cago: Moody, 1983).
Jesus Heralds His Gospel
objective in salvation is to create a true worshiper5 (cf. Phil. 3:3). Our Lord had come into the world to seek and to save the lost. He revealed to a Samaritan woman that His objective in seeking and redeeming sinners is to fulfill God's will in making them true worshipers. Then He invited her to become one.
When Jesus said the Father was seeking true worshipers, it was more than a statement of fact. It was a personal invitation to the Samaritan woman. Do not miss the importance of that invitation. It debunks the notion that Jesus was offering eternal life without making any demand for a spiritual commitment. The Lord of glory does not say "come to the waters" apart from the command, "let the wicked forsake his way" (cf. Isa. 55:1, 7). The call to worship the Father in spirit and in truth was a clear summons to the deepest and most comprehensive kind of spiritual submission.
But the woman was still confused, and one can hardly blame her. She had come to the well to get a simple pot of water, and in a brief conversation, her sin had been exposed and she was challenged to become a true worshiper of the living God. Her heart longed for someone who could take her tangled thoughts and emotions and make some sense out of everything. So she told Jesus, "I know that Messiah is coming . . . ; when that One comes, He will declare all things to us" (John 4:25).
Jesus' reply must have shaken her to the core of her being: "I who speak to you am He" (v. 26). What a dynamic confrontation! This Man who had asked her for a simple cup of water was now standing there, claiming to be the true Messiah, holding forth living water and promising to forgive her sin and transform her into a true worshiper of the living God!
Although the text does not specifically tell us she became a believer, it seems obvious she did. I believe she embraced Him as Messiah and Savior, somewhere in the white space between verses 26 and 27. The hour of salvation had come for her. She would willingly become a true worshiper. She would drink of the Water of Life. The irresistible grace of the Messiah had penetrated her heart. Step by step He had opened her sinful heart and disclosed Himself to her; and apparently she responded with saving faith.
The Lesson of the Witness: This
Man Receives Sinners
The disciples had been in the village buying food, and John tells us they returned "at this point" (John 4:27). The Greek expression means "precisely
5. For a detailed presentation on true worship, see John F. MacArthur, Th e Ultimate Priority (Chicago: Moody, 1983).
He Demands True Worship
at this moment." Apparently they came back just when the Lord said, "I who speak to you am He." Had they arrived any later, they would not have heard the declaration of His messiahship. It must have shocked them to hear Him telling this outcast Samaritan woman that He was the Messiah, since He had never previously told anyone that. John says, "They marveled that He had been speaking with a woman; yet no one said, 'What do You seek?' or, 'Why do You speak with her?' " (v. 27).
The woman's actions at this point strongly indicate that she had become a believer. She "left her waterpot, and went into the city, and said to the men, 'Come, see a man who told me all the things that I have done; this is not the Christ, is it?' " (vv. 28 – 29). She evidenced all the characteristics of genuine conversion. She had sensed her need, she had confessed her guilt, she recognized Jesus as Messiah, and now she was showing the fruit of her transformed life by bringing other people to Him.
It is significant that her first impulse as a new believer was to go and tell others about Christ. The desire to proclaim one's faith is a common experience of new believers. In fact, some of the most zealous witnesses for Christ are brand-new believers. That is because their minds are fresh with the memory of the weight of their guilt and the exhilaration of being loosed from it. That was the case with this woman. The first thing she declared to the men of the town was that Jesus had told her everything she ever did. He had held her sin up to the light, and compelled her to face who she really was. Then He had released her from the shame. That she talked so freely about it shows she had been liberated from the bondage of her guilt.
Jesus had given her a drink of the Water of Life, and she had begun to worship God in spirit and truth. She didn't need to conceal her guilt anymore; she was forgiven.
The way the woman phrased her question seems to imply a negative answer: "This is not the Christ, is it?" But it was not an expression of doubt. If she had come into town and said, "Men, I've found the Messiah," the men would have either ignored her or laughed her out of town. She, an outcast adulteress, was not the most qualified person in town to identify the Messiah. Besides, women didn't tell men anything in that society. So she put it in the form of a question — really a discreet challenge to them. That way they would meet Him with an open mind. She knew Christ would do the rest.
The woman's testimony had a profound impact on the village. Scripture tells us, "From that city many of the Samaritans believed in Him because of the word of the woman who testified, 'He told me all the things that I have done' " (John 4:39). It was the news of how He had uncovered her sin that made such a deep impression. Others, too, responded to Him with zeal (vv. 40 – 42).
