Sermon for the Feast of St Matthew
When and where
do we first meet
St Matthew?
We might think
that we see him first,
sitting at his table of custom.
But, in a strange sort of way
we first meet St Matthew
at Christmas
when we begin his Gospel.
"But all the Gospels
are anonymous!"
Well, that's what
those who somehow
want to depersonalise
the Gospels say.
They say that
to undermine
the reliability of their message.
They want to make them
anonymous
so to take away
their authenticity
and their authority
in our Church.
The problem is
that St Matthew's gospel
is credited with being
St Matthew's Gospel
from the earliest times.
And St Matthew
is the first voice we hear
of the New Testament
sounding out
the news of the Incarnation,
connecting Our Lord
with Abraham and David.
We don't see St Matthew first,
we hear him.
St Matthew's first words to us
are of Our Lord's place
in History,
in a family
and in a royal dynasty.
That's where we first meet him.
Only later
does he tell his backstory.
[PAUSE]
We first see St Matthew
sitting at the seat of custom
as a tax-collector.
Even if he were an honest tax-collector
and not extorting extra money
from his own people,
he is still a collaborator
betraying his people,
his family,
his heritage in the Jewish race
by working with
the oppressors,
the enslavers of Israel,
the new Egyptians,
the Romans.
That's why many tax-collectors
charge more
and cream off the profits
just to make the job worthwhile
in the face of such hatred.
Is it worth it?
[PAUSE]
Well, clearly not.
Just like the fishermen,
all Jesus has to say is
"follow Me!"
and St Matthew is up
and after Him
seemingly immediately.
Like the fishermen,
St Peter, St James, St John,
St Matthew sees something in Jesus
that he hungers for,
something that will
take him away from
this wretched job
that he was enticed to do
and which has brought
such hatred upon him.
He follows and,
with other tax-collectors and sinners,
he sits down to eat
with the One
Who preaches love
and not hate,
Who seeks to reconcile
and not ostracise,
Who seeks to feed and nourish
rather than throw money
and hope that will
solve all the problems.
[PAUSE]
St Matthew's discontent
with his life is clear
and he embraces life with Christ
and death for Christ
rather than betray
his own humanity
and his own heritage
by continuing in sin.
In choosing to become
a tax-collector,
St Matthew loses
his place in society,
his heritage,
his history and
the connection with God
upon which
the Old Covenant was built.
In seeing Christ
he realises how hungry he is
how empty,
how separated,
how lonely he is.
And then,
eating a meal with Jesus,
he finds himself
becoming whole again
part of a new society
part of a new heritage
part of a new history
- new but old.
For nothing is really changed
it is renewed,
restored,
mended,
healed.
It is the sick that need the physician
for there is nothing to heal
in the healthy.
St Matthew's Jewish heritage
is completed in
the Jewish heritage of Jesus
and extended
into the heritage
of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church
- the Church in which
he becomes an apostle
- the Church which is built
upon his Gospel
and testimony of his redemption
and salvation
in the Divine Humanity of Christ.
[PAUSE]
St Matthew hungers
and thirsts for righteousness
rather than accept
a life of discontent
and contempt.
And he urges us
not to live lives
of dreary, hopeless nothingness
but receive the fulness
of our belonging to Chrisy
and our salvation
in which we are growing
day by day.
Whatever we hunger for
in this life
we might never receive.
If we hunger for the true Christ
to whom St Matthew points,
then we shall receive Him
in abundance eternally.
No comments:
Post a Comment