Christ Receiving and Eating with Sinners
Text: “And the Pharisees and scribes murmured, saying, This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them” (Luke 15:2).
This man was Jesus. The meaning of His name is Jehovah Savior. The angel Gabriel commanded His mother so to call Him because He should save His people from their sins.
His name was, therefore, an index of His character and work. He came to seek and to save that which was lost. He came to call, not the righteous, but sinners to repentance. In His more especial work He was declared by His forerunner to be the Lamb of God which taketh away (or beareth away) the sin of the world. It was by His sacrifice for sin that He made atonement for our sins and met all the demands of the law for our condemnation. It is in the furtherance of this work that as our High Priest He is ever interceding for us with God, praying for us as sinners that God will pardon our sins and remove afar from us our transgressions. It is into our sinful hearts that He sends His Holy Spirit, to change them, to convict of sin, to lead us as sinners to look unto Him for salvation, to teach us that there is nothing in us, but everything in Christ, to enable us to cast away all confidence in our own works or merit as fitness, to rely alone upon Christ’s work and His promises, and to trust our whole salvation, beginning and middle and end, entirely into His hands.
Christ deals with us as sinners utterly lost and already condemned and becomes to us a complete Savior in every respect. He is the Jehovah Savior of His sinful people.
But there is a wide step between this position, itself so gracious, and merciful, and that in which our text presents him.
We have not here the mere Savior of sinners but their companion. He is not here exhibited only as dying for man but living with him. The picture presented is not that of the Lamb bearing away the sin of the world, but of the Holy One of God holding fellowship with the worst classes of mankind.
Even our text as translated does not present to us the whole truth. The pious [Horatius] Bonar says with reference to its teaching,
The word “receiveth” is in the original singularly expressive. It means waiteth, watcheth, looks out for, lies in wait. It occurs fourteen times in the New Testament, and in all other places it is translated in some such way: as in Mark 15:43—“who waited for the kingdom of God”; Luke 2:25—“waiting for the consolation of Israel”; Luke 2:3—“looked for redemption in Jerusalem”; Luke 12:30—‘men that wait for their Lord”; Acts 23:21—“looking for a promise from thee”; Titus 2:13—“looking for that blessed hope”; Jude 21—“looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Our text, then, if it presents Christ in His true aspect shows Him to us, as waiting for sinners, looking out for them, longing for them, having that expectation of their coming of which hope is a decided element. And then when these hopes have been fulfilled and they have come to Him, or been found of Him, He is said to take them into intimate fellowship and friendship. “This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.”
But is this statement of the text correct? It is not Christ that says it. It is not one of his disciples. It is not even the language of the ordinary multitude which surrounded him.
It is an accusation against Him made by the Pharisees. We know that their statements cannot be relied upon.
They hated Jesus and were always on the look out for something wherewith to accuse him. The gospel records evince that they were constant spies upon Him and sought continually to mislead the people about Him. They saw Him cast out devils and said, “He casteth out devils through the prince of the devils.” When a man with a withered hand was present they asked Him, “Is it lawful to heal on the sabbath days? that‘they might accuse him.” Luke 6:7 says they “watched him … that they might find an accusation against him.” When He said to the sick of the palsy, “Thy sins are forgiven thee,” they began to reason, saying, “Who is this which speaketh blasphemies?” When He went on the sabbath day to eat bread in the house of one of the chief Pharisees, they watched Him to see if he would heal the man with the dropsy. When He opened the eyes of the man blind from his birth, some of them said, “This man is not of God, because he keepeth not the sabbath day.” Thus did they hate and slander Him, and their accusation in the text might have been the result of this hatred.
The whole information we have from the Gospels teaches us to beware how we receive as true the accusations of the Pharisees. And our text is one of these accusations. The Pharisees and scribes murmured and said, “This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.”
The charge which they made against Jesus was an extraordinary one. His alleged conduct seems greatly to have astonished them. We live at too great a distance of time and under too different circumstances to judge of it. But it was such action as must greatly have perplexed the pious people among the Jews. Here was a religious teacher, one who was declared to be the Messiah, one whose personal purity and sinlessness were asserted by Himself and by His disciples, and whom does He make His companions? The men of authority and position in the nation? The men who were of special purity of life? The Pharisees who were especially the national purists? The scribes who were so intimately associated with the Scriptures of God? No, none of these—not even the men of ordinary purity and morality. But men who were especially recognized as sinners, who were so known as such as to be marked as a special class. And, then, not only these, but even the publicans, the oppressive tax-gatherers, who had sold themselves to the Roman nation and who were enriching themselves by their extortions upon the Jews. These were they whom Jesus is said to have sought after, waited for, expected and longed for as guests, and chosen to sit with Him at table.
