"This
fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them."
- I'm not sure I've ever heard a phrase that held more good news for all of us. The Pharisees said this as an accusation. So it looks like Jesus has upset the religious people of his day again. This is still Good News.
- The Pharisees wonder why Jesus doesn't spend all his time with them. He has been a dinner guest of some of the major players in the Pharisee party. After all, they're worth spending time with, right?. Because of that, they're more than ready to have Jesus come to them, because they have no need to come to him; they are already “found.” The Pharisees and the scribes were scandalized by Jesus' acceptance of sinners, that he would welcome them and eat with them. The sharing of table fellowship was quite important, maybe even more than it is today. It was fine if Jesus came and ate with them, but for Jesus to eat with sinners? That's just beyond the pale! After all, you could catch sin by being around those sinners... which sounds more like the flu than anything else. They've missed the main lesson and it is really quite sad.
- The so-called sinners are different. Jesus accepts the sinful as they are, accepting them while not condoning their sin, and this give them hope and peace. Sinners come to Jesus; he is the way out of being lost. He has good news for them and he'll also sit down and have dinner, too. Maybe they want to be around him to catch what he has.
- Now about us... Does this have anything to say about us?
- Nobody likes to be reminded that they are human, that they are a sinner. It's impolite and controversial and doesn't make good table conversation. We don't want our faults noticed. (At least, I don't.) We all want to be perfect. We all want to be Superman. Actually down deep, we all want to be God. (It's human nature.)
- Still, in our Lutheran Church, we preach repentance and proclaim forgiveness a lot. In the Brief Order of Confession and Forgiveness both are proclaimed and for two reasons: to remind us that we are sinners and to remind us that we are forgiven. Both are quite necessary and both are dangerous.
- Let me speak about these dangers. Christians run two risks when we talk about sin and sinfulness. First, we might feel and think that we are not forgiven, that all we're guilty of is too much to be forgiven. We might feel that we have not done enough to merit forgiveness, that we are unworthy. We'd be right, and that's why the emphasis is on God's grace and nor our efforts. The danger of being reminded of our sinfulness is that someone might not hear the word of forgiveness. They might get caught up in their own past and might miss the reminder of their future. They might be appalled and deafened by what they've done... and failed to do.
- The second risk is to think or feel that we don't sin or cannot sin. As a member of a congregation I attended in the past said “None of us really sin, do we?” We could forget that we remain both sinner and saint. We could forget that we still have to repent of our sins, not so much to be forgiven as to LIVE forgiven. Repentance, after all, leads to growth and to change. This can be tough but it is where we are to go.
- Today, we heard from the letter attributed to Paul written to his co-worker Timothy. He says this about the ministry of Jesus Christ: The saying is sure and worthy of full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners... Paul goes on to say that he is the worst sinner. Maybe... who knows? We'll have to accept what he says about himself. The truth is that Jesus came among us to save sinners, and like it or not, that's a category we all fall into.
- The parables of the lost sheep and the lost coin show the shepherd and the housewife going to great lengths to recover what was lost... and then throwing a party to celebrate the finding of the lost! This is how much our God cares for us and for all the world. This whole passage is shot through with mission for the Church, because our message is based on seeking the lost so we can all share our joy together.
- In Denver, Colorado in the US, there is a small mission church called the House for All Sinners and Saints, part of the ELCA. Their founding pastor is Nadia Bolz-Weber and she might be a bit scary to some. She's a young woman, heavily tattooed, open to a lot of things and quite different from the usual idea of a pastor. She has a lot of good things to say and has written a few books.
- In her latest book, she writes about sin and forgiveness. I'm going to quote from it and the language is not what is usually heard in the pulpit. It's been said that Pr. Nadia cusses like a trucker. I'm quoting her:
“God’s grace is not defined as God being forgiving to us even though we sin. Grace is when God is a source of wholeness, which makes up for my failings. My failings hurt me and others and even the planet, and God’s grace to me is that my brokenness is not the final word. My selfishness is not the end-all…instead, it’s that God makes beautiful things out of even my own shit. Grace isn’t about God creating humans as flawed beings and then acting all hurt when we inevitably fail and then stepping in like the hero to grant us peace—like saying, ‘Oh, it’s OK, I’ll be a good guy and forgive you.’ It’s God saying, ‘I love the world too much to let your sin define you and be the final word. I am a God who makes all things new.”
- "This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them." This fellow loves all the world and all people so much that sin -and death- will not have the final word. The final word, as the Book of Revelation say, is ‘See, I am making all things new.’ And today, this new day – he welcomes us... and eats with us.
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