Prairie Hills Covenant Church

Our scripture this week comes from Mark 2:13-17. In this passage we read these words from Jesus: “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Jesus says these words in response to the Pharisees, the righteous, who were reacting to Jesus eating with a group of tax collectors and sinners. Imagine their surprise when they hear Jesus say that He, the Son of God, did not come for them, for the righteous, for those who have it all together, but instead he came for the sinner, the lost cause, the outcast. Today we sing songs that include the words “Jesus friend of Sinner” with gratefulness and thanksgiving. But when Jesus was called “a friend of tax collectors and sinners” in Matthew 11:19 it wasn’t intended as a positive comment. The righteous were upset that Jesus befriended sinners. These actions of Jesus proved, to them, that Jesus was not ‘holy enough’ to be the Son of God. They could not understand why he would call an evil despicable man l