Many worship a Jesus who forgives personal sin. Others follow a Jesus who fixes systemic injustice. The Gospels reveal One who does both.
A friend who was an Episcopal priest once told me his observation that mainline Protestants tend to define sin primarily as systemic injustice, while evangelicals often understand sin mainly as moral failure. These tendencies are not universal, but they are common enough to notice. Jesus did not engage in such dualistic either/or thinking but became a “friend of sinners” in both camps.
It’s time we examine this comforting phrase and let it make us uncomfortable. Who were these “sinners” that Jesus befriended, and why do the Gospels mention them so consistently? When we read carefully, two groups keep appearing: tax collectors and women labeled as immoral, often described as prostitutes. These are not random examples. They point to two very different—and deeply connected—ways of understanding sin that religious communities have historically used to name brokenness.
Two Kinds of Brokenness: Systemic and Personal
In Jesus’s time, tax collectors were not IRS agents—the sort you don’t want to look at your taxes, but you might barbecue with on the weekends. They were collaborators in a larger system of economic exploitation. The Roman government required them to extract a certain amount of taxes from the population but allowed them to collect additional money—often by effectively shaking people down—for however much they could, to their own profit. They were also permitted the service of Roman soldiers as their goon squad.
In Luke 5:27–32, Jesus calls Levi, a tax collector, to follow him. In Luke 19:1–10, Jesus seeks out Zacchaeus, another tax collector, whose encounter with Jesus leads him to repair the harm he has caused. These stories display Jesus’s love for those embroiled in what we might now call systemic injustice: sin buried in structures, incentives, and institutions.
On the other side are stories like the woman caught in adultery (John 8:1-11), and the “sinful” woman who anoints Jesus’s feet (Luke 7:36-50). Though the Gospels don’t explicitly identify either of these women as sex workers, Jesus elsewhere explicitly refers to “tax collectors and prostitutes” as those with whom he was known to associate. Jesus shows compassion and offers them dignity and a fresh start. This pairing is not a random sampling, but an intentional contrast between two kinds of brokenness: systemic and personal—and the religious habit of reducing both to labels.
The Systemic Side of Personal Sin—and Vice Versa
It’s important to recognize that these two sides are often intertwined. Those seen as having moral failures—represented by prostitutes in this case but not limited to those individuals—are frequently caught in systemic problems such as poverty or exploitation. In many cases, the moral label itself functions as a way to ignore those systemic realities. At the same time, those who perpetuate systemic injustices often have personal sin at the root—like greed or hunger for power. Personal and systemic sin are not opposites; they feed each other. If we’re going to focus on one, we must be willing to consider the other.
Our Own Blind Spots
Because of this connection, Jesus invites us to examine our own blind spots. If we focus only on systemic sin, we might overlook basic moral issues as unimportant. If we focus only on personal purity, we might miss the larger systems of oppression in which we are participants. In Matthew 7:3-5, Jesus tells us to remove the plank from our own eye before addressing the speck in our neighbor’s. This is a call to humility—not only about our own personal behavior, but also about the systems we support, excuse, or benefit from.
Practical Ways to Explore Blind Spots
How can you do this introspection? You might try having conversations with people who see things differently, listening thoughtfully to perspectives you might not otherwise consider. Or you could try some reflective journaling. Ask yourself where you might be missing something. Experiment by reading scripture through a different lens, reading commentaries or exposing yourself to traditions that challenge your usual perspective. The goal is not to abandon conviction, but to deepen it through personal encounter.
Expand Your Friendships
I have seen this in my own life, as I have made friends with people of other faiths and backgrounds. At one point, while pastoring a rural Baptist church and also making friends with gay Wiccans, I got called on the carpet at a church business meeting. In Sitting in the Shade of Another Tree, I wrote:
My heart fell when a deacon said, “Pastor, some of us are getting concerned about the kinds of people you’ve been spending time with. The community is beginning to talk about your choice of friends.” I was certain the jig was up until the deacon continued, “Yes—all those Presbyterian, Methodist, and Lutheran pastors!” Can’t you make friends with the Baptist ministers instead?”
That deacon’s blind spots were so huge that he thought ecumenical Christian relationships were a problem. I can only imagine how alarmed he might have been had he realized that some of my closest friendships fell even farther outside his moral and theological categories.
Exploring your blind spots means hanging out with people who might get you in trouble if the religious folks find out about it. But it will help you get rid of your blind spots. You may discover areas in your own life that need improvement or repentance—including your tendency to label the sins of others before considering yourself. Before you know it, you’ll be seeing God in all kinds of people—not because God is those people, but because God is never absent from them —when Jesus spent time with tax collectors and prostitutes. He got to know them as people, not as labels. And the grace he gave them looked less like forgiveness and more like acceptance and affirmation, with an invitation to a broad view of God and the world.
A Call to Embrace the Full Picture
In the end, Jesus shows us that both personal and systemic transformation are part of the same journey. By recognizing our blind spots—whether they are individual moral struggles or the systems we support—we move closer to the kind of holistic faith Jesus embodied. Our vision sharpens when compassion replaces certainty.
So, I invite you to embrace a spirit of humility and curiosity. Have those good conversations with people who help you ask deeper questions. Let both personal and systemic insights shape your walk of faith. In doing so, you’ll get a fuller picture of what it means to be a Jesus-follower in a complex world.
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