Second Sunday after Pentecost

Sunday, June 26 was the second Sunday after Pentecost, and my (Vicar Brett) last Sunday as vicar of Christ Lutheran.  This blog will be maintained by Vicar Evan when he begins August 1.  The sermon is based on the gospel text, Matthew 10:40-42.  Click below to read the sermon.

Being different can be lonely.


This past week I was blessed to spend on the youth mission trip in Calais, Maine. The theme for the week was “be different,” using a verse from Luke which highlight Jesus' call to radical discipleship. Our youth and all that were there lived this out, being servants doing mission work in this small Maine community. While some assume teenagers to be more self-involved and less willing to help others, these youth proved they are different. Different because of their faith, different because of how they live, serve, and love others.

Today's gospel reading does not on the surface sound like any radical call to different discipleship. Jesus said, “Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.”

In some ways, welcoming is such an expectation that it doesn't seem so radical. Hospitality was an expectation of the cultures of Jesus' day, and it is in certain ways in our culture. That said, though we may put a “welcome” mat in front of our door out of social convention, would we really welcome anyone who happened upon it?

Welcoming even the outcast, those rejected, those who are different, look different, is Jesus' description of discipleship here, offering that cup of cold water. And even with our welcome mats, we don't always measure up to Jesus' intent for community here.

But when we take a look at where these three little verses of the gospel are set, this welcome takes on a new meaning. Jesus' instructions on welcome and reward come as a part of the missionary instructions to the 12 disciples. There they are told how to travel from town to town, without even a cloak, and to enter every home they are welcomed into. But Jesus' instructions to his first missionaries aren't all practical or easily swallowed.

So let's back up a little bit – and look at why Jesus speaks of welcome. Right before today's verses, Jesus says, “Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace,but a sword. 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; and one's foes will be members of one's own household. 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; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me.  Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.  Whoever welcomes you . . . "

Jesus does not mince words here. The division of family sounds harsh. It says to the disciples – you must be different – really different. And being different can be lonely, like the kid in the lunchroom, or the one who stands up to the bully and defends the victim. They are different and sometimes alone, like the disciple who has stepped out in faith.

I know this to the core, as I have lived this division, and am here with you today because of it. My parents, both raised Roman Catholic, joined a Lutheran church just a few months before I was born, realizing that their faith was leading them to strike out into a church home which would be more welcoming. It did divide my family, as I grew up with relatives occasionally making jabs at our Lutheran faith, and going to Catholic mass when my grandmothers visited with the implication that our worship wasn't real church.

When I was 21 I was engaged to be married to a different man. But I came to realize that though he would have been a loving partner, he would never fully support or encourage my call to be an ordained pastor in the Lutheran church. I left that potential family, broke off the engagement, and the division was real.

Jesus' 12 disciples to had suffered sharp divisions because of their radical decision to follow this rabbi, Jesus, out in the wilderness. Being a Christian is not the easiest road. Following Christ does not mean pleasing people or making peace at all costs. Following Christ means picking up your cross, losing your life to find it in Jesus risen.

Following Christ means living in Christian community. For the earliest disciples, this was not choice but necessity, as being Christian meant rejection from their families and many losses.

Jesus' words on dividing families raises up the truth that God's love never leaves us, even if all others do. The missionaries have left home – so Jesus reminds them that they are not alone. Jesus does teach and form his followers to be different, but he never intended them to be lonely. So Jesus speaks of the open welcome each Christian and every person is to receive. God's intent is that you always have a home in the family of faith. And it starts with a welcome.

In the name of Christ, you each were welcomed here, perhaps as a baby, perhaps for the first time today.

In the name of Christ, you have welcomed me here, an itinerant missionary, like those first disciples, I left home and showed up on your doorstep to serve you. But you welcomed me and taught me, showed me Christ's love and shared your story. The intern program here at Christ Lutheran is a sign of God's kingdom in your welcome! As Jesus says, whoever welcomes your missionaries, welcome me, and welcomes the one who sent me.

Thank you for your ministry to me this year. Your deep faith and God's love through you has sustained me and blessed me more than you can know.

Jesus' words of welcoming today are to a people who desperately need it, who have left family and home to follow him. So for them and for all believers, even you and me, Christ set up the church as a family of faith. Jesus instructs all believers to welcome in his name. Family is important, but Christ is the center, our savior, our life, our welcome, even if we have no home.

In welcoming, in offering cups of cold water, hot meals, outstretched arms to those who need it, you have showed your faith, more even than a cross around your neck or the name “Christian” might show. This is a sign of God's spirit in you, you who have a reward in Jesus that you can never lose.

In Christ you are freed to be different, and promised that you are never alone.

You have welcomed me,
welcomed all who enter these doors,
welcomed people in for meals,
welcomed groups like narcotics anonymous and ICAN in to gather and be part of our ministry,
welcomed each other,
welcomed Christ
welcomed God who welcomes you always, and sends you out to serve, with the promise that you will find a welcome, find a home, in Christ's love.  Amen.