Lectionary: Matthew 9 - June 7, 2026

Well, good morning and welcome to Trinity.

My name is Mike, and I'm one of the pastors here.

And this morning I'd like to invite you to turn in your Bibles to Matthew chapter 9.

Matthew 9 · chapter mention

If you don't have a Bible, we do have a stack of them out in the hallway in the back, so please feel free to hop up and grab one if you'd like.

You can find Matthew 9 on page 763 in the church Bibles.

These short verses tell the story of how Matthew, one of Jesus' disciples and the author of the book we just read from or are reading from, came to know and follow Jesus.

He doesn't share a lot of details.

After all, Matthew knows the story he's telling isn't primarily his story, but the few details he does share reveal a fair bit about Jesus.

One of the things that I love about the Bible is identifying and naming the patterns and connections in the big story that bears witness to God's love for the world.

And I'm struck by how consistent the Bible is.

And how consistent God is.

Last week we looked at the creation story in Genesis 1.

We observed how the patterns in the story reveal God's character, how he works in the world, and what it means for us.

And as I studied Matthew 9 this week, I noticed, what do you know, a strikingly similar pattern in Jesus' actions, and how he works and interacts with others.

So that's what we're going to look at this week.

But first, let's pray.

Gracious God, thank you for this morning for the chance to gather, to worship, to pray, to hear from your word, to welcome children into your family.

And now I pray, gracious God, that as my words line up with your words, that they would fall on ears and hearts ready to receive them and respond.

And gracious God, if I say anything that isn't from you, I pray that those words would quickly be forgotten.

And I pray these things through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

Listen again to Matthew.

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.

Last week we observed that God spoke the world into existence, and he saw that it was good.

And here again, we've got Jesus, the very Son of God, second person, the Trinity.

And it starts out, Matthew tells us that he sees Matthew.

Now you might say, Mike, why is this such a big deal?

Most all of us have eyes.

We see things all the time, and that's true.

But I am more and more convinced that most of us, most of the time, have eyes but don't really see.

We're not really paying attention.

I mean, we see what we want to see, we see what we're looking for, and then our eyes glide right past the rest.

Around 15 years or so, I was driving home and I almost hit a runner.

I didn't have a smartphone at that point, and so I wasn't distracted by texting or Instagram or whatever, but I was pulling out from the grocery store.

Maybe you've done this before.

I was pulling out from the grocery store, and I needed to turn right.

And I looked to the right, and then I looked to the left, but I wasn't really concerned about traffic coming from the right because I was turning right.

Have you done this before?

You pull up to a red light, it's red, you stop, you glance briefly, but you know, I'm gonna turn right on red here.

So I'm looking to the left for oncoming traffic, and then we we don't pay attention again to what's to our right.

And I did that.

I was looking to the left, busy traffic coming, there was an opening, and I quickly go to pull out as a runner comes up the sidewalk to my right.

I see her at the last minute.

I slam on my brakes, and my heart is pounding out of my chest.

She looked at me with like horror and anger, waved something at me, and ran really quickly on past.

I was so busy paying attention to the traffic to my left that I wanted to see, that I felt like I needed to see, that I wasn't paying atten that I wasn't seeing.

I wasn't paying attention to the runner on my right.

We do this with all sorts of things, don't we?

We skim emails and miss details.

I did this last year.

I got an email from my airline about a flight.

Jenny and I were going on a big trip with no kids to Italy.

The email came.

Buried in the email was we've changed your flight time.

And they they hadn't, and so the morning of, I go to check the details, I open the email, I start skimming.

Oh, it changed our flight time.

I should check that.

I look.

They hadn't changed it to a different time of day, they had changed it to two days prior.

Thank God I had credit card points.

And they were like, we sent you the email, which they had, and it was buried.

I was looking but not seeing.

We do this with details and emails.

Or we do it this way: we read the Bible without listening to it, right?

Without really actually reading it.

We skim for what it is we want to see.

Or we walk into a room full of people and we see the people we want to see, the people we're looking for.

We miss others altogether.

You do this, I do this, we do this.

But Jesus doesn't do this.

Jesus doesn't do this.

Jesus sees Matthew, which is significant because Matthew is sitting in his tax collector's booth.

He's collecting taxes.

You feel guilty for avoiding eye contact with a Girl Scout when they're selling cookies?

Sitting at the table, you walk out, you're like, I'm avoiding eye contact, I'm walking straight to my car because you don't want to buy or feel bad saying no about cookies.

Imagine there's someone sitting there to collect taxes.

And not just extra, not just taxes, extra taxes from you.

You think this guy ever gets eye contact from anyone?

This is the guy you try to avoid eye contact with at all costs.