Hence the Pharisees immediately seize upon it as a ground of accusation. They show their malice and mischief-making spirit by immediate murmurs. “See what he is doing, this teacher of morals, this Messiah of the Jews, this pretended pure and Holy One. Men are known by the company they keep. See his companions, his chosen ones, whom he delights to honor, whom he eats and drinks with—see him—Why, this man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.”
Is their charge correct?
We look to the record, and we see that the charge is true in all its fullness. At the feast of Matthew, himself a publican, though called as one of the twelve, we are told that “many publicans and sinners came and sat down with him and his disciples.” When Christ entered Jericho, He offered Himself as a guest to Zaccheus, the chief of the publicans. Indeed, the very occasion of the murmuring of the Pharisees in our text was that all the publicans and sinners draw near unto Christ to hear him, and doubtless the very manner of His reception of them justifies the peculiar word of the accusation which charged Christ as expectantly awaiting them.
At the feast of Matthew, Christ Himself acknowledged that the accusation made at that feast was true and assigned the reason for His conduct. But on that occasion He seems simply to have admitted these sinners as companions. His answer was that He had come to call not the righteous but sinners to repentance. It was, therefore, natural that He should consort with those He came to save. The more wicked they were, the more they needed His salvation. The more steeped in sin, the more call was there for His influence to draw them from it. The more guilty they were, the more did they need encouragement to come to Him. The announcement of the nature of His work was, therefore, an assignment of sufficient reason for His stooping to the very depths of human sin to lift out of its toils and from their own defilement the men who were most deeply stained and most inextricably entangled.
In the light of Christ’s life and work as we now see it, we can comprehend the fullness of His mercy and the appropriateness of His action.
He who brings bread to the hungry will seek first those who are ready to perish. Though all may need his help, yet must these first be relieved who otherwise may die before their turn may come.
Such, therefore, was Christ’s true and justifying answer to the charge at Matthew’s feast that He was consorting with sinners. But, as we have seen, the accusation in our text is stronger. It is not merely companionship where men had come in as these did and sat down at the feast with Him and His disciples. It is more than this that is here implied. It is that Christ was waiting, watching, looking out for, hoping to receive, and expecting with earnest desire that these sinners should come to Him.
And Christ makes to this charge a most remarkable answer, one which shows that we may give to this word “receiveth” all the fullness of meaning which may at any time be ascribed to it.
His answer is contained in three of the most remarkable parables to be found in all His sayings. In them He shows that this is His true attitude, nay, that the word of the accusation does not go far enough. It does not express the full truth. There is must more than any could have imagined from His conduct.
Thus replying, too, He shows us unmistakably that the disposition toward sinners He then sets forth is not that of a transient occasion but the pervading and ruling spirit of His life. Nay, that thus is set forth the grand truth in His spiritual kingdom of the deep yearning which He feels that every sinner, a single sinner though but one, any sinner the more vile he be the more is it true, should find in Him salvation and restoration to the failed relationship of God.
The first parable by which He teaches this is that of the shepherd of an hundred sheep leaving the ninety and nine safe within the fold while he goes forth into the wilderness to seek the one that is lost. How strongly and yet how sweetly does the familiar illustration come home to the hearts of all. The anxiety of the shepherd, the danger of the sheep, his going forth with longing heart into the pathless wilderness to seek the sheep, straying per-haps in indifference, in ignorance of danger, perhaps in joy of forbidden pastures, and the speed which the shepherd makes lest the darkness should overtake him and his search be vain or the cold of the night benumb the straying lamb until it perish or the wolf come and devour it when there is no protector by, and when he finds, how tenderly does he deal with it, not chiding nor chastising, not roughly driving it before him nor even leading it back again over the rough roads, but laying it upon his shoulders, bearing for it all the pain and toil of the return and gladly bearing it because of the joy which he feels that he has recovered his sheep. As we recall the emotions natural to the shepherd, we can imagine that joy with which he makes his voice to ring, over hill and dale, calling out to his friends and neighbors, “I have found my sheep, I have found my sheep! Rejoice with me! I have found my sheep!”
Is it true that Jesus thus yearns over every lost sinner and thus longs to find him and to bring him back into his fold? He tells us so. It is thus that He answers the accusation of the Pharisees that He was an expectant looker-out for sinners, eagerly desires to receive and entertain them. Yes, and He adds that as He thus brings each one by persistence and faith into His kingdom, He shouts out His triumph throughout the realms of heaven, and the angelic hosts rejoice at the salvation of a single man.
