The Kingdom Movement

A Literary & Pastoral Study Guide to the Gospel of Matthew

The Inspiration of Matthew,

by Caravaggio

On the King's Errand

Devotional Reflections on Matthew's Gospel

Two Types of Sick People – Under Treatment and Self-Deluded:  Mt.9:10 – 13

^9:10 Then it happened that as Jesus was reclining at the table in the house, behold, many tax collectors and sinners came and were dining with Jesus and his disciples. ¹¹ When the Pharisees saw this, they said to his disciples, ‘Why is your teacher eating with the tax collectors and sinners?’ ¹² But when Jesus heard this, he said, ‘It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick. ¹³ But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire compassion, and not sacrifice,’ for I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.’

          The young woman asked me, ‘Do Christians think that they’re superior to other people?’

I replied, ‘Christians believe that we all have a disease and need treatment from Jesus.  Christians are those who have begun the treatment.’  To not receive Jesus’ diagnosis and remedy is to live in self-denial.

Jesus used the disease metaphor for sin and the healer metaphor for himself in 9:12 – 13.  In fact, this whole section, Matthew 8 – 9, is about Jesus healing the disease of our sin.  Matthew the tax collector had just got up to follow Jesus.  He introduced Jesus to his acquaintances, who were other tax collectors and sinners.  When Jesus was challenged by the Pharisees about why he reached out to these undesirables, Jesus responded with this metaphor.  ‘It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick…not the righteous, but sinners.’

Upon first hearing that, the Pharisees might have thought that this was a satisfying explanation.  ‘Oh, that’s why he’s reaching out to them.’  But think again.  Jesus was just beginning his ministry, and was throwing them puzzles.  When Jesus said that he came for the sick, and not for the healthy, he was using a rhetorical device.  No one is healthy.  Everyone is sick, including them.  Jesus came for everyone. 

The key question is:  ‘Do you understand that you’re sick?’  That’s why my response to the student was about everyone being sick and Jesus offering healing.  The implicit question was, ‘Do you believe this?’  If you don’t believe you’re sick, you’re self-deluded. 

Dr. Cordelia Fine is a psychologist and neuroscience researcher at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at Australian National University.  In a book called A Mind of Its Own: How Your Brain Distorts and Deceives, Dr. Fine documents the great lengths our human brain will go to distort reality in order to protect our egos.  I think distorting the reality of sin is one of the biggest mistakes we make.  Publishers Weekly writes this review of her book:  ‘Vain, immoral, bigoted: this is your brain in action, according to Fine… Fine documents a wealth of surprising information about the brain in this readable account that adopts a good-humored tone about the brain’s failings without underestimating the damage they do.  The brain, she shows, distorts reality in order to save us from the ego-destroying effects of failure and pessimism.’  Scientific American adds this in another review:  ‘So “pigheaded” is the brain about protecting its perspective that it defends cherished positions regardless of data.  The “secretive” brain unconsciously directs our lives via silent neural equipment that creates the illusion of willfulness.  “Never forget,” Fine says, “that your unconscious is smarter than you, faster than you, and more powerful than you. It may even control you.  You will never know all of its secrets.”’  

Cutting through the fog of our self-delusion is the clear voice of Jesus.  He calls us.  ‘I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners’ (Mt.9:12)...‘those who are sick’ (Mt.9:11).  Do we recognize our sickness?  Do we come to him for treatment?

Let’s pray that the Lord will give people more moments of clarity when they can see themselves and humanity truly, so that they could respond to that truth by looking to him. 

Let’s also pray that the Lord will help us not speak and act and feel superior to other people, but as one concerned sick person relating to another.