The cure
Who has the power to keep Matthew sitting at the customs post? Is it a tradition? Is it prestige, a sense of duty? No. Greed is what keeps Matthew nailed to that bench and to that life. And by whom is greed generated? The ego. It is ego that keeps Matthew locked behind the bars of greed and shackled at the tax office. What keeps the Pharisees stuck within the labyrinths of the law and tradition, nailed to the seats of their chairs? Is it religion? Is it divine justice, love of God? No. It is the desire for dominion that keeps the Pharisees perpetually stuck in the vortex of their prejudices. And what generates the desire for dominion? The ego. It is the ego of the Pharisees that holds them chained to their desks and their prejudices. Who are the sick? Who are the healthy? The sick are those who possess ego and do not want to be liberated from it; the healthy are those who possess ego but strongly desire to be liberated from it. Jesus is very clear. He did not come for those who do not recognize the dominion and arrogance of their ego in themselves and who do not desire to be freed from it. Jesus is the most powerful and knowledgeable physician for diseases of the ego. He is the most effective, energetic medicine against the ego's poison. There is no cure in heaven or earth that is more powerful than the Word of Jesus and His Gospel procedures. Jesus can heal a man from all sickness, because, first of all, He is capable of healing a man of the pressures, deception, twisted logic, and disharmonies arising from the ego. Jesus offers His cure: I desire mercy, not sacrifice. Jesus’ cure is love, a love that is distilled in the form of mercy, the mercy of compassion, of understanding. The ego lives and feeds on ambition in all its forms; and ambition can be anything and everything, but the most subtle and dangerous ambition is the vanity that comes from feeling fine, from feeling fine as far as duty, the law, and God are concerned. It is absurd and perverse ambition that drives man to sacrifice himself in order to feel righteous, superior to others, accomplished, fair and honest, adequate, impartial, lawful, legitimate, moral, regular, responsive, focused, measured, chosen, conforming, uniform, deserving. It is ambition that deviates the law until it creates injustice, it strengthens membership while it preaches equality, it feeds on morals while sowing division and misery, and it heaps on duties while it expands its domain and power. I desire mercy and not sacrifice, this is Jesus’ cure for makind's economic, social, and political crisis and this is the Gospel’s medicine against outbreaks of despair and fear, it is the Lord God’s medicine for human misery and fear. I desire mercy and not sacrifice defeats ambition and disarms ego in any form it has found space in the heart and soul of man. Ask God's mercy for the monstrous damage caused by our egos to ourselves, the common good, to the earth and all living beings. Offer mercy to your brothers for all the wounds that their ego has caused us and to our hearts. I desire mercy and not sacrifice; this is Jesus’ cure for those who want to heal.