Unconditional Love Series

INTRODUCTION

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Have you ever thought about how many songs, how many movies, or how many books have love as their subject?

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Then think about how many ways we use the word love.

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I love steak.

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I love baseball.

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I love my daughters.

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I love my wife.

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I love my job.

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I love my cats.

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I love you.

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Love is powerful, and it is something we all seek from others.

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Young girls seek love from their fathers, and when they do not think that is happening, they will look for love from someone else, and a young man will use love to get what he wants.

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People have given everything up for love, died for love, killed in the name of love, and changed their life for love.

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Love is one of the most talked about subjects in the Bible.

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What criteria do you use to determine if you love something or someone?

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Depending on what you decide to love, the criteria will change.

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For instance, what criteria do you use to determine if you love a type of food?

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Taste, texture, smell?

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What criteria do you use to determine if you will love someone?

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One would think that Jesus could display love without people criticizing Him.

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Our text today takes place after Jesus forgives and heals a paralytic who was lowered from the ceiling of a home Jesus was teaching.

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The crowd was amazed once again!

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Jesus is heading toward the sea when He comes to a tax booth where a tax collector named Levi (Matthew) works.

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Our text today will reveal the heart of God towards people.

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Regarding the criteria we use to determine if we will love someone, I wonder if our criteria are the same that God uses.

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Who do we value, and what determines if we value and love them?

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In the passage under consideration today, the criticism Jesus receives is that He spends His time with the wrong type of people.

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Big Idea of the Message: Jesus shows us that God values everyone.

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Let’s turn to Mark 2:13-17 together.

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Mark 2:13–15 (NET 2nd ed.)

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13 Jesus went out again by the sea. The whole crowd came to him, and he taught them.

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14 As he went along, he saw Levi, the son of Alphaeus, sitting at the tax booth. “Follow me,” he said to him. And he got up and followed him.

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15 As Jesus was having a meal in Levi’s home, many tax collectors and sinners were eating with Jesus and his disciples, for there were many who followed him.

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SERMON

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I. Inviting the outcasts.

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Jesus had a large crowd following Him.

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The miracles He performed helped the crowds to grow.

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As Jesus went along, He saw Levi (Matthew), the son of Alphaeus, sitting in the tax booth.

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We have talked about tax collectors before.

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Tax collectors during Roman times were universally despised.

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No one knew the correct amount of tax they had to pay, and the tax collectors earned their income by over-collecting.

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The Greek writer Lucian grouped tax collectors with “adulterers, panderers, flatterers and parasites” (William Barclay, The Gospel of Mark, The Daily Study Bible [Philadelphia: Westminster, 1975], 53).

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Rome would determine how much tax money needed to be collected in a region, and people would bid for the opportunity to collect the taxes, with the understanding they were allowed to add an upcharge so the collectors could pay their collectors and make a profit.

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These men were collecting money for Isreal and passing it on to Rome.

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Rome also had tax collectors who operated booths around major highways so Rome could collect tolls and import and export taxes.

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They would have tax booths in busy fishing areas so they could collect duties from the fishermen and duties collected for transporting people.

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The tax collectors were outcasts, and they were people the RIGHTEOUS people would not give the time of day.

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Have you ever been an outcast, a person that other people would ignore?

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In the 1995 movie Clueless, Cher and Dionne befriend Tai, the new girl at school.

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As they take her around and introduce her to the school, they also—most notably in their eyes—introduce her to the social system.

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They point out the different groups of people and let her know who it is okay to be associated with and who you must avoid if you wish to remain popular (directed by Amy Heckerling [Paramount Pictures, 1995], 23:49).

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As funny as the scene is, it also reflects a truth that seems to run throughout humanity: we think it’s important to associate with the right people.