Matthew 9:9–13Scripture
Everybody open your Bibles to Matthew chapter 9 and we're going to look at verse 9 through 13 this morning.
9 through 13. How's everybody doing? So, did you get fathers? Did you get celebrated this morning a smidge? I woke up to some coffee was an espresso. That was kind of awesome. And then some other little goodies. And so I was really thankful for that. Brooke got me some little trinkets, some nice gifts. I was actually It's always good to be acknowledged. I read it's funny because as you move close to Father's Day, you get all these kind of interesting memes out there about I don't know, they must be they must be built by men, I would assume, on social media and they basically are making cracks at how you come on Father's Day and you just kind of get beat to smitherines, but on Mother's Day, mothers get celebrated and praised and so there's a interesting statistic that just came out by Bara and in this statistics it basically said that Father's Day is the lowest attended service in the entire year in America.
Introduction
It's the lowest attended and I was discouraging, you know, and I think last year I made a mention of that before Father's Day because I read it then and then it seems to pop up in the algorithm every year, maybe because of the articles I read or whatever. That was discouraging. Really discouraging. And I know that the way that we counteract that as men is we make funny memes about why we choose to not lead our family to church.
We of course blame the church, the preaching, the sermon, Scripture. You didn't praise me enough. You didn't celebrate me enough. You didn't make me feel good enough. That's pretty cowardly. Right? We can make excuses all day long about why men opt to stay home on the day they should be leading their family to the church and being an example of what it is to be the spiritual leader of their home. But there is no excuse.
And it's a sad day in America when our men don't lead people church. And I know I'm speaking in the choir because you're here. But there is a pervasive problem in our culture that men have checked out of their leadership in the church.
They've checked out. And it's sad. Breaks my heart. Breaks my heart. But I'm glad you're here. Good. Good job. You made a good choice in leading your family to church today. But if you're someone here that was wanted to stay home, but your wife drugged you here, this should convict you, too. Are you with me today? Because what we need in the what we need in the church, because you Thank you for bringing the Lord's house into Echo church today. See, this is not the church. You are his church. You are his dwelling place.
What we need in the church is men who will lead their family. We don't need men who have punted on their responsibility and are kicking away their responsibility and trying to give it to their wife or to their children or to their pastor.
The greatest disciplehip that will happen in your family's life is not the disciplehip program the church initiates, but it is what you do in your home.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 4:23
Amen. And so if I were to shout something off the bow this morning that you might hear is men continue to lead your home.
Lead people in your home to Christ Jesus. That is the key. He is the answer. Now Matthew 9 there bustes some chops. Now let's move on. Matthew 9.
Matthew 9 chapter 9 says this or verse 9 says this. I love this actually. First time I read this, I actually thought to myself, this is probably the most boring portion of Scripture in the entire Bible. How am I going to preach anything in this? And then I end up having, well, you shouldn't know how many pages I have of notes. That will stress you out.
As Jesus passed on from there, he saw a man called Matthew sitting at a tax booth. And he said to him, "Follow me." And he rose and followed him. Was pretty quick. And Jesus reclined at table in the house. Behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were reclining with Jesus and his disciples. And when the Pharisees saw this, they said to the disciples, "Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?"
But when he heard this, he said, "Those who are well have no need of a physician." Now, let that one strike your heart this morning. Because we live in a generation at a time where everybody wants to put off an appearance that they have everything together. Matter of fact, when we post things on social media, very seldomly do we post what happens in 95% of our life.
Matter of fact, we don't even post the first image we take. We make sure we get it just right.
We have grown accustomed to presenting a dishonest version of our life.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 6:35
Therefore, because we do that and because it gets likes and hits and things like that, we get acknowledged for that. The reality is we don't we I think we have believed a false version of oursel.
We've forgotten that we have some problems. When you scroll on social media, you see all the good stuff you've done and you tend to get a little amnesia on all the problems you got going on in your life.