There are ninety and nine that safely lay
In the shelter of the fold,
But one had wandered far away
In the desert so lone and cold
Away in the mountains wild and bare,
Away from the Shepherd’s tender care.
Shepherd! hast thou not here thy ninety and nine?
Are they not enough for thee?
But the Shepherd replied “This one of mine
has wandered away from me;
The way may be wild and rough and steep;
I go to the desert to find my sheep.
But none of the ransomed ever knew
How deep were the waters crossed;
Nor how dark was the night the Lord passed thro’
Ere he found the sheep that was lost.
Away in the desert he heard its cry
So feeble and helpless and ready to die.
Shepherd; whence are those blood drops all the way
Up the mountains rugged track
They were shed for the one who had gone astray.
Ere the shepherd could bring him back.
Lord, why are thy hands so rent and torn
For him they were pierced with many a thorn.
And afar up the mountain thunder riven
And along the rocky steep
There arose the glad song of joy to heaven
Rejoice, I have found my sheep.
And the angels echoed around the throne
Rejoice, for the Lord brings back His own.
This first parable in which He thus replies mingles the idea of compassion for the sheep with that of the loss of something which is owned. Our Lord, therefore, proceeds one step further in the next by the exclusion of the possible suffering of that which was lost. He thus sets before us the fact that His yearning is not simply compassion, but earnest desire to regain a lost possession. It is the parable of the woman who has lost one out of ten pieces of silver. The lost piece cannot suffer. It cannot be destroyed. It will remain as valuable in itself as ever. If found by another, it will be as useful as ever. But it is a lost piece of property. And the woman begins for it a diligent search. Can we not see her as she looks in one possible place and then another? “Where can I have put it?” she exclaims. “Could I have mislaid it, or have I dropped it?” And as she thinks of this possibility, she lights a candle and sweeps the house and seeks diligently until she finds it.
Is this descriptive of Christ? He says it is. He says it to the Pharisees, who have despised Him for His intercourse with sinners: And, thus, He declares to them these sinners are mine. Each one of them is mine. You say that I am waiting for them. I am doing more than this. Your word waiting does not express the idea. I have lost my property, which I would regain for my happiness and joy, and I am searching for it.
How blessed the language, how deeply should it impress every heart: Christ is searching after sinners. He has lighted His candle. He is sweeping the floor. He is determined to find that poor sinner if possible. Who is it that He thus seeks? It is every sinner. It is any sinner. It is the sinner that is most utterly lost. It is the sinner who cannot even move to come unto Him, but upon whom He will throw the light of His candle, and by the reflection of His light from the lost one will recover His, own, and replace him in His treasury.
Here again, the joy He asserts as His in such finding. Imagine the woman’s exultation after her long and diligent search. She calls to all her friends. “I have found it, I have found it!” And so Christ also has His joy as He sees of the travail of His soul and the angels who strengthened Him in Gethsemane proclaim to the heavenly host the new cause of rejoicing—“Another soul of man is saved. Another penitent is found!”
Ah, but our hearts respond “there is no sin there, no sin in the coin, none even in the sheep even if willfully it had strayed.” Doubtless the Pharisees were ready to say the same thing with a sneer. Why talk of such loss and finding in connection with such sinners?
But Christ stopped the sneer of the Pharisees by His third and last parable, that inimitable one of the Prodigal Son. Here there was sin. It was a willful son, one not content with his father’s house and love, one anxious to shake off dependence upon that father’s authority, one bent upon the free use of all he might call his own, going forth—and that not to a wise but a foolish and sinful use of his opportunities, spending his whole substance in riotous living, brought to a sense of his sinful rebellious and wasted life only by his condition of starvation and servitude, and thus returning. And to such as one how does the father, who here stands for Jesus, appear? As one stern and unbending and unforgiving? turning away in wrath from his spendthrift son and looking with disgust upon his tattered rags? Nay, it is the father who has never forgotten the absent one, who has ever yearned over him, who now sees him while yet afar off, and recognizes him even in his beggary and rags, and who waits not for words of penitence, but filled with compassion runs and falls upon his neck and kisses him, owns him as his son, clothes him with the best robe, putting the ring upon his finger and shoes upon his feet, and kills the fatted calf in honor of his return.
