A Forgiven and Forgotten Past

             Sometime after Jesus calmed the wind and waves on the Sea of Galilee (Matthew 8:23-27), He returned to Capernaum, the city that became His base of operation for His ministry.  While there, He came upon a tax collector named Matthew.  The Scripture records only two words that He said to Matthew, “Follow me” (Matthew 9:9 NIV84).

            To understand how special that invitation was, we must first understand the status of tax collectors in Jesus’ Jewish world.  While, even today, we don’t like to pay taxes, the tax collectors in Jesus’ time were primarily Jews who worked with the Romans to collect the taxes the Romans levied on the Jewish people.  If “conspiring with the enemy” wasn’t bad enough, most of the tax collectors added to the amount owed so that they could line their own pockets with the excess.  In short, tax collectors were despised by the Jewish people.

            Jesus looked beyond Matthew’s occupation and saw who Matthew could be.  By this point in Jesus’ ministry, His reputation preceded Him, so it is no wonder that Matthew readily accepted His invitation.  We don’t know how the other disciples received him, but there was likely some animosity, at least in the beginning.  We do know that there is only one other reference, in Scripture, to Matthew as a tax collector.  In his gospel account, Matthew lists the names of the twelve disciples (Matthew 10:2-4).  While he included some descriptive terms for a few of them—things like their father’s name or their political affiliation (Simon the Zealot), he only lists one occupation—his own. 

            We don’t know why Matthew referred to himself as a tax collector.  After all, he had left that world behind him. Perhaps he still carried the shame of his past.  Many of us have decisions or moments in our past that we can’t seem to forgive or forget, despite our acceptance of the cleansing blood of Christ.  Maybe Matthew was one of those people.

            I think the more likely reason is that he wanted everyone to know that Jesus welcomes sinners.  With Jesus, Matthew found forgiveness and acceptance.  He knew that people needed to understand his past before they could fully understand the depth of Christ’s forgiveness.

            If you have accepted Christ and repented of your sins, whatever part of your past still haunts you was long ago forgiven and forgotten by Christ.  Like Matthew, you have a testimony of the saving grace of Jesus Christ! Don’t live in shame! Use your story to praise Christ, just as I think Matthew did.

Matthew 9: 9 – 13

Matthew 10: 2 – 4

I John 1:9

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