Heck, it's the guy you try to avoid all contact with at all costs.

But Jesus sees him.

Jesus sees him.

And then again in verse nine, Jesus speaks to him.

This isn't the person you want to see.

It's also not the person you want to talk to.

As God spoke into the void and created something out of nothing in Genesis one, so Jesus speaks to the hated tax collector in Matthew 9.

And for Matthew, changes everything.

Two little words from Jesus spoken to a person he sees, and the trajectory of a life opens wide up.

Follow me, Jesus invites.

It's a personal invitation.

It's relational.

It's not small talk.

It's not transactional.

It's a person speaking to a person and inviting that person into a relationship.

It's not about business or transaction or pleasantries.

Jesus sees the overlooked sinner, the one everyone assumed was too far gone, and he doesn't stop there.

He speaks to him and he invites him to know him, be with him, follow him.

Friends, Jesus still does this.

He's still doing this today.

He's still looking for the overlooked.

He's still seeing the forgotten, the hopeless, the hurting, the I'm so messed up.

And the invitation he offers to each of us, no matter where we are in our faith journeys, is the same he offered to Matthew.

Follow me.

I wonder, I wonder.

How might our lives, our neighborhoods, our schools and workplaces be different if we saw people?

If we initiated conversation, not just for the purpose of transaction or business, but for real relationship.

If we saw the overlooked.

Now Matthew doesn't tell us how he responds here.

Do you notice that?

He skips all of that.

Yes, tradition tells us that Matthew, the tax collector, the one Jesus sees and speaks to and invites here in chapter 9, is the very same Matthew who wrote the book we're talking about right now.

It's his story.

He doesn't tell us how he responds, he doesn't tell us what transpired after the seeing, the speaking, the invitation.

But the next thing we know, Jesus is at dinner.

Look at verse 10.

And as Jesus reclined at table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were reclining with Jesus and his disciples.

Last week, if you were here, we observed that God lingered over creation.

What could have been completed in an instant just like that instead took him six days.

And then an extra day tacked on just for rest, which the God of the universe didn't need.

And at the end of each day, scriptures tell us God stopped and looked and saw that it was good.

He lingered over his work and he delighted in it.

And here in verse 10, we find Jesus reclining at table.

He's in a home, presumably Matthew's home, and he's kicked back.

He's put his feet up.

He's not in a rush.

He doesn't have somewhere to be or something to do.

It's not straight to instruction for Matthew, although it is in fact straight to instruction for Matthew, just not the same sort of didactic informational instruction we're used to.

He's instructing Matthew here by modeling something.

Instead, he's sit down, reclining at table.

He's lingering, he's relaxing.

It's still relational.

It's personal.

It's intimate.

Sometimes I think just about my cul-de-sac and how many of my neighbors on my cul-de-sac, how many of their kitchen tables I've sat at?

Surprisingly, not that many.

I mean, think about your own neighborhood, your own friends' server.

I mean, how many kitchen tables have you actually sat at?

Yet here Jesus is.

Presumably a guy he just met, although he's known because he's Jesus.

He's kicking back at table.

And who's lingering with him?

You see?

Tax collectors and sinners, right along with Jesus and his disciples.

They're lingering over a meal in the comfort of a home.

Matthew presumably invited Jesus right in.

Jesus has already seen it with a tax collector, like, how much worse is the inside of his house going to be?

He didn't wait until they'd gotten to know each other better, or until he'd gotten his stuff together or cleaned up his mess of a life, which, if he's anything like most of the rest of us, his life was probably a mess.

And his home was probably a mess.

Meets Jesus and he invites him right into the mess of a life.

The mess of a house.

When was the last time you invited someone into your home to linger over a meal?

Mess and all.

Let's take it a step further.

When was the last time you lingered with Jesus?

Or heck.

Believed that he wants to linger with you.

It all offends the sensibilities of the Pharisees, who are quite certain that Matthew and his friends are the wrong sort of people.

And when the Pharisees saw us, this is verse 11, they said to his disciples, Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?

But the wrong sort of people to the religious types are not the wrong sort of people to Jesus, responds like this in verse 12.

Those who are well have no need of a physician.

Those who are sick do.

So go and learn what this means.

I desire mercy and not sacrifice.

Look, if you think you're fine, that's fine.

And you don't need Jesus.

If that's you this morning, then feel free to carry on.

But if you're not okay, if your life is a mess, or if you're barely holding it together, if you frequently feel overwhelmed in over your head, or have no idea where you're going, well, then you're the very person Jesus has come looking for.

The tired, the overwhelmed, the weary, the chronically ill and overlooked, the hurting, the heartbroken, the too far gone, and I'm tired of pretendings, the I have no idea what I'm doing with my life or even doing here at all.

