TAX COLLECTOR WHO BECAME AN APOSTLE

 

SERMON BY FATHER FRANCIS MAPLE - LINK HERE

TAX COLLECTOR WHO BECAME AN APOSTLE

 

Men in Palestine were often given two names and Levi is better known to us as Matthew – which means the gift of God.  He was a tax collector by profession, one of the ostracised group of Jews because they worked on behalf of the Romans, applying pressure on unwilling people to pay their taxes.  He would have been accustomed to seeing many unfriendly faces.

 

In contrast Jesus approached him with great friendliness and respect, and asked him to leave his work and become one of His Apostles.  Matthew's customs office was at Capernaum on the seashore and often he must have listened to Jesus preach and teach.  Something in the invitation of Jesus went straight to his heart and so when the day came for him to be called he was ready.  He must have felt greatly honoured to have been singled out by Jesus with this personal invitation.  The Jews had no time for Matthew, seeing him only as a sinner and outcast, but Jesus had the ability to recognise in this man the potential for him to be the Apostle, evangelist and saint.

 

When Matthew left his former profession he did not turn his back upon his fellow tax collectors or his friends.  He sought to make them aware of the message and meaning which His new Master had brought into his life, demonstrating a great evangelistic concern by inviting them to his home for a feast so that he could introduce them to Jesus.  Matthew learnt so quickly that the answer to life was not to be found in gold but in God, not in money but in his Master Jesus.

 

Saint Luke in his account of the response of Matthew says that he rose up, left all and followed Jesus.  But there was something which Matthew did take with him … his pen.  It is most likely that what Matthew did was to collect and edit the first collection of the sayings of Jesus and his account of the teachings of Christ formed the basis of the first Gospel.

 

Matthew, whom his contemporaries despised because of his profession, became the first person to present to the world an account of the teachings of Jesus.  It would be impossible to estimate the debt each one of us owes to this once despised Matthew.

 

Once Jesus had brought together the team that was to accompany Him during His three year ministry throughout Palestine, His next task was to commission them.  This involved laying before them the broad outline of His ministry - to preach, teach, heal the sick and cast out demons.  But in order to become true disciples of their Master, they had to learn to think and act like Him.  This could only be done by spending time with Him.  We all want to be disciples of Jesus, lingering in His presence, gazing upon His face and getting to know Him intimately.  But do we spend enough time with Him?

 

The Gospels are silent as to what Matthew said and did while he was in Jesus' company.  Nevertheless, it becomes clear that he had understood the meaning of the ministry, for his Gospel presents Jesus in a light that is not quite captured by any of the other evangelists.  In it he presents Jesus as the Messiah, the one foretold by the Hebrew prophets, and traces the fulfilment of the Messianic prophecies.  It is Matthew who has handed onto us the Lord's Prayer, given to the Apostles by Jesus and recited countless times every day by Christians everywhere.  This prayer teaches us to get our priorities correct, giving God His due first and then praying for our needs.  Matthew writes much also about the Kingdom of God, which Jesus described in numerous parables.

 

Today let us thank God for the life and work of Saint Matthew and him personally for taking the time to write his Gospel and present Jesus to us in his unique way.