Jesus Heralds His Gospel
The reason for such a zealous reaction was that the people were Samaritans. In a sense, they all were in the same boat as the woman. They knew the Messiah was coming to set things right, and most of them probably anticipated His coming with fear. Their perspective was just the opposite of the Pharisees. The Jewish leaders were looking for a conquering victor who would take up their cause and destroy their enemies. The Samaritans had no such expectation. If the Jews were right, they would be the targets of Messiah's wrath.
So when this woman came and announced to the people of Sychar that One claiming to be the Messiah had dealt mercifully with her although He knew all her sin, their hearts embraced Him enthusiastically.
Contrast their reaction with that of the Pharisees, described in Luke 15:2: "Both the Pharisees and the scribes began to grumble, saying, 'This man receives sinners.' " In essence, that is precisely what the Samaritan woman told the men of Sychar: "He is the Messiah, but He receives sinners!" What was repugnant to the scribes and Pharisees was good news to these Samaritans, because they were willing to admit they were sinners.
It was Jesus Himself who said, "I did not come to call the righ teous, but sinners" (Matt. 9:13). Those who refused to acknowledge their sin found Him to be a Judge, not a Savior. He never gave such people any encouragement, any comfort, or any reason to hope. The Water of Life He held forth was given only to those who acknowledged the hopelessness of their sinful state.
God seeks people who will submit themselves to worship Him in spirit and in truth. That kind of worship is impossible for those sheltering sin in their lives. Those who confess and forsake their sin, on the other hand, will find a Savior eager to receive them, forgive them, and liberate them from their sin. Like the woman at the well, they will find a source of living water that will quench forever even the strongest spiritual thirst.
The final chapter of the Bible closes with this invitation, which evokes a picture of the Samaritan woman: "Let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who wishes take the water of life without cost" (Rev. 22:17). While it is free, it is not cheap; the Savior Himself paid the ultimate price so that thirsty, repentant seekers can drink as deeply as they like.
He Receives Sinners but
Refuses the Righ teous
ne of the most malignant by-products of the debacle in contemporary evangelism is a gospel that fails to confront individuals with the reality of their sin. Even the most conservative churches are teeming with people who, claiming to be born again, live like pagans. Contemporary Chris tians have been conditioned never to question anyone's profession of faith. Multitudes declare that they trust Christ as Savior while indulging in lifestyles that are plainly inconsistent with God's Word — yet no one dares to challenge their testimony.
I spent time once with a fellow minister who drove me through his city. We passed a large liquor store, and I happened to mention that it was an unusuallooking place.
"Yes," he said. "There is a whole chain of those stores around the city, all owned by one man. He is a member of my Sunday school class."
I wondered aloud how such a thing could be, and the minister replied, "Oh, he's quite faithful. He is in class every week."
"Does it bother him that he owns all those liquor stores?" I asked. "We've talked about it some," he said. "But he feels people are going to buy liquor anyway, so why not buy it from him?"
I asked, "What is his life like?" "Well, he did leave his wife and is living with a young girl," the minister replied. Then after several minutes of my bewildered and uncomfortable silence, he added, "You know, sometimes it's hard for me to understand how a Chris tian can live like that."
I must confess that it is hard for me to understand how someone who teaches the Bible can assume that a man living in wanton rebellion against God's standards is a Chris tian merely because he claims to be — even if he attends Sunday school every week.
Coming to Grips with Sin
The contemporary church has the idea that salvation is only the granting of eternal life, not necessarily the liberation of a sinner from the bondage of his
Jesus Heralds His Gospel
iniquity. We tell people that God loves them and has a wonderful plan for their lives, but that is only half the truth. God also hates sin and will punish unrepentant sinners with eternal torment. No gospel presentation is complete if it avoids or conceals those facts. Any message that fails to define and confront the severity of personal sin is a deficient gospel. And any "salvation" that does not alter a lifestyle of sin and transform the heart of the sinner is not the salvation God's Word speaks of.
Sin is no peripheral issue as far as salvation is concerned; it is the issue. In fact, the distinctive element of the Chris tian message is the power of Jesus Christ to forgive and conquer our sin. Of all the realities of the gospel, none is more wonderful than the news that the enslaving grasp of sin has been broken. This truth is the heart and the very lifeblood of the Chris tian message. No message that excludes it can purport to be the gospel according to Jesus.
