On the Way to Wonder

First Reading: Zechariah 9:9-12

 ⁹Rejoice greatly, O daughter Zion!
  Shout aloud, O daughter Jerusalem!
       Lo, your king comes to you;
  triumphant and victorious is he,
       humble and riding on a donkey,
  on a colt, the foal of a donkey.
 ¹⁰He will cut off the chariot from Ephraim
  and the war-horse from Jerusalem;
       and the battle bow shall be cut off,
  and he shall command peace to the nations;
       his dominion shall be from sea to sea,
  and from the River to the ends of the earth.
¹¹As for you also, because of the blood of my covenant with you,
  I will set your prisoners free from the waterless pit.
 ¹²Return to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope;
  today I declare that I will restore to you double.

Psalm: Psalm 145:8-14

The Lord is gracious and full of compassion. (Ps. 145:8)

 ⁸The Lord is gracious and full of compassion,
  slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.
 ⁹Lord, you are good to all,
  and your compassion is over all your works. 
 ¹⁰All your works shall praise you, O Lord,
  and your faithful ones shall bless you.
 ¹¹They shall tell of the glory of your kingdom
  and speak of your power,
 ¹²that all people may know of your power
  and the glorious splendor of your kingdom.
 ¹³Your kingdom is an everlasting kingdom; your dominion endures through-out all ages.
  You, Lord, are faithful in all your words, and loving in all your works.
 ¹⁴The Lord upholds all those who fall
  and lifts up those who are bowed down.

Second Reading: Romans 7:15-25a

¹⁵I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate. ¹⁶Now if I do what I do not want, I agree that the law is good. ¹⁷But in fact it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me. ¹⁸For I know that nothing good dwells within me, that is, in my flesh. I can will what is right, but I cannot do it. ¹⁹For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do. ²⁰Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I that do it, but sin that dwells within me.
 ²¹So I find it to be a law that when I want to do what is good, evil lies close at hand. ²²For I delight in the law of God in my inmost self, ²³but I see in my members another law at war with the law of my mind, making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. ²⁴Wretched man that I am! Who will rescue me from this body of death? ^25aThanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord!

Gospel: Matthew 11:16-19, 25-30

 [Jesus spoke to the crowd saying:] ¹⁶“To what will I compare this generation? It is like children sitting in the marketplaces and calling to one another,
 ¹⁷‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
  we wailed, and you did not mourn.’
¹⁸For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they say, ‘He has a demon’; ¹⁹the Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they say, ‘Look, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners!’ Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.”
 ²⁵At that time Jesus said, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants; ²⁶yes, Father, for such was your gracious will. ²⁷All things have been handed over to me by my Father; and no one knows the Son except the Father, and no one knows the Father except the Son and anyone to whom the Son chooses to reveal him.
 ²⁸“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. ²⁹Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

Children’s Sermon:  Let’s review one of the fun fables about how the zebra got his stripes.  It goes back to creation.

         At creation, all the animals looked the same with four legs, one tail, and brown fur.  One day God realized how dull and boring his world was because all the animals were the same.  Why not ask the animals their wish for size, shape, and color? 

“I want a long neck,” said the giraffe.  So it became.

“I want an enormous nose,” said the elephant.  So it became.

“I want sharp claws and huge teeth,” roared the lion.  Wish granted.

         Finally God came to his last brown animal.  “Who are you and what would you like?” asked God. Zebra was not sure if he wanted to be black or white.  He asked to be white, and it was so.  But then he said, “No, wait, I want to be black.”  God changed him to black.  Zebra wailed and said, “No, wait, I want to be white.”  God sighed.  He changed the zebra to black and white stripes. Even today zebra is known by his stripes.

Let us pray.  Lord, may the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight, my Rock and my Redeemer.

SERMON

         Last week we finished three weeks of Jesus’ instructions to his followers about being disciples.  We pondered the rewards of being a disciple, a modern day prophet.  It is an honor to represent God, our creator, who reaches out to us through Jesus Christ to restore relationship.  Prophets often are rewarded receiving a “prophets reward,” kind of like a tip.  And thirdly prophets invest in the future as people turn to Christ and become righteous, our world becomes a better place.  But as we come to today’s text, John the Baptist, a prophet in his time, has been seized by Herod and put in prison.  He has not yet been beheaded and has sent his men to ask if Jesus is really the one.  He is not being honored, rewarded or appearing righteous in the moment.  Jesus himself is not being honored as he is criticized for whom he associates with and questioned about his teachings.  In fact, even we encounter trials that can challenge our faith.  With that backdrop, Jesus turns to speak to the crowds, to us ordinary people.  He asks us, “To what will I compare this generation?

It is like children sitting in the marketplaces

and calling to one another.”

We are no longer sheep without a shepherd but children in a marketplace.    At that time, there were two living models, John and Jesus, but they were so different. We have two living, dynamic examples of faith but “it’s complicated” we might say to indicate whose camp we are in.  John the Baptist called the people to repentance.  He might have been classified as a “hell, fire and brimstone” preacher.  Jesus, on the other hand, was critiqued for associating with sinners.  “Advocacy” proponents might use him as their model. The crowd’s faith temperature seems to vary with surface circumstances.  Children in the marketplace call to each other, “Come look at what I found!”  They run from one captivating scene to another.  Are we also sometimes white and sometimes black like zebra, running around the marketplace looking at all that is available to us today?

