The Gospel of Luke: Guess Who's Coming to Dinner - Video

Sermon Date - 12/29/24 Pastor: Corey Deyamport Luke 5: 27-32 . Check us out at: https://citylightvicksburg.org/ Or check us out here: https://www.facebook.com/citylightvicksburg . In our text, we see someone at the table who doesn’t seem to fit. But Jesus, invites us to the table! And He calls us to call others! In this text we'll see how Jesus calls the outcast, Levi celebrating the change within his life and finally, we see Jesus confronting the critics. Jesus called a tax collector to follow Him. He called a traitor to Him, who exploited His family and the Jewish people. To the Jewish community, Levi wasn’t just a sinner, he was the worst kind of sinner. Jesus calls the worst of us, despised, and ostracized. Jesus calls Him to a new life, to abandon his sinful ways. He was changed from this moment onward! Permanently. Levi also celebrates his transformation. He threw a party! Interacting with Jesus should lead us to celebrate. To come to joy! Levi rejoices, calls together his friends. Who does he invite? Fellow tax collectors. He had no other community. The only people he had to invite were other tax collectors. So he brings them. This feast is a declaration of a spread of Gods faith. This new freedom, he takes it and shares it for the one who frees him, and with those who shared in his bondage. Are we reflecting the light Jesus shows us, or are we veiling our faith to those who need it just as much as we do? But the Pharisees see this teacher or prophet choose to associate with tax collectors! How can this be? Choosing to eat with sinners was seen as accepting their way of life. The Pharisees, instead of seeing the law was about relationship, instead became rigid and hardened their hearts. They didn’t see that Jesus doesn’t become unclean by sitting with the unclean. Instead He makes the unclean clean by coming into contact with them. And Jesus’ metaphor he tells the Pharisees is something they would understand. A doctor’s place is with the sick, not with the healthy. The Pharisees see themselves as well, but they are blind to their own sickness, and need of a savior.