In our life, sooner or later, there comes also that moment of decision, when the issue can be delayed no more: “Is my religion – the relationship of my soul with God – to be given priority in my life or not?  Is my devotion to God to be the most important thing of all or is it to be an extra tacked on to the business of living?”

Of course, Our Lord calls only a few to give up all they possess and live a life of holy poverty.  It is not everyone whom he calls to join a religious community or go overseas as a missionary. We do well to remember, however, that it was to ordinary people like ourselves, living ordinary lives, that he addressed that hard saying, “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me…” (NRSV, Matthew 10:37).  For religion consists, not in obeying a list of rules, but in loving Our Lord ardently and steadfastly, and if we do that we shall find that the rules will look after themselves.

When Our Lord called the fishermen, he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men” (Mark 1:17).  He did not say that to Matthew but there is no doubt that Matthew knew he was being called for a further reason than that of sharing Our Lord’s life.  So he lost no time in holding a supper party that same day to which he invited his business acquaintances to meet his new Master.  Now that he was a definite disciple he was conscious of his responsibility for bringing as many as he knew to Our Lord.

Up to that day he had spent his life in getting money out of other people, now he began, and never ceased, to give other people something which he knew to be more valuable than all the money in the world – the knowledge of Jesus Christ.