Amy L. Sherman: Imitate the “public habits” of Jesus

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As Jesus went on from there, He saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” He told him, and Matthew got up and followed Him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with Him and His disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked His disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” Matthew 9:9-13

“Imitate the practical exercises or rituals of spiritual formation that we find in what I call the “public habits” of Jesus. Consider three of them. Jesus practiced seeing. As He engaged in the culture and marketplace of His time, He intentionally saw; He paid attention to things that many others failed to see. Jesus could identify injustice. He could spot suffering. He could see the cultural entanglements that nurture idolatry. He was wide awake to the places where His Kingdom confronted and clashed with the kingdoms of this world. Jesus also regularly crossed boundaries. He deliberately sought relationships with people on the margins. He reached out across ethnic, socio-economic, religious, and cultural divides in order to create new community. Jesus confronted systems of injustice. He came not only to set individuals right but to set institutions right. He opposed, for example, unrighteous economic behavior not in accord with His Kingdom of shalom, which envisions peace, wholeness, justice, and harmony.”

Amy L. Sherman, Senior Fellow at the Sagamore Institute, in her three-page essay “What does it mean to integrate our faith and work?” in Purposeful Living: Financial Wisdom for All of Life compiled and edited by Gary G. Hoag and Tim Macready (Rhodes, NSW: Christian Super, 2018) 13-15. Click on the title to download this free ebook today.

These three “public habits” of Jesus, as Sherman describes them, provide a construct for looking at His earthly ministry, and for thinking about our own generous living. I browsed through the four Gospels and found a stunning number of verses that report what “Jesus saw” when walking along. He saw what other people missed, walked by, or even ignored.

As Sherman rightly notes, Jesus not only saw, He crossed boundaries of culturally appropriateness, and in today’s Scripture, even tips His proverbial cards and tells us why He does this. He came to bring justice and righteousness, or in plain terms, to make things right. Now brace yourselves. When he saw a rich person, what was His public habit? Lovingly, He told the rich man to share his wealth with those who had insufficient resources to live.

Jesus looked at him and loved him. “One thing you lack,” He said. “Go, sell everything you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven. Then come, follow Me.” At this the man’s face fell. He went away sad, because he had great wealth. Jesus looked around and said to His disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!” Mark 10:21-23

If you are rich, notice the instructions comes in the imperative tense. This is not a suggestion. Also don’t miss the sympathy. Jesus knows it’s hard. He had the riches of heaven and saw the poverty of people on earth, and set it aside. You can too, by grace. For you know the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet for your sake he became poor, so that you through his poverty might become rich.” 2 Corinthians 8:9

Will you imitate the “public habits” of Jesus? Will you practice seeing? Will you cross boundaries? Will you bring justice and righteousness wherever you go? We must apply all we are and all we have to this framework to learn what it’s means to be a disciple of Jesus. As Jesus Himself said in today’s text, “Go and learn what this means.” We have found that you don’t figure it out until you live it out. We never arrive as He puts new challenges before us.