It is absurd to suggest that a person can encounter the holy God of Scripture and be saved without also coming to grips with the heinousness of sin and consequently longing to turn from it. In the Bible, those who met God were invariably confronted with an overwhelming sense of their own sinfulness. Peter, seeing Jesus for who He was, said, "Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!" (Luke 5:8). Paul wrote, "It is a trustworthy statement, deserving full acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners, among whom I am foremost of all" (1 Tim. 1:15). Job, whom God Himself identified as a righ teous man (Job 1:1, 8), said after seeing God face-to-face, "I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes" (Job 42:6 KJV). Isaiah, seeing God, gasped, "Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts" (Isa. 6:5).
There are many other examples of men and women in Scripture who, having seen God, feared for their own lives — always because they were smitten with the weight of their own sin. It is appropriate, then, that when Matthew relates his own conversion experience, the central truth that emerges is Christ's mercy to sinners.
Matthew 9:9 – 13 describes the incident, along with the controversy that ensued. In one of the most important statements ever recorded in the Bible, the Lord says, "I did not come to call the righ teous, but sinners" (v. 13). This statement contains a full perspective on Jesus' ministry, a summary of the message of Chris tian ity, a close-up of the nucleus of the gospel, and the basic rationale behind the incarnation.
Why did Jesus come into the world? To call sinners — those who know they have a terminal disease, those who are hopeless and desperate, those who are hurting, those who are hungry and thirsty, those who are weak and weary,
He Receives sinners but Refuses the Righteous
those who are broken, those whose lives are shattered, those who are desperate — sinners who know they are unworthy yet long to be forgiven.
Jesus' words were aimed at the self-righ teous Pharisees, who, like many today, thought they were righ teous and without any real spiritual need. The truth is that unless people realize they have a sin problem, they will not come to Christ for a solution. People do not come for healing unless they know they have a disease; they do not come for life unless they are conscious that they are under the penalty of death; they do not come for salvation unless they are weary of the bondage of sin.
Thus Jesus came to expose us all as sinners. That is why His message was so penetrating, so forceful. It tore our self-righ teous ness away and exposed our evil hearts so that we might see ourselves as sinners.
Receiving Sinners
Throughout his gospel, Matthew argues that Christ is the Messiah of Israel. In chapters 8 and 9 he describes a series of Jesus' miracles categorically selected to show the range of the Messiah's credentials. He lists nine miracles, showing Jesus' power over sickness (8:1 – 17), over nature (8:23 – 27), over demons (8:28 – 34), over death (9:18 – 26), over blindness (9:27 – 31), and over a silent tongue (9:32 – 34).
Matthew's conversion itself falls in among those miracles, right after a spectacular miracle designed to demonstrate Jesus' power over sin (9:1 – 8). Christ had just forgiven a paralyzed man's sins, and in a monumental display of His divine authority, confirmed His deity before the Pharisees by commanding the disabled man to take up his bed and walk. Following immediately on the heels of that narrative, verse 9 describes the call and salvation of Matthew: "As Jesus passed on from there, He saw a man, called Matthew, sitting in the tax office; and He said to him, 'Follow Me!' And he rose, and followed Him."
By this account, which is consistent with Mark's and Luke's versions, Jesus spoke only two words to him: "Follow Me!" And Matthew obeyed. Luke 5:28 adds this significant statement: "And he left everything behind." He forsook all to follow Christ. Matthew was too humble to say that about himself, but Luke did — and it speaks volumes about the nature of Matthew's conversion. He paid a great price, perhaps a higher price than any of the other disciples. A fisherman who followed Jesus could always go back to fishing. But a tax collector who left his station was finished, because the next day Rome would have someone else to take his place. Yet Matthew forsook everything immediately. He didn't say, "Well, I'm coming Lord — but, hey, I could finance this whole
Jesus Heralds His Gospel
operation if You'd just let me grab these bags!" He turned his back on it all, forsaking everything he had.
Matthew was a major sinner, and everyone knew it. By the standards of his day, he was unequivocally the vilest, most wretched sinner in Capernaum. He was a publican, a willing tool of the Roman government, employed in the odious task of squeezing tax money out of his own people. Publicans would buy franchises from Rome. That gave them the right to collect taxes in a certain town or district. By buying into the Roman system, Matthew had revealed himself as a traitor to Israel. Nothing in the mind of the Jewish people was more offensive. He had hired on to the conquering pagans who oppressed his own people and in doing so established his reputation as the worst kind of turncoat, heretic, and renegade.
