"Two, Maybe Three, Miracles”

So which is harder – the healings Jesus will do, or welcoming a tax collector into the fold?

“Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector" from season 1, episode 7 of The Chosen

Matthew 9:9-13, 18-26

June 7, 2026

Dr. Todd R. Wright

The healings are the showstoppers!

Matthew joins Mark and Luke in telling the story of how Jesus brings a little girl back from the dead and heals a hemorrhaging woman who dared touch his robe!

Together, these twin stories display Jesus’ compassion and miracle-working power!

They form a literary gem – an artful sandwiching of two scenes, with passionate emotions on display and a tension-heightening delay. It contrasts a plea from a powerful religious leader with a bold and yet somehow furtive act by a woman dashing out of the shadows. Crowds press in from every side and noises assault: ritual keening and mocking laughter! The stakes are high!

No wonder all three gospel writers remember this incident and use it to paint the Messiah’s portrait with their own styles and colors!

But I wonder if we aren’t ignoring a third miracle in all this flash!

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Our passage for the day begins with Jesus calling Matthew to follow him.

Now the gospel writer has already told us about how Jesus called Simon Peter and Andrew his brother from their nets; and then, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, from their boat. Somewhere along the line seven others had joined up.

So we shouldn’t be surprised when Jesus rounds out the group with a twelfth member.

But we are – or at least we should be – because Matthew is a tax collector!

Scholars explain why that’s a scandal:

“The Roman system of colonization in Judaea required the cooperation of part of the [local] population. Judaea was not an important province. Even in provinces closer to Rome, the Romans generally did not have enough troops or administrators to handle minor matters such as the collection of village taxes. Instead, they recruited [locals] to the role.”[ii]

“Matthew was likely a kind of customs official, charging a ‘toll’ or ‘tax’ on goods being transported to market. Such booths were sometimes set up along roadsides near fishing villages. Tax collectors were widely unpopular, not only because the taxes themselves were onerous, [or] because such funds supported the Roman Empire and its collaborators — but also because tax collectors were often suspected of charging more than required, and pocketing the difference” – getting rich off their neighbors![iii]

In the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says, “For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same?”[iv] with the implication that tax collectors are purely transactional, not compassionate or virtuous. God is calling us to be better.

So, of course, the Pharisees object when Jesus ends up dining with a collection of tax collectors and other sinners! You can’t be holy if you hang around with such folks!

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But I wonder what Jesus’ disciples thought.

At least four of them were fishermen – a heavily taxed profession. And all of them would have bristled at anyone helping the oppressive occupying power of Rome.

When Dallas Jenkins portrays this scene in season one of The Chosen, he has Peter object,

“Do you have any idea what this guy has done? Do you even know him?”

When Jesus stand firm, Peter shakes his head: “I don’t get it.”

Jesus replies. “You didn’t get it when I chose you either.”

Peter is not convinced: “This is different. I’m not a tax collector.”

“Get used to different,” Jesus says, smiling.[v]

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So which is harder – the healings Jesus will do, or welcoming a tax collector into the fold?

I ask because this is raw grace on display … the kind of welcome that no one else is offering. Not then. Not now. And it is just as miraculous as any healing.

David Ewart calls the grace Jesus offers Matthew a form of “social healing”. He writes,

“Jesus receives everyone: synagogue leader; tax collector; bleeding woman [here]; leper, Roman army officer, [and demoniacs elsewhere]. People who would otherwise despise each other; avoid being in the same room with each other; are connected because they connect with Jesus. The healing and forgiveness that Jesus provides restores the broken bonds of community.

The effect of Jesus' life and teachings was that people no longer accepted social brokenness - sin and sickness and second guessing (for example, a lack of trust and loyalty) - as irreversible; as powers that one could do nothing about. Jesus demonstrated that there was [divine] power [and] authority that could, and did, do something about these things. Because ‘mercy’ is a relationship.”[vi]

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If Ewart is right, then the calling of Matthew is both a message and a reminder:

a message to the Pharisees that the God they worship is devoted to mercy and relationships;

and a reminder to the eleven that we are all sinners, sought by a loving God, and saved by grace.

Jesus, I think, is targeting both. And we are in the crosshairs, too!

So if the faithful want to worship God, follow God, live for God …

They need to show mercy and welcome those who have been rejected.

They also need to thank God every day for their forgiveness and extend forgiveness to others!

Matthew never forgot his grace-filled calling. It is baked into ever line of his gospel.

May it be part of your story

[i] “Jesus calls Matthew the tax collector" from season 1, episode 7 of The Chosen

[ii] See https://enterthebible.org/passage/matthew-99-13-the-call-of-matthew/

[iii] From the SALT project reflections on the texts, 6/5/23

[iv] See Matthew 5:46

[v] See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7IUL9yq0We8

[vi] From his reflections on the text at https://www.holytextures.com/2023/09/matthew-9-9-13-18-26-year-a-pentecost-june-5-june-11-proper-5-ordinary-10-sermon.html