Matthew 10:24-39

Whom to Fear

24 “A disciple is not above the teacher nor a slave above the master; 25 it is enough for the disciple to be like the teacher and the slave like the master. If they have called the master of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign those of his household!26 “So have no fear of them; for nothing is covered up that will not be uncovered, and nothing secret that will not become known. 27 What I say to you in the dark, tell in the light; and what you hear whispered, proclaim from the housetops. 28 Do not fear those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul; rather fear him who can destroy both soul and body in hell. 29 Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father. 30 And even the hairs of your head are all counted. 31 So do not be afraid; you are of more value than many sparrows.

32 “Everyone therefore who acknowledges me before others, I also will acknowledge before my Father in heaven; 33 but whoever denies me before others, I also will deny before my Father in heaven.

Not Peace, but a Sword

34 “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.

35 For I have come to set a man against his father,

and a daughter against her mother,

and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law;

36  and one’s foes will be members of one’s own household.

37 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; 38 and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. 39 Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.

Well friends, here we are on our UCC appreciation day!  It’s an odd lectionary passage, especially for a day that we are talking about the story of the UCC and our stories woven together. The UCC has been on an adventure as a denomination, they have taken may stories and written those through the lives of so many diverse voices coming together.  We are writing a new chapter in the book of the UCC, and Fleming Road is a part of that book.  The good news is that in this new chapter of the book of Fleming Road UCC if you will, we’ve had some great chapters before, and we still have some great chapters to write after this one.  

And, this one is a wild chapter, full of all sorts of disruptions, adaptations, deepening friendships, hard cultural and church conversations, and growth.

This is a hard text on what it means to be united.  In a world where there is so much division, how do we not divide as well?  Seems to be what the text is sharing is that God knows us, is with us, that nothing that happens in this world or in our lives is separate from God’s knowing it and knowing us.  It doesn’t promise that life is easy, just that God is with us.  

It also has this wild saying about bringing a sword and not peace.  Now, we know that Jesus advocated non-violence, so what does this mean?  Well, following Jesus, having hard conversations around loving ourselves and our neighbors, making tough choices to be with folks like Jesus was, including them, can bring division.  I mean, let’s face it, sometimes we have those proverbial tough conversations around different issues at the family dinner table, or extended family meals like Thanksgiving, and even in the church.  Conversations can be divisive when you follow the practices of Jesus.

But, then there’s this piece about loving God more than your mother, father, brother, sister?  What’s that all about?  And why is that in the lectionary on UCC day!?  Here’s a thought:  I don’t think Jesus is saying not to love your family members, but to remember that our family and tribal identities, as important as they can be in formation, do not define who we are becoming.  God’s love for us and our love for God is transformative, it moves us into a deeper identity of being connected to all things and all people in a way that makes us think in different ways and practice friendship in different ways.  

The UCC came together primarily out of three denominations, the German Reformed, the German Evangelical, and the Congregational church (the pilgrims), as well as a few other smaller denominations including a black pentecostal one.  They had to honor their stories from their past, while also leaving them behind to form a new story of a new denomination, they had to lose their lives in order to unite and to begin to shape a new identity.  

Then there’s this last bit, which is the hardest for me at times throughout my life.  Losing my life in order to gain it.

In thinking of stories, and that’s been a theme in our church for the past several years, I thought of this as I was reading this week’s lectionary text and what it means to lose life in order to gain something, and how when we hold on to something to long, we miss an opportunity for growth.

When I was in high school, I was driving back from a revival meeting (I was Southern Baptist growing up, remember).  I was a bit more mature at this moment, a bit more aware.  I was a leader in my youth group, president of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes and the Good News Club at my school, and had started a ministry called Campus Life at my high school.  I was immersed in a wold with a specific worldview, not all bad, but part of it was pretty narrow.  So, here I was giving a friend of mine a ride home.  During the car ride, the conversation got deep, he took a risk, and told me that he was gay.  My first thought was to stop the car, I did not know what to do.  But, I didn’t.  I stayed in the conversation.  Even though my cousin was gay, she was much older, I had never had a good friend, a peer, identify as gay to me.  I stayed curious, and learned something that night.  One, in a moment of humor, he said that he wasn’t attracted to me because I was too skinny.  Our friendship grew as I listened.  I had to lose conceptions, and in its place, new life emerged.  

Losing old ways of being, thinking, and attitudes, some of our understandings of life can be hard.  It does seem like we are losing.  Yet, we know we have to lose some things in order to live, grow, and find new ways of being.

If we want new chapters to read or be written, we have to close or move beyond the chapters we just read.  The UCC has been on a similar path, as has Fleming Road UCC.  

When the UCC was being formed in the 50’s, folks were coming to pivotal moments in their lives with the backdrop of a pivotal moment in their history that required them to think in new way.    

It meant losing in order to gain life.  