Now, just for clarity sake today, how many of you have at least one problem in your life? Just raise your hand. Well, at least one. And don't point to the person next to you. That would be rude. That would be that would be a little rude. We all have some issues. Like, so let me just say this today as we enter into this. You're in good company.
There is no one in this room that is problemless, right? Jesus came to help the unhealthy. He came for the unhealthy.
The tension that exists here is, "Well, then I'm just going to be super unhealthy all the time because I want him to keep on coming." That's not the point of this message.
And my fear a lot of times is that if I create this atmosphere where you grow comfortable with being a sinner and being unhealthy that you'll just choose to set up camp there. But you need to hear it today.
He didn't come for the well. He came for the sick. And the acknowledgment of that is where you find your healing.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 8:22
Let's just get past this whole idea that we got it all together. Let's stop just lying to people and saying, "I don't need help. I'm actually I'm good. I don't need help." We need to get to a place where we can identify with this the truth, the reality that we got a set of problems we need help with. Let's acknowledge it this morning. Let's be honest with oursel.
The Pharisees hated it. They hated it. You know why? Because they're like a lot of us today. They see other people with problems. They see other people who are unhealthy and sinners and unwell. They have questions about why Jesus would choose to hang out with them rather than them. They saw themselves as well and they were just as sick.
You know,
You can dress yourself with all kinds of religious jargon. You can dress yourself and look nice and you can come to church and you can be involved in church activities and you can still be very sin sick.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 9:37
Did you know that? Because religiosity doesn't save you. The acknowledgement that you're unwell is where you begin to open yourself up to the great physician who can move in and save your life.
We all need saving. But when he heard it, he said, "Those who are well have no need for a physician, but those who are sick do." Go and learn what this means. Time for you to get an understanding. I desire mercy, not sacrifice. For I came not to call the righteous, but I came for the sinners. This is important today.
There's a deadly lie that lives in the heart of fallen men. It's a lie that God is mainly interested in good people.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 10:40
The Bible kind of like blows this to smitherreens by saying there is no one that is good but God. Just to get it clear, right? That means I know you think you got it. You're there might be a man in here today that's like, "Well, I brought my family today." Well, be very careful with that today. Right.
You did one thing well. Good job. You did thousands of things not so well. We got our set of problems. But God came for somebody like you. In case you didn't know, God came for the men across America, not in this church, who chose to stay at home instead of lead to church.
You're not better than them. Oh, it's heartbreaking that we have men who don't lead their family in those things. That's heartbreaking. And we should call men to rise to another level, but we're not better than them because we came to church today. Men, you with me? Yeah. You see the tension that exists in the Scripture when you begin to move it into shoe leather here today? How quickly you can be like the Pharisees and how quickly it's amazing how much we're not like Christ.
It's a lie that God's mainly interested in respectable people, moral people, religious people that have kept their name clean and their reputation intact and their sin concealed. And their lives outwardly ordered. Matthew nine, this particular text just shreds that to smitherines. My I have some I know someone I know someone who has struggled for years to walk with the Lord, to commit his ways to the Lord, to walk through the doors of the church because he feels like until he gets his life together, he's not worthy of God's attention.
He has held God at arms length and never truly engaged a relationship with the Lord. Walked in community with him, communion with him, walked in community with other people who love and declare that God is good. He has rejected and walked away. He has stayed clear from the things of God. Although his heart longs for it, he has this innate feeling that he has to get his life together for God to love him. This is a problem.
It is the opposite of the gospel.
God comes for those who don't have their life together. That's who he comes for.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 13:58
And because you're in this room this morning, you're in good company. Cuz none of you got your life together. Your pastor doesn't have his life together. Amen. I'm working on that. I am a work in progress. Amen.
I got Well, I don't got just a set of problems. I got an abacus of problems.
But God came for somebody like me. I love the Apostle Paul because he basically says, "I Paul," and this is the order that he writes his epistles.