No question here of sinfulness, nor of abundant provocation to anger. But still less question of earnest love and vehement desire to get back the lost one. The parable appeals to every child, and especially to every parent. Can there be such love, such forgiveness, such indestructible compassion. Our hearts say, “yes, yes.” They yearn for our own children. We would do all this for them. No joy could exceed the joy which would fill a father’s heart at this the safe return of one long mourned as lost.
Christ says, as are your hearts so is mine. It is on this account and with these feelings that I seek after sinners. Each of them is as dear to me as such a son to you. As you feel more tenderly even to the undeserving when lost, than to the dutiful who have never strayed, so do I feel towards my poor lost ones. The more they have strayed, the more do I yearn. The greater the sinner, the more anxious my heart. My love has never failed. I have never forgotten one. And I stand as did the father of the prodigal looking out even into the far distance that I may see the penitent return.
Such then is Christ’s answer to the charge of the Pharisees. He uses all three of these parables to explain it. No one of them is sufficient. They must be continued together to teach the whole truth. His enemies said, “He receiveth sinners,” He waits for them, watches for them, is expecting them, takes delight in their coming. This was their reproach.
Christ says to them, You have but a part of the truth. I do not only wait, I go and seek the lost, I am filled with anxiety to find my sheep. I search for my treasure as with lighted candle and sweeping broom. My heart yearns for the wanderer, I look eagerly for him, my spirit within cries out in weariness at his delay. I am ready to welcome him with unequalled honors. It is not pleasure only that I take in the society of these sinners. My soul cries out with joy. I cannot contain my feelings. To all my servants around as each returns I impart my rapture, and the heavens ring with joyful exclamation as a single sinner comes back to God.
Do you believe Jesus, my hearers? Has He spoken here the truth concerning Himself? Is it, can it be, true that Jesus thus yearns over each one here? That He thus earnestly desires the salvation of each soul?
Too long have you lingered in the ways of sin and folly. Too long have you stood and trembled and doubted what might be His feelings toward you.
Hearken today to the message of His yearning love by which he would win you.
It tells you of sinners waited for, longed for with deep desire.
It tells you of the yearnings of your Jehovah Savior who cannot afford to lose you. It tells you of His earnest seeking, by which He would take you wounded and sore and unable to return and bear you back upon His shoulders to the fold.
Can you resist these pleadings? Can you reject such love? Can you disappoint such earnest longings and desires?
Will you not welcome to your heart your blessed Lord, your glorious Savior, who thus seeks you that He may regain His wandering sheep, His lost treasure, His prodigal child, that He may once more number you among His own.
Suffer this day the word of exhortation. Would that I could utter such words as would make you hesitate no longer.
Where shall I find them? Isaiah 55:1, “Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price.”
James P. Boyce, “Christ Receiving and Eating with Sinners (
Luke 15:2),” in
James Petigru Boyce: Selected Writings, ed. Timothy George (Nashville, TN: Broadman Press, 1989), 77–84.
Like [Richard] Fuller, Boyce saw these truths of grace as finding their coherence in the person and work of Christ. Boyce’s great sermon on “Christ Receiving and Eating with Sinners” has a Christ-centered focus that should be the goal of every gospel preacher to emulate. Christ waits on sinners. Christ seeks sinners, and Christ rejoices in the coming of sinners and invites them with all earnestness to come to Him. He “shouts out his triumph throughout the realms of heaven, and the angelic hosts rejoice at the salvation of a single man” (James P. Boyce, Selected Writings [Nashville: Broadman Press, 1989], 81).
Tom J. Nettles, “A Historical View of the Doctrinal Importance of Calvinism among Baptists,” in
Calvinism: A Southern Baptist Dialogue, ed. E. Ray Clendenen and Brad J. Waggoner (Nashville, B&H, 2008), 63–64.
Preaching and effectual calling operate in a similar manner. Boyce did not profess to be able to explain these two bits of data with absolute coherence, but he did believe that the principle established earlier, the progressive and self-sustaining character of divine revelation, rendered both biblical realities consistent, similar to prayer and providence. If the Bible calls on us to believe and act in response to both, then we must. God’s sincerity, even in the bare outward call, cannot be questioned precisely because of the biblical portrait of his character. Additionally, however, an absolute determinism to save on the one hand does not contradict the earnestness of the invitation on the other. If those invited are left to do just as they please, none can question the sincerity of the call. An accusation of insincerity would never have crossed one’s mind if efficient grace had not been introduced to guarantee the salvation of some. Had only an external proclamation existed with no special grace, but all alike were left to the consequences of their own corrupted affections and will, the charge of insincerity could not have arisen, for the urgency of the message itself and its call for repentance and trust with the promise of salvation have all the marks of utter truth and, thus, sincerity. Beyond that, God assures sinners of his sincerity by the nature of his pleading with them as in Ezekiel 33:11: “Turn ye, turn ye from your evil ways; for why will ye die, O house of Israel?”
