Us Too - Fourth Midweek Worship in Lent
Author: Pastor Carolyn Hetrick
April 02, 2025
Dining and friendship go hand in hand, and not just in Jesus’ day. Some of you are old to remember the movie “Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?” From my daughter’s youth I remember the movie “Mean Girls,” where high school
students draw a map of who can sit where in the cafeteria. Our dining practices reflect our social realities.
People In Jesus’ day knew their place or were kept in it and nowhere was this more intimately played out than at a meal. Unlike in our world where we create distance and move chairs, folks ate at a low U-shaped table with people on three sides, reclining with their head at the table close to the chest of the person next to them. Eating was done with shared dishes and breaking food by hand. A lot of the practices around washing feet and hands in such settings made absolute sense.
But beyond the physical aspect, think about it. How close do you want to be to someone you don’t approve of, or you’ve been told is an enemy or worse?
Human nature creates separations for these reasons too. And sinners are to be separated. We don’t know what other sinners were at Levi’s house, but we do know there were tax collectors there, who seem to be given their own category.
They were hired to do a job by the Romans who didn’t care how the taxes got collected, nor did the local authorities, so long as they were. The writing of rabbis classified them as robbers making their way at the expense of those they would otherwise be sharing a table with. They were not paid an actual wage, so they had to collect more than was due or else they worked for free. As Jews working for the Romans, they were traitors diverting taxes from already impoverished people to send them to an exploiting government. So not surprisingly, tax collectors didn’t have a lot of social options except other “sinners.”
It's not surprising that Jesus sees Levi the tax collector and invites him to follow. No one is complaining that Jesus called or ate with Levi, after all Jesus is bringing a sinner to repentance. Now that Levi is in Jesus’ company perhaps Levi will change. The problem is that Levi throws a party with his same old crowd!
It’s that Levi invites a host of other sinners and tax collectors to follow. And Jesus and his disciples blend in without batting an eye. Jesus and his disciples eat with them and do not demand their repentance.
Jesus’ ministry began when he proclaimed that the kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe in the good news! But he accompanies sinners without openly condemning or criticizing their behavior. How can Jesus not only welcome sinners but invite them to participate as disciples in his ministry without repenting?
How can he enjoy their company without scolding them?
Jesus is always changing the world through relationships. What is almost unbelievably remarkable is that he chooses friendship, available to everyone, as the means of changing the world, people and societies. Against the overwhelming swirl of the noise around them, Jesus gathers them together and in refusing to scold individual sinners to repent, he honors their common humanity- “this one too is a son of Abraham.” He refuses to endorse the shame they bear at the hands of others perpetuating
the power of sin. We see this long before the table at Levi’s house in Mark.
A man with an unclean spirit burst into the synagogue, crying out, “What have you to do with us, Jesus of Nazareth?” Jesus doesn’t cast out the man, he casts out what makes him unwell and restores the man to his community. When Simon’s mother-in-law is in bed with a fever, he doesn’t question why. He simply lifts her up and restores her place among them so the meal they will share can be served. Then the whole town gathered at the door in one ever-growing community of people who would be redefined as those who are restored to an ever-bigger table.
When a man isolated by leprosy tells Jesus his life can change if Jesus is willing, Jesus quickly responds with “I am willing!” Jesus then encourages the man to go show the religious community so he can be restored to their tables. Not a word of repentance. Jesus doesn’t even bat an eye when a group of folks, probably sinners, cut a hole in a roof to lower a paralyzed man down into the room to be healed. Without a single word of repentance, Jesus tells the man his sins are forgiven AND stand up and walk. This is an apparent contradiction between the moral teachings of a rabbi and his open embrace of sinners.
The first generations of Jesus’ followers probably treasured these stories because they could identify with the characters. Can we?
Brian was only 12 when he arrived in a juvenile detention facility. As a child he observed his parents fight and often his father would walk over to the gun cabinet, get a loaded gun and point it at his mother with “one more word and I’ll take you out!” One day Brian and his sister were fighting over cereal and Brian walked to the gun cabinet and got the gun, pointed it at
her and said, “One more bite and I’ll take you out!” She called his bluff and took another bite. Once at the facility, the staff decided they would wait to bring up why Brian was there until he raised it. Months passed and the staff was concerned. Brian was compliant but also devoid of any emotion. Now what? He was not well. One day a staff member took him fishing and over
lunch said, “Brian, I really enjoy being with you!” Brian replied, “You wouldn’t if you knew why I was here.” The staff member replied,” I know why you’re here.”
“You do?”
“Of course I do, we all do.”
Confronted with such unconditional acceptance and blessing, Brian began to sob, letting his emotion come through for the first time in months. It was a turning point in his life. Brian had committed the unimaginable against his sister over a bowl of cereal. His salvation didn’t come through the condemnation of his behavior. He could do that well enough on his own. It came through blessing- the acceptance of his presence regardless of his history. 1
Jesus’ companionship with “sinners” had no strings attached. He neither scolded them nor directly addressed their sins or corruption. While we cannot fully understand this, suffice it to say that in a world where reputation, honor and shame are forged by the company we keep, Jesus’ companionship with sinners opened him up to challenge, yet he never wavered and many came to faith and do still. There are all kinds of sins and separations.
Sometimes our repentance comes in letting go of the narratives that no longer serves us for the welcome of the table that saves us. And it comes in our being the sinners Jesus uses to embody the most powerful thing of all-to be able to say to anyone who came here struggling, hoping to eat with Jesus, “We know why you’re here. Us too.”
AMEN
Citations
1 Carey, Greg. Sinners: Jesus and His Earliest Followers, pp 34-35.
Copyright Rev. Carolyn K. Hetrick, 2025 All rights reserved. May not be reproduced in whole or in part without written permission.
Sermon Text: Mark 2:13-17
13 Jesus went out again beside the sea; the whole crowd gathered around him, and he taught them. 14 As he was walking along, he saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax booth, and he said to him, "Follow me." And he got up and followed him. 15 And as he sat at dinner in Levi's house, many tax collectors and sinners were also sitting with Jesus and his disciples-- for there were many who followed him. 16 When the scribes of the Pharisees saw that he was eating with sinners and tax collectors, they said to his disciples, "Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?" 17 When Jesus heard this, he said to them, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick; I have come to call not the righteous but sinners."
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