We get them in the order of length. So when you read them in Scripture, you get them in order of length. So the longest first to the shortest. But the actual order that he writes the epistles is like this. I Paul the apostle. I Paul the least of the apostle. I Paul the least of all men. I Paul a sinner saved by grace. I Paul the chief of sinners not even worthy to be writing or even living.
Notice that
His walk with the Lord is in alignment with his acknowledgment of his sinfulness.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 15:27
Notice that his relationship and community with the Lord and relationship as it grows in the Lord, he gets to the place where he realized he's the unhealthiest of them all. Notice he moves from an element of pride in his heart for who he is and what he's chosen to do and his and how he co-labors with the Lord and what God has chosen him for. And notice how that gets diminished to the degree that all he recognizes is that he is a chief of sinners, unhealthy to the degree he's unhealthiest of them all.
And this is when he's at the close is closest with the Lord. Track with me. I'm setting this up for you. Okay? We got three points. We're going to get through them really quick, but just track with me here. Can you handle me just being really candid today, transparent from my heart about a concern I have? Just I just I'm going to do it anyway, but this is me just trying to soften it just a smidge because I just kind of like say the facts and then sometimes that hits hard, but I don't mean them hard. But I'm going to say this.
Please know my heart here. I mean, well, by this, it was amazing because four years ago, I preached a sermon in the church where I laid out a story. I was talking about the dangers of sin. And I laid out this long narrative about a story in a particular city in Europe that had an infestation of rats.
Some of you already know and you're just trying to hold back the laughter. And how they would reproduce according to their kind. And the disease spread so rampantly across the city that people began dying everywhere. Was a plague passed by rats. They duplicated and it became a massive plague. And I said sin is like this when it hits your life.
It duplicates. It never stays where you want it to stay. And we because we are filled with sin are like a bunch of dirty rats. We're impacting and affecting people everywhere. Oh, it became the joke of the church. Track with me here for years.
But the truth remains the same. We are unwell. Some people were so offended by that. They wrestled for years that I called them a bunch of dirty rats in the house. I had meetings and emails and counseling sessions to try to help people. No one in here clearly process why I would speak so negatively of human beings in our fellowship.
Sean, do you not love people? Sean, why would you speak to the negative parts of our life? Sean, why would you why would you tell us we're dirty? Notice the tension here. This is a perfect example. I could not help but tell the story because
There's two types of people represented here. Those who know they're dirty rats and those who think they aren't.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 19:29
That's the story. To really put it in a context that makes sense to echo church. I know this makes it too personal. It's kind of my way, but hear me today. The Scripture impacts you, not just them centuries ago. It's saying something to us in the house today at Echo Church by the way we engage the truth. And the truth is there. You're all sinners.
You're all have problems. You are all unhealthy. You're not all that in a bag of chips. You're not. And you're not. I know t-shirts want to tell you that, but you're not. You need help.
I know you think love is telling people how awesome they are. It's not.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 20:33
The Bible's trying to say you're not all that awesome. You need help.
If a doctor came to someone and said, "You're terminal, you need help, you need these procedures, and if you don't do it, you're going to die in two weeks." It would be unloving to tell that person, "You're fine. You don't need to listen to any of that. You're good just the way you are." Right?
That would come not from a loving tongue, but from a murderous one. Hear me today. Amen. How much more murderous is it to speak in a spiritual tense, to tell people they're good just the way they are, to preach sermons and formulate sermons to tell people you're good just the way you are. He's okay with you just the way you are. We talk about things this way.
How much more hateful and unloving is it to do that when the death they experience is eternal?
Jesus comes to call us from unhealthy places. He is the great physician. But those who think they're well don't go to physicians. Hear me now. Hear me today. For you, not for your neighbor. Not for your kids. Not for your grandparents. Not for your parents. Not for your husband or your wife or your friend or your co-aborer. Not for your friend who you grew up with or your acquaintance down the street or your neighbor to the left or to the right. Hear this morning for you.
