Luke 5: 27-32 Calling of Levi

for today's reading: http://www.usccb.org/bible/readings/021316.cfm

In today's reading Jesus calls Levi and the other tax collectors to follow him.  Jesus is showing us that we can be called, every one of us, to follow him.  It doesn't matter if we are sinners or saints, the door to the Father's banquet is open to each of us.  It is the Father's love that calls us. 

The scribes and Pharisees are adherents to the law, but the laws have become and end to themselves.  Jesus is here to offer us a new covenant made the Father's love and through the Holy Spirit.  Are we ready to accept the Lord's invitation to follow him no matter what others may say or think about us?  Are we ready to have our eyes focused solely on him?  Are we ready to embrace the call to be saints who wear jeans, chew bubble gum, and drink soda and eat fries?  Everyone is called. 

Mark 2:13-17 Calling Levi

The Son of Man has such a power that a simply invitation calls Levi, the son of Alphaeus, to follow Jesus.  Levi worked at the customs post which meant that he checked the goods coming into and out of the area, and collecting taxes on the items.  He in essence, a tax collector.  Scribes and Pharisees tended to throw tax collectors and sinners in to the same category.  Perhaps we still do today as we grudging look at filing taxes.  Jesus, however, reminds them that "Those who are well do not need a physician, but the sick do.  I did not come to call the righteous but sinners.”

Yesterday while preparing for the feast of Santo Nino this Sunday a young man came to help.  This young man had struggled in his youth and is currently in a program almost like a boot camp for teens/young adults who have either gotten in trouble with the law or are at severe risk.  Working with him it was fairly evident that he was still finding his moral ground, that he wasn't sure of himself or who he could really trust, that he is still searching for who he is and what he believes in.  Yet for whatever reason, God called him to the church.  He was put in charge of decorating the altar with the statue of the child Jesus and gold, white, and red linens.  When finished he was starting to appreciated what he had done, the many hundreds of people who would be touched by his good works simply because he was called to the church by some inner voice.  I can't help but think that Levi had a similar experience and that he knew in Jesus was someone he could trust, that there was something so profoundly good in Jesus that he was intrinsically called to it, and that in this trust and goodness, he was willing to see where it would take him, that even following Jesus for a day could turn into a lifetime because it touched something deep in him.