Rome required each publican to collect a certain amount of taxes. Anything they acquired over that they could keep. The Roman government, in order to keep their tax collectors happy and productive, supported them in the wildest excesses and abuses. They virtually had a free hand to overcharge people and extort whatever they could from their countrymen. A shrewd publican could amass a huge fortune in very little time — all at the expense of his own oppressed brethren. Understandably, they were regarded with the utmost contempt by all Israel.
Publicans were so despised by the Jews that they were barred from the synagogues. They were regarded as unclean beasts, treated like swine. They could not be witnesses in any court of law because they were not to be trusted. They were known as flagrant liars, classified with robbers and murderers.
Most Jews believed it was wrong to pay taxes to Rome. Looking backward to an Old Testament theocracy, they believed only God should receive their money. That is why the Pharisees tested Jesus, attempting to bring Him into disfavor with the people by asking Him whether it was right to pay taxes (Matt. 22:15 – 22).
Matthew had authority to collect taxes on almost everything. In addition to import and export taxes, he was free to assess bridge tolls, harbor fees, and road-use taxes. He could open every package coming along the road. He could even open private letters to see if business was being conducted. If so, he could also tax that.
His office was located at the confluence of two roads, probably right at the north port of the Sea of Galilee. That would have put him at a strategic point on the road from Damascus and the Orient, where he could tax everyone going east and west. He also could tax the area's highly productive fishing industry.
Note that Matthew was sitting at the tax table. Some publicans, concerned about their reputations, stayed out of the public eye by hiring others to collect
He Receives sinners but Refuses the Righteous
taxes for them. But the really brash ones — the ones who did not care what people thought of them — actually sat at the table themselves, rather than pay someone else to do it. It was one thing to be a publican; it was worse to flaunt it. Rabbinical tradition said it was impossible for a man in his position to repent. You can imagine the gasps from the crowd when Jesus stopped before Matthew and said, "Follow Me."
Matthew must have been a man under conviction. Deep down in his heart he must have longed to be free from his life of sin, and that must have been why he virtually ran to join Christ. He never would have followed Jesus on a whim; he would have given up too much. He surely knew what he was getting into. Jesus had ministered publicly all over that area; everyone in the vicinity of Capernaum knew who He was and what He taught. They had seen His miracles, signs, and wonders. Matthew was familiar with Jesus' rigorous demands for discipleship (Matt. 8:18 – 22). He knew what he was being recruited for. He had counted the cost and was prepared to follow.
Eating with Tax-Gatherers and Sinners
Matthew decided to have a banquet to introduce Jesus to his friends. Like most new believers, he wanted to bring everyone he knew to Christ. Luke 5:29 reveals that Matthew (who was also known as Levi) held the banquet in his own house. Jesus was the honored guest. This gathering was attended by some of the most notorious, base, villainous people in the history of banquets. The only people Matthew knew were sordid types, wretched sinners, because no one else would associate with him. The respectable people despised him. His friends were thieves, blasphemers, prostitutes, con artists, swindlers, and other tax collectors — the riffraff of society.
Supercilious religious types would say, of course, that Jesus shouldn't go to a banquet with such degenerates. That is exactly what the Pharisees thought. But that was not the way of the Savior. Matthew 11:19 indicates that He was known among the people as "a friend of tax-gatherers and sinners." This very banquet probably gave rise to that perception. The Pharisees meant it derisively, but it was nonetheless a fitting title for the Son of Man.
Matthew 9:10 sets the scene: "It happened that as He was reclining at the table in the house, behold, many tax-gatherers and sinners came and were dining with Jesus and His disciples." This was so scandalous to the self-righ teous Pharisees that they could hardly conceal their shock. If he were really the Messiah, they thought, he would be having a dinner for us!
Apparently the Pharisees lingered outside until the banquet was over. Avoiding a head-on confrontation with Jesus, they cornered the disciples and asked,
Jesus Heralds His Gospel
"Why is your Teacher eating with tax-gatherers and sinners?" (v. 11). Rather than an honest question, this was a veiled rebuke, a venting of their bitterness.
On overhearing their conversation, Jesus had His own rebuke: "It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick. But go and learn what this means, 'I desire compassion, and not sacrifice,' for I did not come to call the righ teous, but sinners" (vv. 12 – 13). Jesus' answer is a powerful threefold argument, first appealing to human experience, then arguing from Scripture, and finally resting on His own divine authority.