In his preaching, therefore, Boyce urged on his hearers the transparent sincerity of God in seeking sinners, all sinners, through the message of the gospel. In a sermon entitled “Christ Receiving and Eating with Sinners,” based on Luke 15:2, Boyce discussed the accusation brought against Jesus, “This man receiveth sinners, and eateth with them.” Since Jesus came to seek the lost, he quite naturally would seek opportunities to “consort with those He came to save.” But the accusation had greater intensity; they “accused him of waiting, watching, looking out for, hoping to receive.” Boyce replied that the accusation does not go far enough, for Jesus manifested a “deep yearning which He feels that every sinner, a single sinner though but one, any sinner the more vile he be the more it is true, should find in Him salvation and restoration to the failed relationship of God.” He emphasized this in increasing intensity by showing how Jesus presented himself in three parables.
In the parable of the lost sheep we find that “Jesus thus yearns over every lost sinner and thus longs to find and to bring him back into his fold.” Jesus was an “expectant looker-out for sinners” and eagerly desired to “receive and entertain them.” And as Jesus brings a sinner home, he shouts out His triumph throughout the realms of heaven, and the angelic hosts rejoice at the salvation of a single man.”
In parable two, Jesus showed his “earnest desire to regain a lost possession.” Jesus is the woman with ten pieces of silver and he says, “I have lost my property, which I would regain for my happiness and joy, and I am searching for it.” Boyce affirmed that Jesus seeks those that the Father gave him before the foundation of the world and will not fail to find them. That truth Boyce indicated implicitly in preaching this series of parables, but explicitly he affirmed that “it is every sinner. It is any sinner. It is the sinner that is most utterly lost. It is the sinner who cannot even move to come unto Him but upon whom He will throw the light of His candle, and by the reflection of His light from the lost one will recover His own, and replace him in His treasury.”
The third parable involved not a sheep or a coin, but an infinitely ungrateful and rebellious son, a true “example of genuine sinfulness” as well as a “real provocation to anger.” This gave even greater offense to Jesus’ accusers as he pictured the justly offended father yearning for the return of the son, and acting in the most outrageously undignified and incalculably gratuitous manner in receiving him back. “The most they have strayed, the more do I yearn,” Boyce pictured the Father as saying. “The greater the sinner, the more anxious my heart. My love has never failed. I have never forgotten one. And I stand as did the father of the prodigal looking out even into the far distance that I may see the penitent return.”
The close Boyce handled masterfully, showing that God is the initiator and consummator of the salvation event, but at the same time pressing the divine earnestness in going after all sinners. Boyce believed that in these parables Christ taught “I do not only wait, I go and seek the lost, I am filled with anxiety to find my sheep. I search for my treasure as with lighted candle and sweeping broom. My heart yearns for the wanderer, I look eagerly for him, my spirit within cries out in weariness at his delay, I am ready to welcome him with unequalled honors.” And at the return of such, Boyce pictured Jesus as affirming, “It is not pleasure only that I take in the society of these sinners. My soul cries out with joy. I cannot contain my feelings. To all my servants around as each returns I impart my rapture, and the heavens ring with joyful exclamation as a single sinner comes back to God.”
To make sure that none could miss his universal intent in setting forth Christ as the willing savior of sinners, Boyce continued, “Do you believe Jesus, my hearers? Has he spoken here the truth concerning Himself? Is it, can it be, true that Jesus thus yearns over each one here? That He thus earnestly desires the salvation of each soul?” He sought to inject the call indelibly into the conscience—“Hearken today to the message of His yearning love by which he would win you. It tells of sinners waited for, longed for with deep desire .… Can you resist these pleadings? Can you reject such love? Can you disappoint such earnest longings and desires?”
Thomas J. Nettles,
James Petigru Boyce: A Southern Baptist Statesman (Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 2009), 427–30. On pages 464–65, Nettles, however, did criticize Boyce’s position on the nature and extent of the atonement as inconsistent. His criticisms were earlier stated in
By His Grace and for His Glory: A Historical, Theological, and Practical Study of the Doctrines of Grace in Baptist Life (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1986), 304. See p. 342 in the 2006 in the 20th Anniversary Revised and Expanded edition. Nettles also argued for a limited sufficiency view on pp. 305–16 [2006 edition, pp. 343–53].
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