Today I'd like to share a "story" sermon with you.

This is the story of a newspaper editor by the name of Ed Williams, who several years ago, found himself at a conference in Miami, the week before Christmas. This is the setting for the story, and I will allow Mr. Williams to speak his own words in narrating what happened to him on one of those days.

He begins by saying: When I arrived in Miami for the conference, I realized I had forgotten how warm Florida can be in December. Unfortunately, I had packed only long sleeved shirts. The downtown hotel where we met is connected to a shopping mall, so I strolled over on the first evening to buy cooler clothing.

I went into J.C. Penney. As I looked at shirts I could feel the throng of shoppers bustling nearby.

I looked up to see a young man emerge from the crowd and zero in on me. I sensed he intended to ask for something. I braced myself for the pitch. But his question took me by surprise. He asked, "Do you believe in Jesus?"

I looked him over. He was a thin, pleasant-looking man in his mid-30s, and wearing loafers with no socks. And he had large sores, visible on his neck and arms. "Why do you ask?" I asked.

And then he told me this story.

He had come to Miami years ago from a nearby town. When he was diagnosed with HIV, his family told him not to come home. Over time, his condition had developed into AIDS. A few days earlier, he said, his family had called. For some reason they had a change of heart. They invited him home for Christmas.

He couldn't tell them, he said, that he was broke. He needed money for bus fare. Ten dollars would get him home for Christmas.

The newspaper editor began reflecting: I'm in a Wednesday morning Bible study group at my church. Not long ago we had discussed a passage from the 9th Chapter of Matthew's Gospel where Jesus called Matthew, the tax collector and outcast, to be a disciple. In that same passage Jesus also was criticized because He chose to have a meal with sinners and with the insignificant persons of that society.

The problem is that there is a discomfort when we know our Bible stories. Because they keep calling us into account. They keep nudging at our consciences. This same Bible story is particularly troubling for the prosperous people who use their prosperity to reject others. And for the critical persons who use their moral certainties and ethical absolutes to run roughshod over others, all in the name of religious superiority.

Then he continues his story: In my pocket I had a $20 bill that I intended to spend on a shirt. I did not know whether to believe him or not. But it did not matter. He obviously needed the money more than I did. So I handed him the twenty. "Here," I said, "Merry Christmas."

He was surprised. He took the money and looked straight into my eyes. "Thank you," he said and it was as heartfelt a thanks as I have ever received. Then he put the money in his pocket and walked away. Just before he melted into the crowd, he turned and raised his hand in a farewell salute. And he said, "I think you are Jesus!"

I was stunned. And before I could respond, he vanished into the crowd of shoppers. And what I would have said to him was, "I thought you were Jesus."

End of the Ed Williams story. Now the beginning of our story.

I guess the problem with Bible stories is knowing them and coming to church each week and hearing them, or reading them each day. The problem is that they get to us; they touch our hearts, they challenge our lives; they call us to account for our actions.

In today's Gospel text, Jesus is in relationship with a host of different people: a specific tax collector, many other tax collectors and sinners, a synagogue official, a woman who had a hemorrhage of blood for 12 years, and a little girl thought to be dead. Except for Matthew, none of these people are given names. None of them are really very important.

But what all these people have in common with Jesus is that they have a relationship. The relationship is that Jesus is able to see in them something no one else is able to see.

In the time of Jesus, there was a purity system that gave structure to society. That purity system created a world with sharp social boundaries. The boundaries were clear: either pure or impure; either righteous or sinner; either, whole or not whole; male or female, rich or poor, Jew or Gentile. Such a system kept beautiful order and it beautifully kept people separated.

In 2008, in a similar manner, we have our own purity systems of separating people. We have our social boundaries, our lines between the righteous and the sinners, the pure and the impure.

The problem with our system is the same as the problem with the system in Jesus' time: it is not the Gospel. It is not what Jesus said to the Pharisees, "I desire mercy, not sacrifice." In our passage from the prophet Hosea that Jesus quotes, these words are translated, "I desire steadfast love!" What a magnificent desire of God, that we simply give a steadfast love. Mercy and steadfast love-that's God's system of loving us: no boundaries, no separations; and that's the system of Jesus in our relationships with each other.

What a gift if someday, someone would turn to any one of us, after seeing how we interacted with another person, and say: "I thought you were Jesus." What a gift that would be! It would be like Christmas! Even in June! Amen.