, Jesus Christ our Savior, He goes to one of these tax collectors and says to him, "Follow me."

It's kind of embarrassing, you know, that He's picking—not just asking Matthew, come join the crowd, all these that are following me. It's not that He's asking him to be among the seventy apostles, or not only the twelve, but one of the four Evangelists. The Gospel that we have depends on Matthew with three others inspired by God to write the Gospels that we have.

And it's a bit like if He went and chose a used car salesman, or probably worse than that, a telemarketer—worse, like a scammer or a drug dealer—and said, "Excellent, great. I want you to be one of my pastors, one of those that is going to be the face of the church, the voice of the Gospel that is going to be proclaimed throughout all the earth, even to the ends of the universe."

The fact is that Jesus passed by many righteous and upstanding people, those of good reputation, those loved in their community, to seek out Matthew, this tax collector. And He somehow sees something in his heart even right there. He's in the tax office collecting the money in the way that I described when Jesus meets him. He's not at his best. And Jesus says to him, "Follow me."

And Jesus knows who it is that He's speaking to. And He knows his inmost heart. And He recognizes what all others do not—that even though Matthew is consumed day after day with this ugly business of collecting taxes and his own little cut on top of it to pay the bills, when the Lord comes to him, his heart is ready.

Immediately he rises up, leaves behind all that work in the tax office, and follows Jesus for the rest of his days.

And when the Pharisees challenge Jesus about this, He explains yet further that God has not come to call the righteous but sinners to repentance. That those who are well do not need a physician, but those who are sick.

Brothers and sisters, this is the heart of the Gospel—this healing, this wholeness that is needed by us all. This repentance, turning our lives around away from those pursuits, that business that is corrupt and destroying us and harming other people, turning away from that way of life that is ruining us and darkening our souls, and toward the One who will grant us light and life, healing and restoration. That's what the Gospel is all about.

And Matthew knows it from the inside. He knows it himself in his own very heart that has been restored.

Those Pharisees saw only tax collectors and sinners. They did not see the possibility of repentance. And while their eyes were filled with everything that consumed them with contempt in Matthew and the other tax collectors and sinners that were sitting there at the table with Jesus, they did not see the need in their own hearts, what they were lacking in their own lives. They imagined that they were well and had no need of a physician, that they were well-founded in the hearts of the people of God. They weren't lost in need of a shepherd. They weren't dying in need of resurrection.

And so the Lord passes them by because their hearts are not open. But these sinners and tax collectors are ready to hear the Gospel. They are ready to repent and find what they need.

Brothers and sisters, by God's grace, we have come to the beginning of the Advent season, the Nativity Fast. Forty days leading us up to the coming of the celebration of this long-promised Messiah, the birth of our Lord and God and Savior Jesus Christ according to the flesh.

We are given this opportunity in our own lives, this invitation to turn our lives away from the business that consumes us, that we imagine is so valuable, so pressing, but that fills us up with things that do not give us life, that do not lead us to the light of all. To leave that behind, to repent, to turn towards our Lord and God and Savior and find what it is that we need. To turn away from looking at the failings of others and to recognize what needs to change in our own lives. To seek out healing and wisdom, strength and spiritual nourishment from the God who loves to show mercy on us. To allow our hearts to recognize that longing that is hidden within us—that need for something greater than anything this world can provide.

So that we ourselves may find mercy and grace in abundance. Not just for our own lives, but for us to be able to share with others around us. That all of us may learn to repent and find the One who brings light and life, the gospel to all the world. Amen.

Glory to Jesus Christ. Glory forever.