For we have all sinned. We are all sinners. Don't be so prideful to think like the Pharisees that you don't have a sin problem.
Because if you think like that this morning, let me tell you how this sermon will strike you. It will strike you like the dirty rat comment.
I'm too good to ever be called that. I'm too good to be ever told that I have a sin problem. I'm just too good. I'm too good. I see myself as too good. I'm prideful enough to miss God when he walks by. It's a problem today. And honestly,
What we're wrestling with is not an issue of understanding truth. What we're wrestling with is a cultural idea that's corrupted truth.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 23:35
Point 1Jesus sees the sinner
Number one, what we notice in this text, and I love this, as Jesus sees the sinner.
Yeah. That's who he sees. Out of all the people that are there, Jesus sees what? Exactly. I love that. That was You're awesome, by the way. The sinner. Thank you for that. The sinner.
So today in a culture where you're trying to put out the ambassador of you rather than the real you, he already sees you. Come on now.
The danger is not listen. You know what the danger is? The danger is if you put out a version of you, the ambassador of you, enough, you'll begin to think that's really you. But God won't.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 24:45
Amen. It begins to shape the way you talk and the way you walk and the way you live and the way you think about yourself. I'm not against social media. I use it. I think it's great and all, but you need to understand something. It does have a way of formulating a version of you that might not be the real you.
I How many of you hate taking your picture when you're laying on the bed like this? I can honestly say that I have never posted a picture of myself doing a selfie on the bed like this.
I'll do it today for our edification. It ain't pretty. It ain't pretty, folks. It is not pretty. This is the part in the church that we don't want to show to people. Can I say something? Jesus sees Matthew. He sees him right where he's sitting. He sees you right where you're sitting. Some of you are like, "Well, I'm glad because he's up there and that's a better angle.
That's a better angle. I'm glad that Jesus isn't down here looking up cuz that's not that's not so good of an angle. Okay, I got jokes. But he sees you right where you're at.
He sees you where you're at when you're at home and you're doing small group. He sees you there and the way you behave in that environment and then he sees you at home when you're stressed. You with me today? He sees both. People at church don't. God does. He sees it. And Jesus passed on from there. And he saw the man Matthew sitting in a tax booth. Now listen, do not move too quickly past these words, okay? Because Jesus saw Matthew.
Here's what other people saw. A punk, a thief, a tax collector. Jesus saw Matthew. Other people create labels. Jesus sees Matthew. Other people saw a traitor and Jesus saw a man enslaved in sin.
Other people saw his reputation. Jesus saw his soul.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 27:59
Matthew was sitting in a tax booth. This is what would be equivalent of an actual seat of rebellion. Some of you might be sitting in something similar today. Coming to church, going through the motion, rebellious in your life against the things of God. This is a seat of rebellion. That was the place where his sin had structure. Track with me here because your sin always finds a way to be structured, routine, income, and identity. His sin was not merely something he had done. It had become the life he lived.
It was his life. He built his entire world around it. He learned to sit comfortably in a very place that testified against him. That's what sin does. It is not merely visit. It transforms your life. It shapes everything about you. Track with me here. Am I right about this? How many of you have ever been a prisoner to sinfulness?
Okay. How many of you know it affects everything about your life? It affects where you go. It affects what you do. It affects your home. How many of you know that it is so pervasive? It's like lightning that streaks across the sky and branches out and touches everything. It begins to reshape your world.
It doesn't just merely visit. It builds a home. It forms a habit. It shapes desires. It trains your conscience to be quiet.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 29:48
It teaches a man to live with what once would have terrified him.
The first time a man sins, his conscience tells him a lot. But the more that he rejects true repentance, the quieter that conviction becomes until he settles in the booth of destruction.
And Jesus saw him there. This booth is terrifying and merc and merciful. This is both terrifying and merciful that Jesus sees them. It's terrifying because no man is hidden from Christ. He sees everything about your life. He sees through the image you've created. He sees through your church clothes. He sees through the public prayers, the reputation you protect.
