Jesus, we’ve been over this before. Maybe this will help you understand. You’ve entered into a time and place where there is great harassment and resulting poverty, disease, no hope. You are known for your compassion for these whom nobody else wanted and so used the greatest power you had, power based in love, to heal “every sort of disease and illness.” Gracious God, but their gratitude for how you changed these lives could never be great enough to repay. You ask only that people follow you.

Nice. Yet it wasn’t enough. A healed body is only a start. They needed a new way of life, a new way of thinking, believing, in knowing God. Your message was centered in that. This only comes by relationship, not by a mass produced slick ad campaign. (Ok, not in that era but it shows the futility of the effort otherwise.) So you say to your close crew of twelve, “The harvest is large, but the workers are few.” What’s needed is more workers spreading out with Jesus’ message of love of God and neighbor.

Now here’s the point. You mobilize your men to do just that. But imbedded in these twelve are the ingredients for more trouble than you have yet to bring on yourself. Couldn’t you, why wouldn’t you recruit better skilled and adept ones than these?

It’s the Economy, Stupid

Don’t take that literally but hear what it’s saying. You have to look beyond the obvious and see what’s underneath Jesus’ purpose and mission in sending out these particular twelve men.

No, sometimes they weren’t the brightest bulbs in the box. Often, they just didn’t get that Jesus as Messiah wasn’t what they thought. Yet, the one thing they had going for them as Jesus gave his marching orders was they were to move among people who were just like them. Crowds would be receptive to hearing a message from one of their own.

A good leader knows the limitations of his workforce. For now at least, Jesus says stay away from those who weren’t Jews as they were in ethnicity or faith traditions, such as Gentiles or half-breed Samaritans. For the time being, they wouldn’t be embroiled in prejudicial conflict. They weren’t ready for that. But he did empower them with divine authority to exorcise demons and heal “every sort of disease and illness.” The people would recognize who their leader was by that.

A Secondary Purpose

You’re right. These guys, even if they were all Jews, were diverse in background and what brought them to Jesus in the first place. Again, Jesus knew this could be an advantage. Several were fishermen. They knew how the Romans robbed their livelihood, and the people would see in them what they suffered in their own lives. So what if these guys weren’t Ivy-league graduates? These laborers would speak their language and command their attention. If you are going to build a movement based in relationship, you want these guys on your team.

Conflicting Interests

Yet, two of them were as far apart as you might imagine. No doubt they stayed opposite each other as they lined up when following Jesus or made snide remarks to their mission partners when they thought their leader wasn’t listening. But know this, each disciple was chosen for a specific purpose, and these two each had it in him to fulfil that.

Hated Tax Collector

One was Matthew to whom one of the records of Jesus’ life is attributed as author. He also had lived as a despicable collaborator with the Romans. Tax collectors were lumped with “notorious sinners” by religious leaders and the citizenry certainly concurred. Besides taxing a shark-sized bite out of profits from their labor, these taxes were not returned in benefits or infrastructure for the people. King Herod and Rome made out well by the practice. Not to mention how these creeps skimmed off extra for themselves.  And of all people, Matthew had been one of these traitorous Jews.

Why recruit such a turncoat? Who better to demonstrate, testify to how Jesus could offer more than pockets full of cash but rather a heart healed as they were in body and limb? This kind of reversal is ultimately what Jesus offered, and he needed Matthew to live out and model its possibility.

Passionate Zeal

But pitted against Matthew was another who would have burned with hatred against him. Simon the Zealot is an obscure disciple, only mentioned in lists of the twelve. It is in being known as “Zealot” though his character and passion is inferred.

Zealot could mean he was adamant in keeping the Law of Moses and would have been the kind who adhered to the Law down to the least letter and punctuation in it. Tithing, worship practices, purity rituals were likely a huge part of his life. However, it was insistence that any form of idolatry, that is, putting any other or thing before God, be prohibited which would  take precedence in his passion. To be fair, there is also some thought that the religious leaders and those who were such keepers of the law believed if all the Jews kept the law perfectly for twenty-four hours, the Messiah would come to restore them as a nation. Behind such a hope lay their passion, and religious fanatics might have been an understandable result.

Yet there is some thought that Simon’s passion as Zealot could be taken as more than just toeing the line on the 613 laws held over the Jewish people. While historical records are not clear on the timing of their formation, Zealots were a loosely held faction that eventually escalated into a religious-political party organized to overthrow the Romans.

Simon the Zealot could have been one or both of these when Jesus called him. Similar to Matthew, he would need a change in heart. Given the Zealot propensity for violence, Jesus’ call to turn the other cheek and love your enemy would have been a gut flip for the likes of him.

A Bipartisan Agreement

When Simon laid eyes on Matthew, he likely choked. Of all things Zealots hated, paying taxes to Romans was the worst form of idolatry. They considered the practice as conceding control to Romans and Caesars’ claim to be divine. This was not going to be a good mix.

Exactly. Jesus, this would be like throwing Democrats and Republicans, the far right and the far left, Jews and Muslims, Martha’s Vineyard with San Francisco Tenderloin district, Zelensky and Putin, maybe even the Eagles and the Cowboys into the same pot and lighting up the oil inside. What were you thinking!

Within God’s community, the kingdom of heaven as it is sometimes called, there will be many who look different and look at life from all kinds of ways. Jesus knew such a large harvest required all such kinds of character.

Maybe this inclusion of such different men and ideological backgrounds was a deliberate counterbalance of one with the other. Both perspectives were prevalent among the people, thus needed was an understanding and trust from where they were sitting and who was sent to speak to them.

Still, maybe by this deliberate teaming was part of their formation as disciples. Being charged to work for a common aim, the closeness it required could have revealed to them the others’ needs and what brought each to his perspective.

These twelve, called out of their common heritage as Abraham’s children, were not the same in any respect. Centered though in each was a relationship with Jesus, each knowing forgiveness from the worst of themselves to grow into and beyond what they’d never be on their own because of his love of them and those who need him in the worst way. The large harvest required of them to…

“Give as freely as you have been given.”

Matthew 9:35-10:8