Jesus tried to get the tax collectors and sinners to repent of their evil ways. He tried to teach them how to live the right way. I'm sure some didn't listen to the wisdom back then, either, and stuck with the liberal agenda of the day.
Too bad for them, huh? They should have listened to him.
Exactly. These “conservative purists” are wholesale rejecting anyone who sins just like the Pharisees did. Jesus embraced the sinners and tax collectors and, as you say, tried to teach them the right way to live, to repent and change their behavior. The old saying that churches are “a hospital for sinners not a museum for saints” is appropriate here. Or as my pastor father-in-law says, “the problem with Christianity is all the Christians”. My church pastor is finishing up a series on what it means to be a “Christian”. His running theme has been that you can tell a Christian by the way they treat others. The scripture lessons just this past Sunday were the Parable of the Lost Sheep, the Parable of the Lost Son and the Parable of the Prodigal Son. Very appropriate considering this thread.