Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” 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.” (Luke 5:29-32)

Yesterday, we mentioned the increasing trend sweeping our society in this late stage of the pandemic to require proof of vaccination status. Many, but not all, of those who have received the vaccine are grateful to be able to jump into full participation in filled-to-capacity venues again: it starts to feel like a sense of “normalcy” has returned, if even just a little.

But there remains a question of who gets left out and what happens to them. Those who remain unvaccinated are not a monolithic crowd. Some have had barriers to accessing the vaccine, others have medical reasons that steer them away, and still others have a healthy—and particularly among racialized groups, a well-founded—distrust of government and public institutions. I have spoken to some who remain unvaccinated at this time and have found some legitimate reasons among them for having elected this choice. So, what happens to them when they show up at the gates with naught but filthy rags to show for themselves?

The gut reaction for many of us is to say: they made their own bed, and they can lay in it. They chose not to participate with the rest of society in this communal effort of getting out of COVID, so why should society now keep a place for them? Choices have consequences. Those who chose to get vaccinated want to get back to normal, so why should that get held up by those who chose not to love their neighbours as well as the vaccinated have?

Well, again, firstly: vaccine hesitancy is not quite that simple. It cannot properly be called “just a choice,” when some people, for no fault of their own, are simply unable. But, more importantly for our purposes in this devotion today: all of us make bad choices that screw up our lives and the lives of others. All of us have deliberately chosen to sin at some point along the way: probably at multiple points. And Jesus keeps a place for us anyway. We call it grace. Jesus eats with us anyway. Forgives us anyway. And yes, is also willing to sacrifice his health, unto death, for us who have chosen to sin against him and our neighbours, anyway.

It is not the law-abiding righteous that Jesus comes for: it’s the sinners. The ones who, like tax collector Levi and Zacchaeus have chosen to think of themselves first and sin against others: those are the ones Jesus continually chooses to eat with. They are the sick ones who need the doctor. And to them: Jesus comes. Will we?