Waist Deep 2018 - September 6


Luke 5: 31, 32 Jesus answered them, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance.” (NIV)


How on earth can you and I stand in the pulpit, in a Sunday school class, or in a small group and tell people how to reach a lost world when we refuse to step outside our little bubble of isolation?*


The Pharisees probably wanted to get into a discussion about who was righteous, but Jesus was not concerned about that. Jesus’ point in this passage was that righteous people don’t need to repent and that’s why he was hanging out with sinners. As Paul reminds us in Romans 3: 10 (quoting Psalm 14: 3), no one is righteous; so who is in any position to criticize Jesus for the people he associates with?

Think of the church as a hospital and each individual church member as an employee of the hospital. A hospital has a lot more than just doctors on staff. A well-run hospital has nurses, technicians, janitors, cooks, and office-workers. Some people drive the ambulance that brings in the badly injured patients; others pick up sick people at their homes and drive them to the hospital for treatment or surgery. The hospital exists to treat and prevent illness and injury – not so that doctors and nurses and technicians can encourage each other and have meetings to discuss the latest treatment theories. Yes, just like a hospital, the church needs to train and encourage its employees, but it is a useless institution if it never comes into contact with the sin-diseased world.


Consider who Jesus spent his time with while on earth. He spent time with, worked with, and changed the lives of those who were broken and lost.*


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