He sees through your careful language in front of others. He hears what you say when you're in the car by yourself.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 30:55
He hears the murmurings of your heart and your mind. He sees the anger in your home that others never hear. He sees the bitterness that has been nursed for years. He sees the lust and the lustful choices and things you do, the privacy and the private parts of your life.
He sees the greed that hides behind responsibility. He sees the unbelief. Here's what Hebrews 4:13 says. No creature is hidden from his sight. He sees you. It goes on to say in Hebrews 4, but all are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must all give an account one day.
It's wonderful to be seen and it is immensely terrifying. Okay. You know what I believe? The longer I live that what most people want in life is most people want to be seen for who they truly are and still be loved. That one of man and women's greatest desire in life is to truly be seen and still be chosen.
That's why we're so scared to really show every part of oursel because we don't want to obliterate what has begun. This is why a lot of people when they're in relationship with one another, they continue to send their ambassador out because they're afraid they'll be rejected once they truly been seen for who they truly are. The way you enter your relationship with other men, you cannot reenter your relationship with God this way. For he truly sees every part of you. That's right.
The good news of this text is that God still chose him even though he truly saw him for who he is.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 33:03
That's good news. Yes, this should sober every soul in the room this morning. You are fully seen by God. Not partially seen, not generally seen, but fully seen. And Christ sees more than the Pharisees could have ever seen. Yet he extends mercy. Pharisees want to string them up and they don't even know the full magnitude of the problem going on with Matthew.
Like the level of righteousness that God demands is much higher than any Pharisee could ever demand. They're ready to string them up and Jesus applies mercy. It's amazing. He sees you.
The question is not does Christ see me. He does. The question is, will I come into the light before him?
Pastor Shawn Gray · 34:04
And Jesus sees the sinner, not the imagined version, not the polished version, not the version people applaud. He sees the real sinner, the exposed sinner, the guilty one, the helpless sinner. Jesus sees what? The sinner.
Point 2Jesus calls the sinner
Number two, even though Jesus sees the sinner, guess what he does next? He calls the sinner. Say what? Say what? He calls the sinner. I think you would call the person that had their degree. I would imagine you would call the person who's a pastor, a religious man, somebody who knew the ways of God, somebody that had me remembered portions of the Old Testament.
This doesn't make any sense. We are now. So, okay. So, break this down for me, Jesus. So now you're calling people who are the worst of the worst, those who have attached themselves to the Roman government. You're calling those people to do your work. Okay, that's weird.
God has a way of calling people that other people would never call.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 35:32
Matthew 9:9 continues, "and he said to him, follow me." And he rose and followed him. These two words, follow me, are full of authority, but they're also full of mercy.
We want to talk today a lot about the authority of his call, and we should talk about that. We should talk about that today. Brooke intentionally talked about that this morning. We should talk about the authority of his call, but we should never forget the mercy behind it.
The fact that he would call someone as unlikely as Matthew. Listen to me today.
God's call has great amount of authority, but it has an equal amount of mercy.
An equal amount of mercy. Now, why is it important that we understand the mercy? Because we have a tendency to be prideful. And he go, he called me. I'm called.
In case you didn't know, I'm called. Why? Why do we need to focus on the mercy more than the authority of his call to call us? Because it cannot feed pride when we understand the merciful display of his glory and loving kindness that he would call us at all. Oh, come on now. He didn't call you because of your degrees. He didn't call you because of your church attendance. He didn't call you because of all the things you do for him. He didn't call you because you're goodter than the other person. He called you because he's merciful. Right? Amen.
And you are not worthy to be called. That's right. You are not worthy to be called. You're unhealthy. And you're a sinner. See? See?
The glory goes to him the more you diminish self.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 37:40
The glory goes where it should be. That's why we got to get this right. I know we like to glory in self, but glorying in self is the diminishment and the ultimate diminishment of true worshiping him.