Friends, we are all in a similar moment in our history, our lives, and our stories.  Our culture is asking great questions, so are we.  We don’t have anything to fear, other than letting go of ways of thinking that probably are not working as well for us and move towards being united in our desire for a new story to emerge out of the stories that we have lived in the past.  

So, what do you say to this?  Let’s lose, together, with God, in order to have life, life to the full and that is UNITED in Christ.  

Matthew 9:35-38 NRSVUE

³⁵ Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness. ³⁶ When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. ³⁷ Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; ³⁸ therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.” 

Matthew 10:7-8 NRSVUE

⁷ As you go, proclaim the good news, ‘The kingdom of heaven has come near.’ ⁸ Cure the sick; raise the dead; cleanse those with a skin disease; cast out demons. You received without payment; give without payment.

I grew up outside of Louisville, KY.  It was one of the only areas that was a commercial free zone, and it was kind of in the country.  Most of the lots were at least 8 acres I believe.  We had one lot and my great aunt and uncle, and my cousin, whom we all adored had another 8-9 acre lot next to us.  Our two families shared a lot, including a hobby farm.  

My uncle had cows and there was, at the end of our property, a manure pile.  Every fall, before it got cold, we would go to the manure pile and shovel that stuff into a trailer to be taken up the hill to our huge shared garden, put it in the manure spreader and spread it.  In addition to shoveling the stuff, it was also my job and my sister’s job to ride on the back of the manure spreader so that while it was churning up the dirt the manure could get deep into all of the soil.  

This made the ground rich for growth as seeds were planted.

Our gospel lesson this morning is talking about a harvest field.  First century Palestine was, and still is, an agrarian culture.  It is rich nutrients in the soil for growth and rich in terms of weather.  It was, and is, a bread basket, literally, for the surrounding area.  But, before the author gets to the harvest field, he’s laying down a story about Jesus’ character, his emotional connection to people, and his charge, or call, to the disciples.

This phrase of Jesus going around to the cities villages and healing folks and loving them is something that Matthew uses before the sermon on the mount as well.  It seems as if Jesus made it a habit to be with people, in their neighborhoods.  He did preach on the Sabbath in their synagogues, but, throughout the week, you wouldn’t find him in the office.  He was with people.  

While he was with people, he heard them…and they heard him.  He was vulnerable, real, and did not promise them a new movement, a new church, or the latest fad or program to draw people towards the good news of what it means to be human, an image bearer of God.  He simply loved them and shared in their struggle.  The word for compassion in this passage in the Greek literally means moved with emotion to where it moved your bowels, Jesus’ entire body was being moved by the people.  The phrase for harassed and helpless literally means that the people were skinned, flayed.  The author is saying that Jesus was heartbroken, to the point of physical stress because that people had been misinformed, divided, and had lived into a narrative that left them less that human, less than image bearers of the divine.

They were sheep, led to a slaughter, a slow death of the status quo…and their supposed leaders were not leading out of compassion, but out of anxiety and control.  They did not have a shepherd to guide them towards wide open green pastures…instead they settled for being in a ghetto of the same thoughts, the same pastures that are overused and exhausted.  Instead of judging them, Jesus ached for them.  

Jesus then looks at his disciples.  He doesn’t tell them they need other gifts, more money, or that they lacked anything.  He simply says that the harvest is plentiful.  There are persons who are ready for a change, ready for growth.  He doesn’t tell them to plant seeds.  Those seeds have already been planted.  He tells them to go and simply proclaim the good news that they are loved.  To draw out of them from the rich nutrients in their lives that have not been tended.  To see where the seeds of God’s Presence have landed and bring them out.  

Notice, Jesus does not say go out and recruit new workers.  He looks at this messy, emotional group of disciples and says, GO.  You have all of the gifts you need, be the workers, the cultivators, the people that you’ve called to be.  

The next verses starting in chapter 10 are an imperative.  Receive the call.  Be the church, be the body of Christ, be image bearers in a world that is harassed and helpless.

Oh Fleming Road, we have had so many discussions about calling and church these past few years, and even these past few weeks.  You have everything you need, all the gifts in this room to be magic with one another and this neighborhood.  The question is do you want to heed that calling?  Do we want to put behind us the narrative that divides us that the systems of the world have used to keep us harassed and helpless?  Do we want to be raised from the dead and then go and raise others from the dead?  Do we want to live in the expansive pasture that God has given us to live in filled with rich nutrients for growth?  I believe that you have said yes to this call.  As have I.  Let’s get on with it shall we?

As I grew up, I began to appreciate the lessons of shoveling manure.  It’s kind of like life, even the church at times.  It can be messy, you maybe can’t wait for the job to be done and do something else.  Yet, in the mess, goodness is being spread that can bring things, and people to life.

Matthew 28:16-20 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

The Commissioning of the Disciples

16 Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 And Jesus came and said to them, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

What is a disciple?

