Homily, June 7, 2026, Rev. Holly Cardone
Second Sunday After Pentecost
June 7, 2026
The Lord said to Abraham, pack your bags, leave everything you have ever known, the place you grew up, the house you live in, your family, your job, everything, and I will show you the way to the land that is promised to you. Let’s assume that Abraham had a pretty good life. Most likely he was very well off as referred to in Genesis 14:14 which says that upon hearing Lot was captured, Abraham mobilized 318 men who had been born in his household. A wealthy clan patriarch, with a large household who had herds of animals and negotiated with other settled people for resources they needed. A pretty good life.
But God says, I’m going to make something spectacular happen through you, and I am going to bless you. You are going to bless a whole lot of people, and all the people of the earth are going to be blessed in you.
Abraham said yes. He was old, and his wife was old, they had no children, but Abraham took his nephew with him. They packed their bags, their tents, their possessions, slaves, those 318 men, everything and set out on a mysterious journey. They had no idea what was going to happen, but Abraham had faith. What did he sacrifice: fixed property, permanent housing, trade relationships and social networks, the security of a known community and legal system and access to urban markets and goods.
Off they go, and they get to the land of Canaan, but the land was occupied. God promised to give the land to Abram and his offspring, so it was there that Abraham built an altar. Taking God’s promise at face value, Abraham believed the word of God and went. He didn’t dawdle, balk or try to make a deal with God and there were no guarantees. In fact, Abraham is thrown into a crisis. The land is occupied. He doesn’t question how the Canaanites are going to leave the land, and as one writer said, “Life in the real world is relentlessly ambiguous; faith never permits the people of Abraham to escape the ambiguity…Faith, as Abraham embraces it, is a decision to live the promise precisely where the promise is in question and at risk.”
The tax collector, Matthew, doesn’t dawdle, balk or try to make a deal either. Jesus says, “Follow me,” and Matthew gets up and leaves.
When Jesus called Matthew to follow him, he was calling the most unlikely candidate that one could imagine in the first century. Matthew sat at a tax collector's booth in Capernaum, likely collecting customs duties on goods passing through the busy trade routes of Galilee. Matthew operated within the Roman system of what is called tax farming, and it’s as complicated as it sounds. Rome would auction off the right to collect taxes to the highest bidder in any region of Rome. The regional contractors would then hire local sub-contractors to do the actual work on the ground. Setting up a booth and collecting taxes from citizens, business owners, and merchants. Tax collectors made their profit by collecting more than the Roman-mandated amount and keeping the difference. Basically, legalized extortion.
To his community, Matthew was a traitor and collaborator with Rome. Rome was a pagan occupying power, so to his fellow Jews, Matthew was the worst of the worst. Plus, he was in constant contact with Gentiles and handled coins bearing Caesar’s image, all bad. He was ritually impure, his profession being synonymous with “sinner” so men like Matthew were excluded from the synagogue.
So, Jesus walks up to this despised, wealthy, and socially exiled man and simply says, “Follow me.”
Sure, being a tax collector makes you a pariah, but you’re wealthy. You probably have a house, you’re comfortable, you don’t worry about what you’re going to eat, or wear, or how to feed your family. You can certainly pay your taxes, no problem. But then Jesus walks by and changes your life forever.
Jesus, the revelation of God in the world, isn’t bidding Matthew to go, as God did with Abraham, but he’s inviting Matthew into relationship with him. To follow Jesus on a path that will last 3 years. There were no promises made to the disciples, like Abraham, they decided based on faith alone to follow Jesus. The disciples took what they had on their backs, left their lives, and put their trust in Jesus.
Matthew follows Jesus to dinner, where there are many tax collectors and sinners. Today, Christians refer to any person who has fallen short of God’s moral standard as a “sinner,” which basically means everyone. But the Pharisees weren’t making a statement about human nature, they are referring to specific categories of people. The word “sinners” encompassed not only tax collectors, but gamblers, money lenders, dung collectors, and common, uneducated, poor Jews who could not observe all the laws of the Torah or the purity codes. Prostitutes, adulterers, anyone who broke a commandment and didn’t repent. A Gentile was referred to as a sinner. Any person outside the community deemed, “Not one of us.” Associating with a “sinner” risks the persons own ritual purity, and they are not worthy of a rabbi’s attention or fellowship.
The promise of God evolved from the giving of a promise to Abraham 2000 years before Christ, to God being the promise in Christ. The promise of love, compassion, inclusion, mercy, and justice. Jesus was a radical rabbi because he didn’t keep his distance from the impure, from “sinners,” he ate, drank, walked, lived among them. He chose them, including Matthew the tax collector, to be one of his twelve closest disciples. He told them they will enter the kingdom of heaven before the rich and powerful, he defended them against the frustration and anger of the Pharisees. He showed them a life of abundance, love and acceptance.
If that’s what God has for sinners, then I’m all in.
Amen