That's why our worship song shouldn't be celebrating us, but they should be civil celebrating him. Come on now. I mean I know worshiping yourself that sells that creates labels that's infiltrated our culture that makes churches happy but I'm not sure it makes them holy because worship that glorifies him lower self I should say praise but you get what I mean. Jesus calls Matthew while he's sitting in the tax booth. He does not say this. All right, Matthew.
Clean yourself up and then you're called. He does not say, "Matthew, repair your reputation and then follow me." He does not say, "Matthew, make yourself worthy and then I'll receive you." He says, "Follow me. This is the grace of God. Christ does not call the worthy. He makes the worthy his own.
Christ does not find clean men and then receive them. He receives sinners and makes them clean.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 39:28
Christ does not wait for the dead to raise themself. He speaks and the dead live. Notice that the order is reversed. Notice there is a cleaning that happens. Notice there is holiness that happens. Notice there is the removal of sinful ways and habitual sin that happened. Notice that he turns from what he used to sit in and now sits in the direction of Christ.
But notice the order. The call is first. The transformation is second. Notice the transformation is not required by the ws of men, but by the power of Christ. The call precedes the transformation which done by Christ, not by men. You're saved by grace, not by works, that you may be able to boast. That's right.
That's why he calls first. He makes second. We have to be clear about this.
The grace that calls sinners also commands the sinner. The mercy that receives Matthew does not leave Matthew at the tax booth.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 40:43
Some of you, some of you that have been in some habitual sin, you love the part I've just been talking about. You love it because you're always looking for an excuse to stay in the sin. God has mercy on me. He sees me even though I'm a sinner. So, I'm going to keep being a sinner. So, he keeps seeing me and having mercy on me. I want to hook a brother up.
He likes people like me, so I'm going to stay like me. Notice he didn't call Matthew to stay in the booth. That's right. He called Matthew away from the booth.
There's much in our day that want forgiveness without submission, salvation without repentance, grace without holiness, Christ as savior but not Christ as Lord.
But that is not the gospel of Matthew 9.
The same Christ who receives sinners also rules sinners. The same Christ who pardons also possesses. The same Christ who forgives also transforms.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 41:52
Matthew rose and followed him. That simp that sentence is simple but it is costly.
He rose. He left the booth and everything his life was built on and followed him. Yes. Let us not forget the mercy of the call. But let us also not forget the cost of the call. This is why Jesus says, "Count the cost of following me." There's a cost.
There's a surrender. Listen to this. I'm going to go back to it. Matthew nine. I got to go back to it. I think I caught something in here. Hold on. I got all kinds of things happening up here. Track with me here. I desire mercy and not sacrifice for I came not to call the righteous but sinners.
What is this saying here? It's saying that
The prerequisite for the call is not sacrifice.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 43:18
The prerequisite for the call is mercy. What he is not saying here is that it won't cost you anything. He's saying he is saying that the prerequisite is not sacrifice. But how many of you know that Matthew had to sacrifice some stuff? Yeah. Just not to be called.
Track with me here. It's important. It may be a sin you project. Let me ask you a question. What's your tax booth? What sin are you sitting in?
I try to move around because some people like, "Why were you staring at me the whole entire time?" It's amazing. I feel like I stare over here sometimes and then somebody over there I'm talking to thought I was staring at them and I was like, "do I have a dead eyee?"
Conviction will do that.
Do not make peace with your tax booth.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 44:42
Don't you dare decorate it with religious language. Do not say, "at least I'm not as bad as Matthew." That's that's the very spirit of the Pharisees. The issue is not whether your tax booth looks more respectable than another man's. The issue is whether you will leave it when Christ says follow me. That is where the call of Christ must be pressed upon the conscience.
There is no following Jesus while remaining Lord over your own life. There is no disciplehip that allows a man to keep his beloved sin untouched. There is no true faith that says to Christ, "you may save me, but you must never rule me." Yeah. Luke 9:23 says, "if anyone would come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross daily, and follow me." This is not religious decoration.
