The Tax Collector (1 of 5)
Series: Labels
Jeff Strite
Luke 5:27-32
OPEN: Back in 2002, a newspaper in Massachusetts had this classified ad: ‘‘Unknown item for sale. We know it’s valuable; we just don’t know what it is. If you can identify it, we’ll sell it for $250.’’ (Reader’s Digest 9/02 p. 145)
The Bible is a collection of stories where God knew why people were valuable even though we might not understand why. There are people we might discard because those folks had LABELS which were dismissive of their worth as individuals.
This month we’re going to be focusing on people in the New Testament who were given LABELS’’ that might make us dismiss them as having value to God... or to us. There was Simon the Zealot; James and John, The Sons of Thunder; Doubting Thomas; And of course today - Matthew (Levi) the Tax Collector.
When we think of Matthew, we think of the Gospel that bears his name.
It’s the FIRST of the four Gospels, and it’s unique for a number of reasons. The Gospel starts out by giving us
the Genealogy of Jesus;
it introduces us to Joseph being told not to divorce Mary because what was conceived in her was from the Holy Spirit;
it’s the only Gospel to tell us about the Wisemen from the East and the star that led them to the house where they lived in Bethlehem;
and it’s in Matthew that we read the Sermon on the Matthew and read what is called the ‘‘Lord’s Prayer.’’
And that’s just the first 7 chapters!!!
The focus of Matthew’s Gospel was to convince the Jewish people that Jesus was the Messiah. To do that, Matthew quoted from the Old Testament 99 times (from 14 different Old Testament books). Matthew quoted more from the Old Testament more than Mark, Luke and John ... combined. (Derek Geldart)
You see, if Matthew hadn’t written his Gospel we’d have missed out on a lot about what we know of Jesus. And because the Gospel of Matthew has been so central to our understanding of Jesus, the church has of often held this Apost ...
Series: Labels
Jeff Strite
Luke 5:27-32
OPEN: Back in 2002, a newspaper in Massachusetts had this classified ad: ‘‘Unknown item for sale. We know it’s valuable; we just don’t know what it is. If you can identify it, we’ll sell it for $250.’’ (Reader’s Digest 9/02 p. 145)
The Bible is a collection of stories where God knew why people were valuable even though we might not understand why. There are people we might discard because those folks had LABELS which were dismissive of their worth as individuals.
This month we’re going to be focusing on people in the New Testament who were given LABELS’’ that might make us dismiss them as having value to God... or to us. There was Simon the Zealot; James and John, The Sons of Thunder; Doubting Thomas; And of course today - Matthew (Levi) the Tax Collector.
When we think of Matthew, we think of the Gospel that bears his name.
It’s the FIRST of the four Gospels, and it’s unique for a number of reasons. The Gospel starts out by giving us
the Genealogy of Jesus;
it introduces us to Joseph being told not to divorce Mary because what was conceived in her was from the Holy Spirit;
it’s the only Gospel to tell us about the Wisemen from the East and the star that led them to the house where they lived in Bethlehem;
and it’s in Matthew that we read the Sermon on the Matthew and read what is called the ‘‘Lord’s Prayer.’’
And that’s just the first 7 chapters!!!
The focus of Matthew’s Gospel was to convince the Jewish people that Jesus was the Messiah. To do that, Matthew quoted from the Old Testament 99 times (from 14 different Old Testament books). Matthew quoted more from the Old Testament more than Mark, Luke and John ... combined. (Derek Geldart)
You see, if Matthew hadn’t written his Gospel we’d have missed out on a lot about what we know of Jesus. And because the Gospel of Matthew has been so central to our understanding of Jesus, the church has of often held this Apost ...
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