Despised

Advent 2025, Day 13

Luke 5:27-32

            Who knows how he became a tax collector? Maybe he craved the financial or physical security such a position offered. Maybe he felt forced into this work somehow by the Roman oppressors. Maybe he was fleeing an even worse situation. Or maybe he Just didn’t care what anyone else thought. 

            Whatever the case, he is now seen as a traitor and a backstabber. He spends his days exploiting his own people, and his own people despise and reject him. There is no way he can ever go back. Forgiveness for such betrayal must seem impossible. He is branded forever by his occupation. He lives on the margins: not a Roman, no longer an Israelite.   

            Surely this despised man must also despise himself. One can feel no deeper loneliness than his own self-loathing. Worse than being invisible is being detested. 

            Then Jesus comes along. Jesus sees Matthew—I mean really sees him. He doesn’t see a traitor. He sees a sick man. A dying man who needs a doctor. 

            “Come on.” Jesus doesn’t flinch. “Follow me.”

            What does Matthew have to lose? Well, everything. But everything, even all his wealth, feels like nothing when you are worse than an outcast. It doesn’t seem to take Matthew much deliberation. Jesus sees, Jesus calls, and Matthew follows. 

            Such is the power of this love. Jesus looks past the mess you have made of yourself, the rejection of others and the self-hatred that defines you. He sees the soul he created before the world began, the soul now sick, now crying for a Healer. This is what he came for. 

            He comes into your bad choices, into every mistake you have made, every selfish thing you have done in desperation to protect yourself. He comes into your fortress of loneliness and shame and knocks it all down and takes everything. 

            And he gives you himself. 

            Then he throws a party and invites all your friends. I’m telling you; Jesus knows how to have fun. And all the self-righteous people show up with their outrage and accusations, and Jesus just grins at them and says, “This is why I came.”

            Jesus picks the outsiders. He doesn’t see what others see. Though his choices are all good ones, he, too, is a pariah. He is despised and rejected by others. But he knows the path set before him leads to joy. This joy he also offers to you. 

            The Physician came to bring you healing. It is possible to leave all your messy choices behind. It is possible to get up, shake off your self-pity, and just do it. Just follow. Could be he wants to throw you a party. Could be he wants you to be one of his best friends (I guarantee it). Could be he will fill you up with his love and send you out to give it away to others. 

            He sees you. He’s calling you. Get up and go.