This is death itself. Have you risen from your tax booth? I don't mean have you become more religious. Matthew did not leave the tax booth for relig for religious respectability. He left it for Christ. There is a difference. One feeds your pride, the other destroys it. Oh, okay. Oh, man. I want to mess with that. I want to mess with that a little bit because when you get in the church, nothing will everything you say yes to in the life of a religious organization will possibly feed your pride.
You need to begin to ask your question the question, am I why am I doing this?
Because
Following Christ kills your pride. Oftentime religious activity for the sake of religious activity inflates your pride.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 46:55
You should constantly be asking why am I doing what I'm doing in the life of the church.
Point 3Jesus heals sinners
Number three, Jesus heals sinners. Well, I'm thankful about that, man. Heal me. I need healing. After Matthew follows Jesus, the scene moves to a meal and Jesus is eating with the tax collectors and the sinners. This is shocking to everybody and it was very offensive to religious leaders. Matthew 9:11 says, "and when the Pharisees saw this, they said to the disciples, why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?
That's why he came." Notice what is happening. The Pharisees can identify sinners, but they have no mercy for them. Well, that should meddle. That should meddle a little bit.
You know why we don't have mercy for the sinners we identify? It's because we don't think we are one.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 48:18
Mercy ends will where mercy ends where self aagulation begins.
I think self- adulation is a thing. I don't know. I pulled that from some resource catalog back in there. We'll have to test that and make sure that I even said something of in English. But I think it's you're awesome.
You. I think the greatest movement of the antichrist today is to help people right inside the church to glorify themselves.
Yeah. Okay. It's not Satanism statues wherever there's a ten commandment statue. That's not how he's moving in the earth today. The bar down the street. That's not how he's moving in the earth today. That's not how he's getting the job done.
His greatest attack, his frontline movement is to infiltrate the church and make you celebrate you.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 49:28
Yes. It's a problem. It's a problem.
We're sick, but he still sees you. He still calls you. And even though he sees you as sick and a sinner and you're somebody in sitting in a booth of your own problems, guess what? He sees you. He calls you so he can heal the real you. Yes. Not the ambassador of you. Amen. Some of you need healing this morning.
That healing comes on the other side of confession. Just getting honest about your problems. Some of you hold your healing at a distance because you can't get honest that you have a problem.
God help us. Some of us are just like the Pharisees. The healing they long for for themselves and for others, they can never snatch up because they think they're well enough as they are.
The Pharisees were offended that Jesus would eat with such people, but
Jesus was not contaminated by sinners. He came to cleanse them. He did not enter that room because sin was harmless. He entered that room because sinners were helpless.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 51:10
Matthew 9:12 through 13 says, "but when he heard this," he said, "Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick, go and learn what this means.
For I came not to call the righteous, but sinners." This is one of the clearest declarations of the mission of Christ. He came for sinners, the sick. He came for those who know that they cannot heal themselves.
Sin is rebellion against God. It's lawlessness. It's a disease. It's a corruption of the heart. It blinds the mind. Disorders our affections. Enslaves the will, defiles the conscience, and separates man from God. And no sinner can heal himself. That's why Jesus had to come. He is the great physician this morning. Much like in this text, Jesus is near.
He sees you. A sinner.
He sees you sick. He moves towards us in mercy.
Are you like the Pharisee or are you like Matthew? Only Christ heals your tax booth. You sit in, your sin, you sit in, it will never heal you.
It will only empty your life more and more. Are you with me today? It will not fulfill your life. You will be crushed by it, left dried up on the side of the road, crushed and empty. It will only destroy everything in your life. Track with me today.
The more you sit in the booth of your sin, the more it will destroy you. You think it provides and orders your life, but it destroys it.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 53:38
Amen.
