Göttinger Predigten
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2nd Sunday after Pentecost , 06/26/2011
Sermon on Matthew 10:40-42, by Luke Bouman
Matthew 10:40 "Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. 41 Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet's reward; and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous; 42 and whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple-- truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward."
Of Giving and Receiving
I must admit a passage like this makes me nervous. It seems to be about welcoming, receiving, hospitality. At first glance it also seems to be about a reward that is offered for those who welcome rightly. If you welcome the prophet and the righteous rightly, you will get your reward. If you offer the hospitality of cold water (a first century delight) to even the smallest of guests, you won't lose your reward. That's what seems to be offered here. And if that be the case, then this passage makes me nervous.
After all, we mostly proclaim a message of grace. It is about God giving to us, and thus us passing on to others. It is about grace, God's gifts given without respect to having earned them. It is about our gracious response, being a giving people without respect to reward. What then do we make of a passage that suggests that we do something and receive a reward for it? Is this a bump in our journey of grace and faith? Do we try to fit this passage into our framework of grace somehow? Or is our framework somehow broken.
I have pondered much about this sense of giving and receiving. Who really is doing the giving? How do we give and how do we receive the gifts placed in our midst? Jesus talks about "welcoming" others in our text for today. But how do we welcome them? How do we receive them, these others, be they prophets, the righteous, or even one of the little ones? And more to the point, as we go out into the world, bearing the name of Father, Son, and Holy spirit, as we remembered last week on Trinity Sunday, how will we be welcomed? That's the real question, is it not?
Representing More than Ourselves
Jesus did his ministry representing more than just himself. That was the trouble. Others around him saw him as just another wandering rabbi. Perhaps they saw him as a prophet, or even a righteous man. But they didn't want to hear about him as the one who bears the presence of the living God in human form. It was one thing to welcome Jesus, the man, but Jesus, the Son of the Living God was not welcome. It was considered heresy. To welcome such a one into our presence means that we are confronted by the Living God in strange and unusual ways.
Like Peter, or Moses, or all others who find themselves face to face with God incarnate, we are likely first ashamed. All our faults are laid bare. All our thoughts are no longer secret. We fall on our faces and we cower. This kind of exposure is unwelcome, and brings with it unwelcome judgment and pain. We avoid this. Like Adam and Eve, we hide from it. Like Abraham, we push it and test it to see how far we can go. To welcome Jesus means to welcome this kind of scrutiny, and the world is not pleased to do this.
Instead the world rejects it. The world rejected the prophets, mistreating and killing them. The world rejects the truly righteous, relegating them to the fringe in order that they not challenge the false righteousness of the hypocrites. The world rejects the little ones of the disciples, depriving them of food, water, clothing, and shelter, perhaps even of love. The world rejects Jesus as Son of God, calling him instead, prophet, or teacher of morality, or just another failed messiah. Certainly he is not the Son of God, that would be blasphemy, and those who claim such deserve death, even a cross. Such is the welcome that comes from exposing the Sin of the world.
Such who welcome thus, reap similar rewards. They reject and so feel rejected. They hate and so feel hated. Just so, they miss the surprising word that comes after the word of judgment.
The Welcome of Grace
For when God comes to visit, whether through prophet or Son, God brings more than a cool eye for appraising each of us as we are. God also brings the grace to forgive and appraise us as we will be, as we are being created anew, each day in love. It is this transforming love that is at the center of the prophet's message, or in the righteous one's action. They proclaim a God who is fiercely just, and even more fiercely, relentlessly merciful. Slow to anger they name him, and abounding in covenantal love.
After the honest and forthright appraisal of our shortcomings, those who have the courage to welcome this God, or this God's servants, experience largess beyond dream or expectation. The one who is welcomed becomes the host who welcomes. How many times do we see this? The fishermen become the catch. The boy's lunch becomes the meal for thousands. The Passover meal becomes God's gift of self and grace. How many times must we see this before we understand it? Judgment does not get the last word.
Now, you might say, "that must be the reward!" We, who endure judgment in welcoming God, get the reward of grace. First, know that no gift, such as grace, could ever be a reward. This is not earned. It is given. Next know that it is God's nature to give, to create, to forgive. This is birthed of love, not of our welcome. Finally know that God's gift of grace is given to all, even those who fail to welcome, though it does those latter precious little good. This grace is no reward. It is God's gift for all people.
What then is the prophet's reward? What then is the reward of the righteous? It was one of the little ones of the disciples who taught me this. It was my own son. When he was six years old, he earned a great reward in his first grade classroom. There was a special award day when he was given this award. He had competed against another girl in this class, and they were neck in neck before he won the prize. As I picked him up from school that day, I asked if I could see the prize, knowing he had gotten it that day. He told me he didn't have it. I asked him if he had lost it, and he said that he had given it away. Stunned, I asked him why he did that? He said he gave it to the girl who came in second. He explained that she had been so disappointed that he decided to give her the prize. In that moment I wondered what possessed my son to do such a thing. I asked him what he hoped to gain from giving the prize away. Even a first grader might have a crush on a girl, I reasoned. My son answered, as if it were the most natural thing in the world, that sometimes a good deed is its own reward. I have long forgotten what prize it was that he gave away. But I have not forgotten his words. Giving the prize away was the real prize for him that day. I could only stare at the wonder of God's love shining and teaching me through my son.
Grace is it's own reward. Receiving grace is not the reward for the disciples that Jesus is talking to. Giving grace is the reward of the prophet. Living grace is the reward of the righteous man. To be refreshing water for his father was the reward of the little one who had tasted the cool water of God's grace deeply enough to be gracious himself. No matter whether the world reject us or respond in grace to our grace, as disciples we can do no other but follow our Rabbi, Jesus, who is himself the Son of God. When we are welcomed, it is not we alone, but also Jesus who is welcomed, and not Jesus alone, but also his Father who sent him. When we go out, we do not go out as ourselves, but we represent the baptismal grace of the one who sends us. We give not ourselves, but we give the lives that have been returned to us in forgiveness and love by our father. We do not give in order to receive some reward, nor even because we have first received from God. Giving is its own reward, even when those whom we love and serve do not welcome us. But the ones who do will soon discover that they too become the giving disciples of a giving God.