Miriam Webster defines disciple as this:

– one who accepts and assists in spreading the doctrines of another: such as

Christianity : one of the twelve in the inner circle of Christ’s followers according to the Gospel accounts

–  a convinced adherent of a school or individual

a disciple of Freud

That’s always an interesting question isn’t it.  What is a disciple?  We have these definitions, but I think there is much to say about what it means to be a disciple in the lectionary passage this morning.  Especially as we come to this time in the readings after Easter, and in an ever changing world.

Remember, the disciples, Jesus’ followers are in a state of transition.  A liminal or threshold time where they have been following Jesus, listening to him, seeing his example of listening, loving, and including others.  Hearing him talk about community and being in union with God, which brings everyone into restored communion with God.  Into deep friendship.  Remember the words that Paul shares in 2 Corinthians 5:20, “become friends with God, God is already of friend of yours”.  So, Jesus followers had been attracted to this message both spoken and lived out by Jesus.  Jesus demonstrated a certain kind of discipleship, the  discipleship of “with-ness”, not just a witness to something, but coming alongside.  We are called to emulate and model Jesus’ emptying by simply doing what Jesus did: by being “with” others or practicing  “being with” or “with-ness” if you will.

“Being with” is a central tenant of the outpouring, the emptying of God’s Spirit through the Trinitarian flow. 

Author Samuel Well notes, 

“Being with the dynamic of the inner relations of the Trinity – God being with God; it is the essence of God being with us in Christ; and it is the fulfillment of the Spirit’s work in our being with one another.” 

My doctoral research project embodied “being with” from the very beginning as we invited persons into community with one another and then focused on a practical way of how to be “with” the community in a work project that built friendship. Scripture reminds us that Christ resides within humanity: “Christ is all and in all” (Colossians 3:11b). Jesus is the Christ, flowing from the Trinity, residing with us, as well as our neighbors, and in all things. As we live into Jesus being made present with us, we can then be present with ourselves and others, with everything. As we practice “being with” and have a theological understanding that Christ is in all things and people, then we can understand being one, or in communion with others. 

When we come to the farewell discourses in John where Jesus is preparing the disciples for a time of violence being inflicted upon Jesus and for them to remember his words and actions and to stay unified and in friendship, to remember their “with-ness” of God being with them and them being with one another.

Then there’s Jesus’ death, the disciples flee and hide in rooms with barricaded doors.  Jesus appears to them, resurrected.  These appearances are wondrous, but the disciples, the followers, still are consumed with doubt.  They want to go back to “normal”, but know that they cannot, and that “normal” was not working anyway for them.  

But, they stuck together, even though they were hiding.  

Then, we come to this passage where Jesus is physically taken up to be with God.  In essence, saying that he is with the disciples always through his spirit which will empower them to have agency and encouragement.  

When we read this passage, we see that the disciples to the mountain where Jesus tells them to congregate for this occasion.  When they saw Jesus, they worshipped him, but some still doubted….goodness, they were a mess!  Like us.  So many times, we give God lip service, but, inside, if you are like me and most humans, and honest, they (and we) still have some doubts, fears, concerns.  Yet, they stood there.  Watching.  There’s something in that, I would encourage you to look at that messiness in the disciples and our lives, and know that it’s a sign of being spiritual.  Heck, even Jesus struggled.  Yet, there is a power in sticking with it, and even when you can’t stick with it, staying put on the mountain and waiting.  

Jesus then reminds them that he has authority, he has agency, and that this agency also resides in us.  GO!  Don’t be immobilized forever, move!  Go is an imperative, a command.  If you want to grow, get off the couch, get out of the pew, and get into authentic relationships with those around you.  One thing that the pandemic taught us is that as great as our building is, as much as we love Sunday mornings, our faith is much more than those things…we have an active faith that compels us to connect with others.  

And, when we do connect, what does Jesus say?  Don’t try to win arguments, don’t try to make converts, but make disciples!  In other words, show others how to live through word and actions of loving and listening.  The best teachers I’ve ever had are ones that won me over if you will by how well they listened to me, and allowed me to listen to them, and showed concern and belief in their humanity and the humanity of others.

I never will forget when my friend Peter Block told me he wasn’t interested in being my mentor, but he’d be my friend.  And, what does Jesus say to his disciples before this moment, in the upper room?  I no longer call you disciples, but friends!  In that moment, it is is a discipling moment, a teaching moment.  Because, in friendship, in moving to “with-ness” and away from being merely disciples, we experience growth and presence…especially when we enter those friendships with an open heart.  

Finally, Jesus says to us, stick it out.  You need each other, you can’t do this life thing on your own.  And, that he is with us through the power of Christ living inside of us…the presence of Christ through God’s connective tissue, nature, spirit is with us…teaching us each moment if we are paying attention, on how to love and live.  Now, and to the end of the age.

So, friends, or siblings, or disciples, Jesus followers:  we are “with-nessing” to one another…and God is with us.  May we live in presence and in being.  Amen.