Better Than Me, Or Better Than Them…

Attitude is everything. This couldn’t be more clear than today’s passage. There are those that think their poop doesn’t stink. And there are those that know their excrement reels of foul odor. It’s supposed to. The body gets rid of it because it performs no more benefits to it. The difference is attitude. One has the ability to be honest with oneself. They can accept truth in life and apply it to themselves. The other lives a “pretend life”. They are always looking to justify or defend themselves for their actions. One sees people from an equal and sometimes “better than me” perspective, while the other sees themselves as “better than others”, or at least “better than some”. The difference is one knows they are a “sinner”, while the other thinks they are “healthy”. Jesus came for sinners. And the bottom line is that we are all sinners. Some get it, snd some don’t. And the saddest part is, the reason some don’t get it, is simply because they don’t want to get it. Either way when it comes time to be confronted with the truth, how we respond determines everything. Levi responded well. The Pharisees didn’t. Being righteous means “being right” with God. The only way to do that is through repentance and faith in Jesus. Which group do you fall in? Are you a sinner in need of a Savior? Or are you content with the state of your own health?

13 Then Jesus went out to the lakeshore again and taught the crowds that were coming to Him. 14 As He walked along, He saw Levi son of Alphaeus sitting at his tax collector’s booth. “Follow Me and be My disciple,” Jesus said to him. So Levi got up and followed Him.15 Later, Levi invited Jesus and His disciples to his home as dinner guests, along with many tax collectors and other disreputable sinners. (There were many people of this kind among Jesus’ followers.) 16 But when the teachers of religious law who were Pharisees saw Him eating with tax collectors and other sinners, they asked His disciples, “Why does He eat with such scum?”17 When Jesus heard this, He told them, “Healthy people don’t need a doctor–sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners.” Mark 2:13-17