And Jesus is trying to call you out from it. We have to ask ourself, where are we in this scene? Are we at the table as sinners receiving mercy? Are we outside as religious critics offended by mercy? There are two searching applications here. First, come to Christ as the sick sinner who needs healing. Stop pretending. Stop minimizing. Stop hiding. Stop comparing. Stop saying, "Well, at least I'm not as bad as they are.
Do not cover yourself up and then come. Come now. Come quickly. Come with transparency. Come with truth. Come with transparency." I'll say it again.
Second, go towards sinners with mercy. If Christ has shown mercy to you, then you have no right to look upon other sinners with proud disgust. Lord, help us. Lord, help us. Lord, help me.
You may grieve sin. You must not approve of sin. You must call out sin, but you check your heart.
And you still long for mercy for those people. You must never forget you were a debtor, too.
A merciful church does not become a worldly church. Mercy is not compromised. Christ ate with sinners, but he didn't become one.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 55:22
I'm going to close with this. I got to end it because I got too many pages. Oh, I got too many pages. Just track with me here. I got to end this. So, I looked up there like I could see it. I can't see nothing up there. I got to end this, though. I feel it in my bones. I can't see that either, buddy. I'm blinder in the back. Thank you. Thank you for the Thank you for trying to help. Listen to me. I got to remember what I was going to say.
Yeah, we think in the church that the more we extend grace, the more we extend mercy, the greater risk is of compromise regarding sin. But notice Jesus was the king of extending grace and mercy and not compromising sin. There are churches today that have not extended mercy the way the Bible defines it. Are you with me today? They've redefined mercy and they've incubated sin in their house.
Not because it's the same mercy we see in Scripture, but because they redefine mercy and they created allowance for people to stay in their booth, but follow Christ.
I could talk about what they are. We're ordaining pastors in sin, still celebrating their booth and preaching from the window of it and claiming a version of mercy and grace that's not biblical.
He said, "if you truly understand what mercy is, if you truly understand the gospel message, if you truly understand grace as I have defined it, a merciful church does not incubate sin. So
Don't be scared to be merciful just because you're scared that people will stay in sin. True mercy calls people out of it."
Pastor Shawn Gray · 57:43
Are you with me today? You let God deal with that.
We need to let God deal with that. Number one, Jesus sees the sinner. Number two, Jesus calls the sinner. Number three, Jesus heals the sinner. This is the message of the passage. This is the hope of the gospel. So, where are you? Maybe you're Matthew sitting in a tax booth. You know your sin. You know your guilt. You know the thing that has defined you. You know the shame you carry. You know the life you have built around compromise.
Hear the voice of Christ with me this morning. Follow me. Track with me. Do not stay where you are. Rise and follow him. That's the call this morning. Maybe you're a Pharisee standing at a distance. You see what is wrong with everyone else, but you're blind to your own heart. You know how to diagnose sin, but you have little mercy for people. You know religious language, but you do not have the heart of God. You are offended by the very mercy that you yourself need.
Hear the warning of Christ this morning in this text. Go and learn what this means. I desire mercy and not sacrifice.
Maybe you're trying to pretend you're healthy, but deep down you know the truth. You know that you're spiritually sick. Hear the invitation of Christ. Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.
The great physician is not afraid of your disease. The Savior is not surprised by your sin. The King is not lacking in mercy.
Pastor Shawn Gray · 59:50
You must come honestly. You must come repentance. You must come by faith. Jesus did not come to call the righteous, but the sinner. I'm gonna I'm gonna say these eight things I wrote down in my journal. And I'll leave us with this.
That means there is hope for Matthew. That means there is hope for the tax collector. That means there is hope for the hypocrite. That means there is hope for the guilty. That means that there is hope for the ashamed. That means there is hope for the religious man who finally sees his emptiness. That means that there is hope for the broken woman who finally stops hiding.
That means that there is hope for every sinner who comes to Christ. This is the good news of the gospel. Jesus sees you a sinner. Jesus calls you the sinner. Jesus heals you the sinner.
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