The Great Physician

Rebecca Sheridan
Sunday, June 7, 2026
Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26

    I recently read the novel, Theo of Golden by Allen Levi – has anyone else read this book?  Without giving most of the book away, the book is about an older man, Theo, who moves to a small town in Georgia and sees portraits of local people hanging in a coffee shop for sale.  He starts buying them and then giving them to the portrait subjects, meeting up with them in a public place to “bestow” the pictures to their rightful owners, one at a time.  What makes the novel so beautiful is Theo’s old-school way of engaging people, one on one, in personal conversation to surprise them with this gift of themselves depicted in art. In addition to the physical “bestowal” of the portrait, in Theo’s conversation with each person, we learn their stories.  He sees their sadness. One woman was pressured to have an abortion early in life and is now having trouble conceiving.  Another is a single dad working the night shift so he can care for his elementary school age daughter who is hospitalized long-term during the day. Another is a homeless woman struggling with mental illness.  Beyond their painful situations, though, Theo sees each person’s gifts and strengths. The homeless woman is a birdwatching expert and literary critic.  The single father is a singer and loving, dedicated parent.  The woman grieving the loss of her child while waiting for another is beautiful inside and out, Theo assures her, and capable of great love for others whether she becomes a mother or not.  
    I couldn’t help but think of this book as I read our gospel this morning.  Just as Jesus calls Matthew to follow him, so he also calls us to follow in his way of mercy instead of puffing ourselves up with prideful self-righteousness.  Jesus asks us to see people as he sees them, not with the harsh judgment of society as often represented by the Pharisees in Matthew’s gospel.  “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” the Pharisees ask Jesus’ disciples.  This gives us an insight into how they see people – in their view, these people are damaged goods without any redemptive qualities.  God wants nothing to do with them. Matthew is a tax collector, a guy literally working for “the man” of the Roman Empire – how dare he!  The woman who has been hemorrhaging for ten years is unclean/untouchable.  The leader’s daughter is dead.  That is how the world sees – unworthy, unclean, a death that cannot be undone.
    Like Theo in that story I mentioned, Jesus doesn’t ignore the sin, the sadness, and the pain that these people are experiencing.  He says, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick.”  We can reflect upon the people we know who are “sick” and in need of Jesus our great Physician’s healing, whether it is physical, emotional, or spiritual pain.  People who are caught up in the rat race of the commuter lifestyle, weighed down by unmanageable debt.  People who are worried about their daughter’s eating disorder or son’s major depression.  People who are struggling with death, chronic illness or addiction.  These are things we might obviously see or we might discover below the surface if we take the time and compassion to listen to the pain of our neighbor’s story.  Regardless, Jesus moves us to see beyond the hurt to the wholeness and healing he offers.  No one is so sick that Jesus can’t redeem, heal and save, thanks be to God!  He sees and touches the tax collector, the unclean, the dead and transforms with new life! This is what it means to call Jesus our Great Physician!
    But that’s not all.  After reminding the Pharisees that he has come to heal the sick, he quotes from our first lesson from Hosea, “I desire mercy, not sacrifice.”  God desires that we show mercy more than our self-righteous good works.  We can’t give what we haven’t received.  We need mercy to show mercy to others.  Maybe this gospel, maybe OUR story, is not just about how we extend mercy to others, but how we first receive the mercy of God in Jesus Christ in the first place, seeing ourselves alongside the homeless, the tax collector, the grieving, the “unclean,” the struggling single parent, the woman who had an abortion and so on.  What is our sickness, our pain, our struggle that we cannot fix on our own?  Are we in denial that we need to go to Jesus our doctor, or can we humble ourselves to accept that there are some things we just cannot fix on our own?  We, too, are the sinners who come to the table to receive the mercy of God in Jesus Christ, and thank God, Jesus welcomes us there.  As people who have been transformed by the saving grace of Jesus’ love, like Theo of Golden, we strive to share that transformative mercy with others – not as someone who is better than them, but as a bedmate in the hospital of God.  I love this quote which I know I have shared before, and has been attributed to many famous theologians over the years, “The church is not a museum of saints, but a hospital for sinners.”  This ought to be the mission of every church so that we are preparing emergency response teams to extend the transformative saving, healing mercy of Jesus to all those in need, which includes us.
    Just as Jesus calls Matthew, the tax collector-sinner, to follow him as a co-worker in the hospital for sinners, so Jesus calls us.  We know Matthew as the tax collector, but we also know him as a disciple and gospel writer.  Do you know what his name means in Greek?  “Gift of God.”  Jesus definitely sees that Matthew is not just a sinner in need of God’s mercy, but also a gift of God.  Jesus, our Great Physician, calls us to see ourselves also beyond the labels that we and others give us to see that we, too, are gifts of God with talents and blessings to share.  Our faith in Christ’s mercy and healing power makes us well.  May we continue to go and learn what this means.  Amen.