As contenders for the Republican presidential nomination heap loads of dirt on each other, one can only imagine the field day the others would have if some delicious scandal were uncovered, say that one of them was known to have dined regularly with prostitutes, or with organized crime bosses, or Wall Street bankers known to have committed fraud and embezzlement. I guess that last isn’t such a big a stretch of the imagination.
In any case, it’s standard practice to judge a person, especially a public person, by the company he or she keeps. It’s even biblical to do so. Proverbs 24:1 says, “Do not envy wicked men, do not desire their company.” And in I Corinthians 15:33, Paul quotes a Greek poet to offer a very familiar proverb, “Bad company ruins good morals.”
So why then do we find Jesus in Mark 2:13-17 flouting both social opinion and Scripture to enjoy a meal with a collection of sinners? And lest we think that these folks were only nominal or relative “sinners,” with the word in quotes as the NIV translates, let us remember that Jewish tax collectors worked for the occupying forces of a conquering country and that they regularly defrauded their own people with excessive taxes that went into their own pockets. No, these weren’t just nice but misunderstood people Jesus was hanging out with. They were sinners.
In verse 17 Jesus reminds us that His whole purpose was to find and redeem sinners, not righteous people. The exercise of trying to find oneself in a biblical story might be a good one especially in this text. Are we willing to admit our sin and welcome Jesus into our company. Or are we standing aloof from the sinners of our society and perhaps missing the company of Jesus like the scribes and Pharisees?
And how do we put all this together with the moral and biblical worries about the corrupting effect of bad company? Of course, we are sure that Jesus couldn’t be corrupted. But how about us if we try to follow Him and place ourselves in the midst of bad people? What’s it mean to be like Jesus in this regard?
Lots of questions in this little text. May our Lord give us hearts of discernment and love like His own so that we can be in His company, whoever else might be there as well.