Text: Matt 10:1-23
In the name of + Jesus. Amen.
Our Lord has been indefatigably healing and casting out demons – even raising the dead. He pointed out, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.” So like the vineyard owner in so many of our Lord’s stories, Jesus goes out looking for laborers. He is recruiting a few men, twelve, in fact, like the tribes of Israel. He is beckoning laborers to help build His kingdom, to give them “authority over unclean spirits, to cast them out, and to heal every disease and affliction.” He doesn’t recruit from among the scribes and Pharisees, the Council, the rabbis, the priests, and the leading men of the Holy City. He doesn’t give tests and psychological self-studies. He mocks the devil by choosing the most unlikely laborers, even those most unlikely called in the last hour, to engage in the most unlikely labor.
The Twelve include fishermen, workers, some disciples of John the Baptist, and even a tax collector and a militant revolutionary. This band of misfit disciples will also include a traitor – whose treachery cannot stop the kingdom, but actually hastens it by his wickedness: playing a key role in the conspiracy to crucify our Lord and to destroy the devil by his own cunning. These disciples, that is, these students of their Rabbi, will enter three years of training under the Master. At the end of their period of study, which will be like nothing ever experienced by anyone in the history of the world, they will become those laborers charged with reaping a harvest after sowing the seeds of the Word of God, and bringing in other laborers to likewise sow, to cultivate, to weed, to nurture, and also to harvest the fruit of the kingdom.
At this point, the disciples are to engage in a kind of trial run, going into cities to announce the coming of Jesus before His arrival. But our Lord warns them about what it will mean when they really labor in the fields: being “sheep in the midst of wolves,” falsely accused of crime, flogged, persecuted by both synagogue and state. But this is an opportunity for labor in the kingdom, “to bear witness to them and to the Gentiles.” Jesus tells them not to worry about it, for the Spirit will do the talking when the time comes. Jesus gives them advice that all would do well to heed: “Be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”
The kingdom continues to this day, dear friends, as our Lord’s disciples believe and live out their lives, serve and worship, teach and learn. Some of those disciples are laborers who are still preaching and absolving sins, still casting out demons and giving life by means of the Gospel. Christians of every calling are still “hated by all for [His] name’s sake.” Jesus is still building His kingdom and gathering in a harvest. This labor will continue until the final trumpet sounds, and when our labors will cease. Our labor, dear friends, is to simply do our jobs – whatever we are called to do. God created each one of us for some specific labor in the kingdom, whether we are preachers or confessors of Jesus and the Gospel. All of our labor is holy and sanctified, no matter what purpose we serve. And like the original disciples who came from various backgrounds, we remain students of the Word, we continue to be a band of Christ’s misfits, and we are scoffed at by the Important People.
But hear this, dear friends, hear this and take it to heart, for it comes from our Lord Himself: “The one who endures to the end will be saved.” Just hold on, dear brothers and sisters. Just hold on one more day. For our Lord may return today. Just one more day.
Amen.
In the name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment