In this passage Jesus selects his team among whom are fishermen, a tax collector and an insurrectionist. Matthew had been a traitor, a Jew working for the enemy, a little bit like a Jewish citizen today working for the Palestinian Authority against his own people. Simon the Zealot, on the other hand was a Jewish freedom fighter, an enemy of the empire.
Imagine their conversations. Imagine how Simon must have been tempted to hold Matthew in contempt. Yet the “band of brothers” (Judas aside) held together.
This is a sign of the presence of the Kingdom of God. Wherever you see Christ followers of different background, politics, ethnicity, race, gender, heritage, language, etc, etc. working together in a common bond toward the end of bringing other into a healing relationship with Jesus Christ, you are in the presence of the Kingdom of God.
Wherever there is division, hatred, strife, gossip, posturing, criticism of one another, the world has every right to question whether or not the Kingdom is actually here.
“I pray that they will all be one, just as you and I are one—as you are in me, Father, and I am in you. And may they be in us so that the world will believe you sent me” . John 17:21 (NLT)
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