The Offense of Grace
Most religions of the world have some things in common. One is the belief in a higher power that can impact life in either a positive or negative way. Religions also share practices like worship, kindness, compassion, and community. But what is the goal of these practices?
The fundamental goal of all religions is to enable worshipers to connect with the object of their worship. To reach that goal, they must find a way to be acceptable to the god or gods they worship. Subjectively, they concern sin and the sinner. Objectively, they seek forgiveness of sin and welcome to the sinner.
Granted, not all religions have a concept of sin. But most of them operate on the premise that the worshiper must DO something to make him or herself acceptable to the one being worshiped. The Rabbinical traditions of Judaism in Jesus’ day followed this premise. All of their cumbersome observances were only an attempted answer to the question, “How can a person be just with God?”
Judaism, as practiced in the time of Christ, stood silent and powerless regarding the forgiveness of sins. It had no word of welcome or help for the sinner. The very title, “Pharisee,” meant “separated one,” and it implied that sinners were excluded. We see this mindset and its effects repeatedly in the Gospels. Pharisees believed that the unlearned or ignorant in the Law could neither be right with God nor live righteously. Contact with such people made one unclean.
Understanding this concept is critical to the proper interpretation of the healing of the paralytic (which we looked at last time) and the text before us today. In the minds of the religious leaders, one needed to clean up their life before coming to God. Once that happened, God would accept them. So, when Jesus welcomed sinners and offered them grace, the scribes and Pharisees were offended because it was contrary to their whole belief system. I’ve titled my teaching “The Offense of Grace.”
That Jesus introduces this concept of grace so early in His ministry is instructive. His miracles of curing human sickness and curing the sickness of the soul showcased His power as the Great Physician.
So, follow along now as I read Mark 2:13 to 17. Follow the sequence of events and the varied reactions to the grace of Jesus.
The sequence of ACTIONS in this text shows us how grace is restorative to the sinner but offensive to the self-righteous. The actions are the call to a sinner, the community of sinners, the contempt of the scribes, and the correction of the Savior.
The First ACTION is,
The Call to a Sinner
Levi was a tax collector for the hated Roman government. Jesus met him, in the words of our text, “…sitting at the tax office.” Sitting at, is literally sitting on the elevated platform or bench, which was the principal feature of the toll office. This customs office was at Capernaum, the landing place for the many ships which traversed the lake or coasted from town to town. It wasn’t only for those who had business in Capernaum but for those who would connect there with the great road of eastern commerce that ran from Damascus to the harbors of the West.
Of the two kinds of tax collectors in Jesus’ day, Levi was among the group that was most hated, the Mokhsa. They were responsible for collecting duty on all...
