Jesus saw Matthew sitting there at the customs post. He noticed him and took and interest in him. Jesus sees us. He notices us. He takes interest in us. He looks at us and beckons us: “Follow me.” Jesus is the good physician, the best of all healers. To all those acknowledge their need for a doctor, he gives the prescription of himself. He is the medicine that can cure us of that which most ails us. He is the most vital drug – – the medicine of immortality, as St. Ignatius of Antioch described the “Bread of Life.”
Only those who acknowledge their sickness come to the doctor. They show their wounds to him that they might be cured of them. Only those who come to the doctor are healed. The light shall rise for those who repent and seek to make amends, their strength will be renewed, the parched land of their souls will become like a water garden, like a spring whose water never fails. If we take the Lord’s medicine, if we do his will and walk in his truth, seeking his interests and not our own, we will find that the Lord becomes our delight. He will make us to ride upon the heights of the earth.
The Lord has mercy on those who cry out to him, he is good and forgiving to those call upon him. Like the good Shepherd that he is, he comes seeking us because he takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked man but rather in his conversion. Let us acknowledge that we are not healthy, that we are not righteous. We are sinners for whom he came to save. We need a doctor (Mother Mary is that welcoming nurse who helps to facilitate the visit). Then let us go to him and show him our wounds that he may heal us and make us new.
(Inspired by insights sparked by the day’s homily by EWTN’s Father Joseph W. MFVA)