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Nov 11, 2025 06:00am

Walking Through Luke: Jesus Made a New Way

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Some people are casual about change and new experiences. Others feel anxious about it, preferring things to stay the way they’ve always been.

I’m somewhere in the middle. I get excited for big changes (if they’re good). It brings a buzzing, energetic feeling that comes from knowing life is progressing. Things are moving forward, and even if they won’t be the same, that’s okay because life is marching on. This was harder to understand as a child. When I was seven years old, my family moved from Arizona—where I lived next door to one set of grandparents and was only two hours from the other—then moved halfway across the country to a small town in Kansas. I did not like that change. Nor did I like it eighteen months later when we moved from the eastern side of Kansas to an even smaller town on the western side.

With age came understanding and perspective. At seventeen, my family moved again—this time to Arkansas. And while I was sad to leave behind friends and a home I had known for nearly a decade, I was also excited for the opportunities ahead of me. Being a senior in high school, I recognized that there were more collegiate opportunities for me in Central Arkansas than in Southwest Kansas. That sense of excitement at change continued into the big events most young adults experienced: first days of college, preparation for a wedding, starting new jobs, and welcoming my first child.

Smaller changes are often harder for me to handle. I like my daily routine. I like things to go the way they do every day. I can adjust for plans made in advance (like dinner with friends or leading a youth group outing). But if it’s a sudden thing, like someone saying, “Hey, do you want to do something tonight?” it throws me off. I need time to mentally prepare for a change in my routine.

Change can be good or bad, big or small. But change is necessary for life to flourish. If things always stayed the same, we would become stagnant—and stagnant things eventually die. Not literally, of course (unless you’re a shark), but it can make us become stuck in our ways, buried in the mundanity of things. Change shakes things up, keeps them interesting, and helps us keep moving forward rather than fall into the trap of being too comfortable.

Many American churches struggle with change. Churches have a reputation for liking things to stay the same way they’ve always been. Thousands of churches across America wrestle with music preferences—traditional hymns or contemporary worship, drums or no drums, hymnbooks or projected lyrics. Others exclusively read the King James Version of the Bible, seeing different versions as too progressive, if not outright sinful. It would not be out of the ordinary to find some that expect their women and girls to dress in ankle-length skirts and dresses and their men and boys to wear ties. They expect these things and believe these things because that is the way things have always been done, and clinging to those traditions can feel more comfortable than grappling with change.

I’m thankful to be part of a church that is not resistant to change. We recently painted and refurnished our foyer, which created a buzz of excitement in our congregation. Some churches have entered into long-standing debates about carpet color, having pews vs. chairs in the sanctuary, and any other number of arguments over minutiae. Such arguments have even caused permanent rifts within congregations, leading members to split off and form new churches across town. But those things don’t help or hurt our ability to worship God or take the Gospel to the lost. Yet somehow, we get stuck in the mundane.

It gets worse when it comes to people outside our circle. I heard a story about a couple, living an unbiblical lifestyle, who showed up to a Sunday morning service at a small-town church. They weren’t church members; they weren’t even believers. They were visitors—visitors who needed to experience the love of Jesus and allow the Gospel to transform them. But after the service, the pastor went to them and told them that since they were living that lifestyle, they were told they were not welcome to return.

Hearing that story filled me with righteous anger and frustration. It is likely that the couple will never go to another church again. If they don’t hear from someone who cares about them that Jesus loves them and died for them, they will die lost—and that pastor will shoulder a portion of the blame because he made them feel that they were unwelcome among God’s people.

Yes, that bothers me. I hope it bothers you, too.

Jesus tells us to reach the lost. That’s everyone who doesn’t know Him. He doesn’t want them to stay sinners; He leads them to change and become more like Him. But He welcomes them just as they are. The change comes after they have established a relationship with Him. But it can be far too easy for Christians to become judgmental. If someone is dressed in a way we consider inappropriate or behaves in a way we consider unrighteous, too many of us don’t give them a chance. We kick them right out, as if they’re unwelcome to hear the Gospel.

Luke 5:27–39 reveals that Jesus welcomes everyone. Jesus called a man that most people hated: a tax collector. Levi was a Jewish man, but he had become employed by Rome to be a tax collector. Because of this, most other Jewish people would have called him a traitor and never spoken to him. Jesus didn’t care about that. He approached Levi’s tax booth and said, “Follow Me.” And Levi did! He left his post, along with the money he had collected, and he followed Jesus.

And he didn’t just follow Him—he brought others! He had a party at his house, and he invited all the other tax collectors and sinners he knew. He brought them to Jesus, too. This angered the Pharisees, who were the religious elite of that area. They said, “Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and sinners?” (v. 30). And Jesus said, “Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance” (v. 31). He didn’t come for the self-righteous crowd who were confident in their own way of being right with God. He came for those who recognized their sinfulness—those society despised—so they could find forgiveness.

Jesus compared their religious practices to His new ways (vv. 33–39). He warned that those who were obsessed with tradition would never come around to new ways because they were too set in their old ways. Let’s not be like them. Let’s not be so set in the old ways that we can’t change for the sake of the Gospel. Some things we should never change. We should never say sin is okay. We should never say there are other ways to heaven besides Jesus. But we shouldn’t be so set on traditions and the way we’ve always done things that we become irrelevant and, worse, ineffective. Jesus gave us a beautiful example of the way forward: changing the world by sharing His love through compassion, understanding, and gentle rebuke.

I can’t imagine the disciples felt at ease eating with tax collectors, but Mark’s parallel passage reveals that they were right there with Him (Mark 5:16). They were willing to step outside their comfort zone and accompany Jesus into the world, into a crowd hated by the “righteous” folks, and dine with them. Because Jesus did it, and He called them to do it with Him. He calls us to do the same. Let’s resolve to extend the same compassion we were shown to those who need it, even if some of their habits or lifestyle choices make us uncomfortable. This is how the love of God changes the world.