If you have the power and privilege to opt out, you must opt in for the Good News to be received: None shall lose their reward

Lessons from South Africa

Matthew 10:40-42 Sermon for Sunday, June 28, 2020

None of these will lose their reward. Jesus is still speaking to his disciples just as we heard in last week’s reading from Matthew’s 10th chapter. But today, in these three short verses, verses 40 to 42, we have moved from where Jesus was describing the trials that the disciples would experience when they were sent out to what the reward will be for those who receive them. We have gone from the position of hearing Matthew’s gospel proclaimed as disciples, to now hearing it as the overhearers and the receivers, and those who will provide hospitality along the way.

There is a continuity between Jesus and the ones who are sent out. We see here in the first verse, “Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, whoever welcomes me, welcomes the one who sent me.” There is a continuity between God the father, God the son, and the disciple messenger, who is sent out. In this case, the verses say a prophet, a righteous person, or a disciple. As receivers of prophets, righteous people, and disciples, we are promised to receive a reward. Prophet’s reward, the reward of the righteous, the reward of being a disciple. This continuity of the message from the one who was sent, transforms each of the ones who receives it along the way as long as it is received in the name of the one who is bringing it, in the way and the intention with which it is being offered.

We see right here in the last section about the little ones that are hoping to receive even a cup of cold water, the little ones are the vulnerable who are sent out. And in order to receive a vulnerable disciple, traveling lightly, as we hear Jesus describing in Matthew’s gospel, to receive the vulnerable in the name, as one of the vulnerable makes us vulnerable, as well. We become a prophet when we receive a prophet in the name of a prophet. That is a prophet’s reward. We are counted as righteous when we receive a righteous person as a righteous person with all of the conviction that goes along with it. And when we receive one of these little ones as a learner, and we are in the place of being a learner as well, we receive greater riches than we could either ask or imagine.

But what is that like, to be transformed? We are asking that question right now in our country, about being transformed by the message of the gospel. And we are being challenged to risk receiving a disciple as a disciple with the message they hope to bring. And many of us actually resist being a vulnerable follower of Christ. It’s hard. In 2014, I had the privilege of traveling to South Africa with the Wabash pastoral leadership program, a program here in Indiana that took ecumenical pastors from around the state to study topics such as racism, and especially institutionalized racism, and took us on a pilgrimage to South Africa, where we went on a pilgrimage of pain and hope to learn about life in post apartheid. Apartheid was of course the government sanctioned racism with ethnic segregation, institutionalized on a scale that makes us wonder how something so blatantly wrong could happen in such a civilized time as the 20th century. We pastors went as a group of praying ecumenical friends so that we could learn and listen.

One of the lessons from that pilgrimage in 2014 was relevant then, and is even more so strikingly relevant here in June, 2020. Of course, at the popular level of news and information, the ending of apartheid had seemed like a great success. Equality was now open and available to people across the country. And Archbishop Desmond Tutu had led the historic truth and reconciliation commission to heroic levels of reconciliation to heal the nation. The deeper truth that we discovered on our pilgrimage was much more complex, much more disappointing, and painful to take in. At the end of South Africa’s apartheid in the 1990s, the countries which had engaged in the boycotts and sanctions for ending it began to move on with a mission accomplished attitude. In contrast, during our pilgrimage, we pastors witnessed the ongoing ravages of apartheid’s institutionalized racism and the continued economic disparity still painfully present along racial lines.

Before we arrived in South Africa, we had heard successful sound bytes from the truth and reconciliation commission, which had brought tears of pain and redemption. As we witnessed recorded confessions from white oppressors murderers being forgiven by those family members that they had hurt. Amazing, amazing stuff. While on our pilgrimage, we heard about the sadness and the disappointment that the truth and reconciliation commission had only scratched the surface in the healing of the country. You see, only those who might’ve been brought up on criminal charges had an incentive to testify. They could tell the whole painful truth and receive amnesty. And there was yes, true Christ like redemption for those who enter the process. But the truth and reconciliation commission fell short of its goal to heal the nation, as groundbreaking as it was because those in power who could escape charges, chose to stay away. Reconciliation fell short because those who had the power to opt out chose to do so.

Our pilgrimage in 2014 gave me the lens for understanding the systemic generational racism and oppression that we have here in the United States. Like the crucified body of Christ, racist oppression in South Africa was held up on the cross of apartheid and became an agonizing witness to the world and to us in 2020. We learned firsthand that systemic institutionalized racism doesn’t end with a legislative vote. Legislation is necessary, but we must always go farther than the letter of the law allows if we are to be truly free. All of us. Hearts, minds, and the way we give and spend our money must change to reflect the spirit. Such laws are meant to lead us to, until those who have the power to opt out, choose to opt in, come to the table, share power, and risk everything for the sake of the gospel, nothing substantial changes, systems of oppression, persevere, and the reward is lost.

For many people in this country, in the United States, issues of racism, inequality, and oppression are daily fears, anxieties, and conversations. For many sisters and brothers, there is no option. It is part of daily life. For those of privilege in the dominant culture, primarily the white culture here in the United States, there are many who can choose to opt out, many who do choose to opt out of conversation and confession, much like many of those in South Africa who chose not to participate in the truth and reconciliation commission. Be clear, we will never heal as a nation. We will never discover a prophet’s righteous or disciples reward until those who have power choose to opt in again and again, especially when it is uncomfortable.

But Jesus has promised that when you receive the vulnerable as a vulnerable and you are vulnerable yourself, allowing the giver and the receiver to both be changed and transformed by the message of the one who did the original sending, none of these will lose their reward. Powers of privilege and systemic oppression remain in place in South Africa and here in the United States. But we have seen the possibility for healing and the potential for those who do risk. That is healing for the nations, if we are willing sisters and brothers. That is following the message of Christ as a disciple and a receiver of disciples. May you and I, and each one of us for the sake of the gospel, choose to opt in, for none of us shall lose our reward.