Luke 15:1 Commentary and Bible Study

Vast crowds were following the Lord Jesus Christ. We get some indication of the size of the crowd in the previous chapter, ‘And there went great multitudes with him, and he turned and said unto them’ – not just multitudes, but great multitudes. And yet at the beginning of chapter 15, we read: ‘Then drew near unto him all the publicans [tax collectors] and sinners for to hear him.’ That doesn't mean that only they were present. It means that because of the nature of the message of Christ, even those who were outcasts from the synagogues, religious rejects, were attracted to him. The tax gatherers were wealthy people. In the system of those days, they purchased at great expense the right to tax the people from the Roman authorities. It was a kind of outsourcing system, and if you were wealthy enough, you could buy a region, and you made your profit from collecting the taxes, remitting what was required by the Roman authorities, and pocketing the rest, and you could contrive to overcharge, and many of them no doubt did. Consequently the tax gatherers were very rich, and because they were working for the Romans, they were despised and ostracized. But now even they, who have not worshipped, are concerned to hear Christ. This is a message of free forgiveness, a message of new life which is not earned, which is not deserved. Even prostitutes and tax gatherers, many, many of them, somehow found their way to the front, and so significant was their presence that it's noted here.