The writer of the gospel of Matthew shares his story of being called to follow Jesus. It is an amazing story contained in one verse. “As Jesus passed on from there, He saw a man called Matthew sitting at the tax booth, and He said to him, ‘Follow Me.’ And he rose and followed Him” (Matthew 9:9, ESV).
Jesus never did anything haphazardly, so He did not decide on the fly to call Matthew to follow Him, but clearly did so with a purpose in mind. However, as we learn of what Matthew did as a living this was surprising call. Jesus calls a tax collector to become one of His twelve disciples.
Matthew was Jewish – if you look in the other gospel accounts of his call, his name is Levi – so gathering taxes to give to the Roman government was seen as being a traitor to his own people. Accordingly, on the scale of popularity among his peers, he was at the bottom. Jesus knew this and He called him anyway.
Matthew did not hesitate to follow Jesus. The account of this story in Mark’s gospel states that Levi (Matthew) “immediately” followed Him. Tax collectors of that day were well paid, so it was no small thing for Matthew to walk away from it all to follow this man he had never met.
There must have been something rather special about this man for Matthew to “immediately” leave the safety and security of a career to follow an unknown Rabbi.
We do not know what Matthew was thinking, but we do know what he did right away. He called all those within his sphere of influence and threw a party! Jesus, along with His first few disciples also came.
This did not go over well with the religious establishment, who questioned Jesus’ wisdom in hanging out with “tax collectors and sinners.”
The words that Jesus spoke must have stunned them: “Those who are well have not need of a physician, but those who are sick. Go and learn what this means, ‘I desire mercy, and not sacrifice.’ For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners” (Matthew 9:12-13). It seems that He did not call the religious, but the irreligious.
When Jesus calls, we are to follow Him immediately. There is no good reason to question why and to dither over the consequences of following Him. Those that did question and gave excuses were gently reprimanded.
In our age, it is time for people to revisit the call of Matthew. He left everything to follow Jesus, without question or doubt.
Faith is a strong word that should remind us that the righteous live by faith from the beginning, and fully express that faith by following Jesus to the end. It is time for us in the West to cease our endless questioning and to start following Jesus, as Matthew did.
Jesus is calling you to follow Him; what is your response?