Far Better Than Evangelism
Proper 6A | Matthew 9:35-10:8(9-23)
After calling some people to be disciples and preaching the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus gets his ministry really going with healings and exorcisms. And it is hard to undersell how popular he becomes from all of this.
It often seems easy to assume such popularity is good or innocent. Harder to contend with the truth. That it can be dangerous. People can be desperate. How many start to behave like groupies, following him, pushing people out of the way to get close to him. It isn’t easy being the savior of humanity. Or following him, honestly. Because some of those people are selfish and have sharp elbows.
We saw a little of that last week, when a woman, having suffered for twelve years, just grabs Jesus’s cloak, believing that if she merely touched it, she could be healed. And the crazy part of it was that she was right.
We also see Jesus pushing past people’s expectations of a Messiah, by healing a Gentile, not just Hebrews, commanding the elements to stop a storm, and then, in last week’s gospel, he raises a girl from the dead. An act he diminishes by saying that she was merely sleeping and he just woke her up.
These actions highlight the ongoing tension of following the Messiah. And of being the Messiah the crowds surround.
The Work
We also read last week about Jesus calling a tax collector named Matthew and how he chose to sit and eat with tax collectors and sinners. Which has come to sound like a slogan for Jesus more than a departure from tradition. That he didn’t seem bothered by hanging out with traitors and exploiters, with prostitutes and the homeless. This is the sort of behavior that elites think will derail a presidential campaign. And they lodge a complaint that he doesn’t make his own followers follow the rules of their tradition. And, well, his critics have a point.
And yet, Jesus keeps healing people. And people keep coming to him looking to be healed. A couple of blind men shout for help and Jesus tries to get them to keep it quiet. And it was just as ineffective as telling the people that he just woke up that girl the other day.
Then he cast out a demon from a man who couldn’t speak. An evil spirit stopped the man’s tongue. This became another talking point for the critics. Jesus must be bad because he can command evil spirits.
This is the world Jesus calls his disciples into, gathers them together and tells them that it is going to be their turn. God will empower them with the same Jesus juice that he has to command evil spirits and heal the sick. And that they will need to go out into this world and do some good.
The Laborers’ Instruction
It is a beautiful sequence we read here. Go out in pairs and don’t worry about taking anything with you. You aren’t going to need it, “for laborers deserve their food.”
That’s a different way of looking at it, isn’t it?
I think most of us hear this from the perspective of the disciples. Jesus is saying, go travel without provisions. No trail mix or Stanley water bottles. No spare underwear or backup clothes in case something happens. No fancy clothes, either, in case it’s a more upscale neighborhood. Nothing. And we’re like, that seems like a bad idea. Because what if they say no?
Now, Jesus does get into this after a minute, but stay with me, because Jesus is not dealing with it from that perspective. He’s telling them they won’t need these things and they keep thinking, because we keep thinking it, yeah, but what if we do? And that isn’t what Jesus is teaching. He’s being explicit here! They keep saying to themselves, yeah, but what if? And he keeps saying to us (because let’s admit it, it isn’t them who are this skeptical, but it is we who are) Yeah, but you won’t!
Laborers deserve their food.
Deserving
There’s another skeptical thing that can happen when we negotiate with God and ourselves about this, and that is the idea of deserving. And I honestly can’t imagine anyone here would think of going out and proclaiming the good news as laboring. And I doubt we would think of receiving the generosity of strangers as a wage. But Jesus is saying this directly.
You are laborers. The harvest is ready and abundant. There are so few actually in the fields. And the generosity of others will be your compensation.
I’m going to guess that too many Christians have spent time trying to make this a literal reality. But I do want us to consider this argument Jesus makes as quite a serious one. That we are called to do work in the world. That this is our place and for it, we are compensated.
Here, I want to push us away from modern economic theories and remind us of the economic command of the time: to welcome the stranger into your home and feed them. In this way, Jesus is saying, you can rely on the kindness of strangers quite literally because it is the law.
We can see that it isn’t the law now. Far from it. But the principal is no less true. He tells them to trust, not because it is statistically likely to be true, but because this is how the work happens. And in this way, the work hasn’t changed a bit in two thousand years.
Is This Still True?
I know some of you are still skeptical. Especially the part about the lack of laborers in the fields. I mean, just check out the prevalence of a Christian athletes group on ISU and the prevalence of overtly Christian politicians in Washington and the state house. They make it seem like the laborers are many.
And the dramatic decline in Christian participation over the last three generations makes the harvest look small.
Perhaps, we might say, the work has changed.
Mmmm, I don’t think so. Not like that, anyway.
Jesus sends the people out to heal the sick and exorcise demons. And our government cut USAID which would have prevented the ebola outbreak. That act alone might kill two million people who would’ve been healed. They cut funding for screwworm prevention and oops! Looks like that’s our problem now. I’m reading John Green’s Everything is Tuberculosis and our complicated, do-it-cheap strategy for fighting TB in the world is spreading more drug-resistant strains simply because we’re not treating the people of Sierra Leone like we treat ourselves. We must remember the great commandment.
Is this our laboring in the fields? There is much to harvest, friends. And some supposed people of faith are leaving it to rot.
Economics
We can see that this is about economics, right? That it is about evangelism and loving our neighbors and doing good works. And we can also see that it isn’t going door to door and asking people if they have taken Jesus Christ as their personal savior. Notice how that is not at all what Jesus puts on them. He puts action on them. To serve and heal and drive out evil from the world.
There are many people of faith who sincerely think they’re doing that. With their cutting of support to international aid or driving LGBTQ+ persons from public spaces. But neither passes the smell test when it comes to the stuff Jesus actually teaches. Which is more clearly about healing the sick and restoring them to wholeness in their community.
Isn’t that what drives us, too?
To help the children who have nothing to eat at home, so we try to make sure they get at least one good meal a day?
To help people who have no place to live some comfort from a tent, a blanket, or some fresh water?
Isn’t this what we already do?
Hospitality
Jesus centers the gospel in hospitality. In trusting in hospitality. That it is as much about receiving hospitality as it is offering it. And some of us focus only on one of these and not the other. And the wicked would deprive others of both.
Notice, too, that this isn’t a growth strategy. A vision of evangelism that wins people for Team Jesus, or more particularly, this congregation. This entire model is go to where people are and bring healing to them. Rely on their hospitality. And when you’re done, move along.
This has nothing to do with maintenance, security, or even feeling good. It is, however, about restoration, about wholeness, healing, and hope. It is about Shalom. And that we bring it with us wherever we go. That is the work. That is our mission.
We love.
And he gives us the best vision for it. To visit with each other, to sit down at a wooden kitchen table, covered in a table cloth and candle as a centerpiece. To sit in a hard wooden chair as they offer you something cool to drink, some iced tea maybe. Some cheese and crackers or a sandwich.
And you say to them, “Hmm. I could eat.”