Jesus' appeal to experience compares sinners to sick people who need a doctor. The analogy is simple: a physician can be expected to visit the ill (or at least that was the case in Jesus' day), so a forgiver should be expected to visit people who sin. It came as a stinging rebuke to the hard-heartedness of the Pharisees: "If you're so perceptive as to diagnose them as sinners, what are you going to do about it? Or are you doctors who give diagnoses but no cure?" Thus He exposed the Pharisees as pious critics who freely defined others as sinners but were utterly indifferent to their plight.
Jesus' argument from Scripture blasted the Pharisees' pride: "Go and learn" (v. 13). This phrase was used in the rabbinic writings to reprove students who were ignorant about something they should have known. It was like saying, "Go back through the books and come again when you've got the basic information." He quotes Hosea 6:6, "I delight in loyalty [Heb., h.ésed, 'lovingkindness'] rather than sacrifice." In other words, God is not concerned with ritual (ceremony) but with compassion, mercy, and lovingkindness (character). The Pharisees, good at ritual, had no love for sinners. God had instituted the sacrificial system and had ordered Israel to follow prescribed rituals, but that was pleasing to God only when it was the expression of a broken and contrite heart (Ps. 51:16 – 17). When the heart was not right, the ritual was an abomination. God is never pleased with forms of religion apart from personal righ teous ness.
The third argument, from His own authority, leveled the Pharisees: "I did not come to call the righ teous, but sinners" (v. 13). Luke 5:32 adds the words, "to repentance." Luke 18:9 describes the Pharisees as "certain ones who trusted in themselves that they were righ teous, and viewed others with contempt." Here, in essence, Jesus is saying to them, "You say you're righ teous, and I accept that as your self-evaluation. But if that's the case, I have nothing to say to you, for I have come to call sinners to repentance."
The Greek word translated "call" here is kaleo m, a word often used for inviting a guest into one's home. Such an invitation is found in Matthew 22:1 – 14, a parable that fits perfectly with Jesus' words to these Pharisees. There, Jesus pictured His kingdom as a banquet. A king sent invitations calling all his friends to a wedding banquet for his son, but everyone who was invited refused to come.
He Receives sinners but Refuses the Righteous
So the king told his servants to invite anyone they could find. These pious, coldhearted, self-righ teous Pharisees were like those who refused to come to the banquet. They would not acknowledge their sin, so they could not respond to Jesus' call.
This is the theme of the gospel according to Jesus: He came to call sinners to repentance. The corollary is that until people have been brought to see that they are sinners, until they realize their thirst, until they feel the weight of sin and long to be rid of it, the Lord will not give them salvation.
Refusing the Righ teous
God receives sinners. The flip side of that truth is that He refuses the righ teous. Not that there are any truly righ teous people, of course (Rom. 3:10). But those who think they are good enough — those who do not understand the seriousness of sin — cannot respond to the gospel. They cannot be saved, for the gospel is a call to sinners to repent and be forgiven. These are frightening words: "I did not come to call the righ teous." The unmistakable message is that Christ's gracious call to salvation is not extended to those who view themselves as righ teous.
The gospel according to Jesus is first of all a mandate for repentance. I mentioned that in relating this account of Matthew's conversion, Luke includes two words Matthew omitted: "I have not come to call the righ teous but sinners to repentance" (Luke 5:32, emphasis added). From the beginning of Jesus' ministry, the heart of His message was a call to repentance. In fact, when our Lord first began to preach, the opening word of His message was "Repent" (Matt. 4:17). It was also the first word of John the Baptist's message (Matt. 3:2) and the basis of the gospel the apostles preached (Acts 3:19; 20:21; 26:20). No one who neglects to call sinners to repentance is preaching the gospel according to Jesus.
Now and then a preacher will smugly say that he does not preach on sin because it is too negative. A few years ago, a nationally known preacher sent me a book he had written in which he redefined sin as nothing more than a poor self-image. The way to reach people, he said, is to bolster their self-esteem, not to make them think of themselves as sinful. There is no gospel in a message like that! Rather than bringing people to salvation, it confirms them in the self-condemning vanity of their own egos.
The truth of the gospel according to Jesus is that the only ones who are eligible for salvation are those who realize they are sinners and are willing to repent. Christ's call is extended only to sinners who in desperation realize their need and desire transformation. Our Lord came to save sinners. But to those who are unwilling to admit their sin, He has nothing to say — except to pronounce judgment.