You are the very people for whom Jesus has come.

And he sees you, the real you.

And he has the same two words for you that he had for Matthew the cheat, Matthew the crook, Matthew the hated, Matthew the sinner.

Follow me.

It's not a come and be my minions, sort of follow me, but an I'd like to linger at the dinner table with you, sort of follow me.

If you struggle to hear that or believe that, then hear what Jesus says next.

He says, I desire mercy and not sacrifice.

If you've got a Bible, open your lap, scribble Hosea 6, 6 in the margin, because that's the reference Jesus is paraphrasing here.

Here's what it says: Hosea 6.6, for I desire steadfast love and not sacrifice, the knowledge of God rather than burnt offerings.

Look, Jesus isn't primarily interested in pedigree or lawkeeping, which are both of particular interest to the Pharisees.

Jesus is interested in a life of faith which works itself out by way of steadfast love.

Let me say that again.

The thing that Jesus is interested in is a life of faith that works itself out by way of steadfast love.

It's an invitation to sinners.

Sinners know their only hope is faith, not good deeds.

And in case there's any doubt at all, Jesus makes it explicit in verse 13.

For I came not to call the righteous, he says, direct quote, but sinners.

We hear these words every week here.

We'll hear them again in just a few minutes after we confess our sins.

This saying is trustworthy.

Do you know it?

And deserving of full acceptance.

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.

And oh, this is good news for me.

Okay, so what?

First, Jesus' priorities are people.

Jesus' priorities are people.

They're relational and not transactional, and this is important.

The way that he prioritizes people cannot be done in a hurry.

Hurrying people don't see people.

Hurrying people turn right and almost hit runners.

Hurrying people don't really speak to people.

Hey, how's your day?

Okay, great, carry on.

Hurrying people certainly don't linger around dinner tables or host slow dinners around their tables.

So Jesus is interested, his priority is people, and his interest is relational.

There are two things I'd like to say about this, and then we'll wrap up.

First, is this what your relationships look like?

If your life is too busy to see people and too busy to invite them in, if you're never quite ready or able to host, might I gently encourage you to pause and linger to take that risk, invite someone into the mess.

Might I gently encourage you to look around and see.

Take a risk, invite someone in.

Don't just invite them out to dinner.

That's great too.

Do that.

But dinner is sanitized.

Right?

Someone else does the cleaning for you, hosting for you.

Usually it's already clean when you get there.

Instead, invite someone into the mess of your home and your life and linger there a bit.

It's convicting for me, I must confess.

A couple years ago, some of you know this, I gave up hurrying for Lent.

It's like, this is what I'm gonna give up.

I'm gonna fast from hurry.

And it was so good.

And there's still vestiges of that in my life.

And as I was writing that, I was like, I should probably do that again.

Give up hurry.

First, is this what your life looks like?

Second, this is how Jesus wants to know you.

Okay?

This is how Jesus wants to know you.

And he's not too busy for you.

He's not too busy for you.

So let me say this.

Don't be too busy for him.

It's really easy in our neck of the woods, isn't it?

Jesus is looking for you.

He's inviting you.

And the response he's looking for, we see in Matthew.

He wants you to invite him into the mess.

Tell him to pull up a chair and kick off his shoes.

Now, maybe you don't actually believe Jesus wants to know you like this.

Perhaps you feel too unimportant or insignificant or imperfect or whatever.

And oh, we're we're all a little bit like that.

Jesus came for the sinner anyway.

Maybe you're here this morning and you're like, I don't know why any of this matters.

My life is just fine.

Like I said, okay.

Jesus came for the sick, not the well.

Maybe you're here this morning and you want that sort of connection with God.

The kind that's hurried and seen, lingers over a meal.

But maybe it's been a little while.

Or you feel insecure about the mess or the size of your kitchen or whatever.

Hear me when I say to you.

You don't need to impress Jesus.

He's already seen the worst of it anyway.

You don't need to impress him.

All you need to do is say yes, okay.

Come on in.

So take a deep breath.

Stop and see.

Listen.

Slow down.

And I'd encourage you today say yes to Jesus.

Invite him on in for dinner.

Linger for a minute.

Maybe look around this room.

Take that same risk with somebody else here today.

Will you stand and pray with me?

Gracious God, we confess, I confess that in Northern Virginia, it is really hard to be unhurried.

It is really hard to slow down and linger over anything.

Because we've got a lot of important stuff to do.

And it's well and good.

But gracious God, I do pray that you would empower us by your Holy Spirit to be the sort of people who see others, who linger.

And oh gracious God, I pray that you would give me a soft heart and a desire to linger with you.

I pray all these things through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.