Book of Matthew

The Life Project: Matthew

Matt Roberts

About a hundred years ago, a man looked at the morning newspaper and to his surprise

and horror, read his name in the obituary column. His older brother had just passed

away from a horrible disease and the newspapers had mistakingly reported the death of

the wrong person. His first response was shock (as I am sure we could imagine). When

he regained his composure, his second thought was to find out what people had said

about him; how the legacy of his life up to this point would read. What an awesome

opportunity for anyone!

The obituary read, “Father of Mass Destruction Dies Today.” It also read that “he was

the merchant of death.” This man was the inventor of dynamite and when he read the

words “merchant of death,” he asked himself a question, “Is this how I am going to be

remembered?” He made a resolute decision that day and decided that this was not the

way he wanted to be remembered. From that day on, he dedicated his life toward the

establishment of worldwide peace. His name was Alfred Nobel and he is remembered

today by the great Nobel Peace Prize that bears his name.

We find a similar story being told “between the lines” of the Gospel of Matthew. We are

introduced to the author as a tax collector. This profession hasn’t been a popular one in

any century but especially in the days of Jesus. Tax collectors were the bottom feeders

of Israel. They took from the poor and the oppressed to give back to the mighty Roman

Empire and padded their own pockets heavily in the process. They were traitors, liars

and thieves who had abandoned all common decency for their own personal gain.

When someone like Matthew showed up in your town you would run and hide hoping

not to be found.

It is interesting to me to read the story of Matthew’s collision with Jesus in Matthew

9:9-13

9

As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax

collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him.

10

While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners

came and ate with him and his disciples.

11 When the Pharisees saw this, they asked

his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?”

12

On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick.

13

But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice”. For I have not come

to call the righteous, but sinners.”

Don’t you get the sense that while everyone else was doing their best to avoid this

scourge that Jesus sought him out. This wasn’t a chance meeting but one that was

divinely orchestrated in heaven. Jesus was putting together his team of 12 and Matthew

was offered the “golden ticket” that read “come follow me”!

Matthew and Jesus must have made quite a pair. A tax collector who preyed upon his

own people to live a life of excess and a powerfully simple carpenter who came to

comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable. I cannot help but wonder what these two

saw in one another. Whatever it was, it lead to one of the most powerful pictures of

relationship we find in scripture. A spoiled rotten thief leaving behind everything once

and for all to follow Jesus down a path of persecution, passion and purpose.

What an honor it was to be in the inner circle of God in flesh; to learn the ways he

spoke, the ways he felt and the ways he responded to the world around him. What an

honor to be able to record those times for countless generations to read and find an

introduction to the greatest life ever lived. Matthew found the chance to change his

legacy with three words “come follow me” and today instead of being a forgotten ancient

thief he is known as a revolutionary follower of Jesus!

It could be easy for us to feel a twinge of jealousy as we read Matthews account; to

wonder where our second chance at life is. Well, I have good news for you today! That

same Jesus that called Matthew out to a new life, is calling you! In John chapter 10,

Jesus says that “i came that they may have life and that they may have it abundantly”.

Abundant life. That’s the call. The call to live life with our Savior. Will you answer the

call fully? Will you follow him fully; casting everything aside the way that Matthew did?

If you will, you will never regret it!!