Title: Life is a decision!
1. Introduction
The story of the text is not that we live in sin and live like this. Even though it is not like this, a man who lived indecently day by day, met the Lord Jesus and decided to liquidate all his life of sin so far, and changed his life from a non-essential life to an essential life. As a result, it is a biography of a life that has changed from an ownership-oriented life to an existence-oriented life.
2. Existence of the tax collector Levi
The man's name was Levi and his occupation was a publican. In Jesus' day, tax collectors are like high-class detectives in the Japanese colonial era in our case. Therefore, the tax collector Levi was comfortable with food, clothing, and shelter, but his heart was always troubled, and he lived with a heavy sense of guilt that he shouldn't have lived like this.
He was always at odds with the two voices coming from within, and his soul was restless. One voice is to live comfortably as a publican even if you are reviled or sinned, and the other is not. Let's live like people. Let's live proudly. It is to live the truth. Levi, the tax collector, was hesitant and indecisive in the midst of this, and he lived day by day, saying that this is not the case and that it is not.
3. Meeting of the tax collector Levi and Jesus
One day, Levi meets Jesus who has come to Galilee. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. Jesus looked into Levi's troubled soul. And he said clearly and firmly, <Follow me!>. What does it mean? Levi! live like a human live proudly live the truth That's the right thing to say.
These words of Jesus, <Follow me!>, struck the soul of Levi, who was conflicted, agonized, and unassuming, and thunderbolts and storms. In fact, everyone knows how to live the right way. Nevertheless, the reason we cannot escape from that non-essential life, a life that is not like this, is because our sins are so wide, deep, and chewy like arrowroot, that it wraps around our souls.
These words, <Follow me!>, become a sharp golden ax that cuts off the thick and tough sinew like arrowroot that entangled Levi's soul into hundreds of pieces, leading Levi to an essential life, a life of dignity, and a human life. You have given me the freedom to change into life.
Oh, the freedom to decide!
We all know that real life comes from decisive decisions
4. What was Levi's decision?
By meeting Jesus, Levi has the freedom to decide. The text of Luke 5:28 summarizes the decision of Levi the tax collector in just three words. “He left everything and got up and followed him. Let go, get up, and follow.
first. The decision is to throw everything away. The decision is to throw it away first of all. What do you mean abandoned? It means that you have abandoned your attitude, habits, and outlook on life. Levi abandoned his evil profession as an anti-national publican. He gave up all kinds of sinful behaviors related to the taxancies. It also means letting go of the psychological sins of inferiority, superiority, and the disappointment and frustration that I was already wrong.
second. The decision is what happens. To rise here means to get up to shake off the place of life where you used to sit and live in complacency, to set a clear direction for your new life and to go on that path. In the case of Levi, it means that he got up to go on the path of Jesus, the way he had been sitting until now, the way of being a publican without worrying about food, clothing, and food, even though he was pointed at by people.
third. The decision is to follow. To follow here means to go on that path consistently and consistently without changing the heart of the first decision. Most of our decisions are made of three days. This is Dragon頭蛇尾. To follow means to do one thing, not three days in the heart. It's not about being a dragon, it's about being 始如一.
5. I envy Levi
The Danish philosopher Kierkegaard once compared the modern man, who is undecided and complacent with the present life, who lives aesthetically and lives day by day toward a tragic end, to a foolish migratory duck (refer to the classic illustration on the back page).
I'm just like that duck right now. It's not this, it's not this I live day by day The days are getting colder... This is the day of my life. It means getting colder. It's not that the ducks didn't know they had to leave. But the duck, who had only had one day, finally froze to death miserably. Nor do I know how to live. But one week, another week is wasted. The northwest wind in my life is getting colder... Therefore, I envy and envy Levi the publican. I pray that Jesus will be present in the field of my life as well.
6. Closing story
Behold, now is the time to meet Jesus, the day to decide!