         Jesus is using a picture from an urban setting we can identify with.  My second son was in Istanbul this week and sent me a picture of the market that was so similar to the open markets in Kenya.  It looked like our farmers’ markets.  Vegetable stands line the walkway with little cafes and people walking along looking.  Marketplaces are places with lots of energy, activity and choice. “Marketplace” has now become synonymous with finding medical insurance.  But whether you want medical insurance or walk the malls for exercise or go to the mall to get out of the house, you will encounter diversity, alternatives, activity and your senses can become overloaded with choice.  Like children, our “wants” often speak louder than our “needs.”

         May I suggest that our religious scene in the United States is also a marketplace of denominations, worship styles, programs and gifted speakers.  We often act like children.  That which glitters attracts us.  We are like a child standing in the cereal isle at the grocery store.  We are kind of like the zebra, we don’t know if we want to be black or white

White shows the dirt but black feels awfully dark!  We come to church but many times we are asking in our hearts what is in this for me.  A miracle? A healing? A good, entertaining sermon? A fantastic choir? Perhaps a financial handout for the needy.   We know we don’t want another sermon on money.  The question in our heart might be what we can get from church rather than what we can give.  Worship can become superficial.

         Perhaps, though, Jesus compares us to children because children have the ability to love mother and love father, to love all sorts of friends. They can throw their arms around John the Baptist and around Jesus and the different styles don’t bother them.  They have not reached the age of commitment to a single spouse.  They can embrace diversity.  I think of the song in South Pacific,

“You’ve got to be taught, To hate and fear,

You’ve got to be taught, From year to year, In your dear little ear

You’ve got to be carefully taught.

You’ve got to be taught to be afraid, Of people whose eyes are oddly made,

And people whose skin is a different shade, You’ve got to be carefully taught.

You’ve got to be taught before it’s too late, Before you are six or seven or eight,

To hate all the people your relatives hate, You’ve got to be carefully taught!”

         But children are easily distracted and undiscerning. Like the zebra they often want to be black and to be white.  The newest fad grabs their attention.

¹⁷‘We played the flute for you, and you did not dance;
  we wailed, and you did not mourn.’

         The crowd’s response to John the Baptist or Jesus speaks to our own fickleness in going to church. It seems that churches today are trying to engage people who are shopping, that are looking for something.  We use the language, “seekers.”  It is easy to depend on our entertainment, our “dance.”  We may not be surprised when we are rejected for a bigger church that offers more programs.  We might sigh and pray for a bigger ministry but we err when we loose sight and become discouraged about who we are.  Maybe if I were white, then people would come.  No, probably we ought to be black.  And like the zebra, we might be doubtful of who God wants us to be at this moment in our context.

         So again why does Jesus compare us to children?  How do children act in the marketplace?  When we were in Minneapolis checking out a possible assignment we dropped our five children at the Mall of America with money.  We picked them up afterwards and none had bought anything!  Coming from Africa, it was all new and overwhelming to them.  They spent the whole time looking, open to the new experience.  They looked but did not commit.  “Openness” and “curiosity” characterize a child.        Jesus is sending his disciples out to places that will look very different from the synagogues in Jerusalem and they will need to be open and curious.  They are going to have to be willing to try to dance to new tunes and they are going to have to be able to mourn.  Children in the marketplace must decide which item is of value and which vendor is honest.  They are going to have to go beyond the glitter to find the gold that God has placed in every culture.  The question is not whether the zebra is black on white or white on black but whether it is alive and living out the purpose God made it for.

         So if we are children in the marketplace, Jesus may be asking us in our text if we are just being entertained by church or are we open to the diversity we are being led into and are we able to love all sorts of people who are his creation. Jesus next turns to God to pray and suddenly the children become the heroes of our sermon.

“I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth,

 because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants;

         Discipleship and faith is not about education and intelligence.  It is not about quoting Scripture.  Wisdom is important.  Children have the ability of being able to run to the parent, to God, for protection, with their questions and fears, and with their doubts when they don’t know if they should be white or black as a zebra.  The picture of children sitting in Jesus’ lap comes to mind and their open nonjudgmental love of him.  Jesus tells his disciples, “‘Let the little children come to me, and do not stop them; for it is to such as these that the kingdom of heaven belongs.’ (Matthew 19:14)” 

         In this text Jesus says, “Yet wisdom is vindicated by her deeds.”  Children are spontaneous and transparent.  When they are hurt they cry and when they are happy, they laugh.  Children can be very selfish grabbing a toy for themselves and they can be very generous.  Normally children are devoted to those they love. Are we as transparent in living out our faith as a child is?   Children are many things but we do not think of children usually as wise.  Wisdom comes from God and the work of the Holy Spirit.  Wisdom comes from age, experience, and God.  Like children we must learn to listen and obey.

“Come…”

         I must end with the closing paragraph of our text today.  It is exhausting being a child.  Our eldest son would refuse ice cream for desert and curl up on the couch and go to sleep by 7 pm after a hard day of play with his village friends.  The marketplace is exhausting.  We often come home just plain tuckered out.  Keeping up with all the family activities of a church can be exhausting too.  Those tough days when we hold on to our faith by our fingertips challenge our faith and we become weary.

         Our generation is not that different from the one at the time of John the Baptist. The marketplace of freedom we celebrated on the 4^th this week allows the message of faith to be broadcast. But today we may actually feel exhausted trying to figure out which church best fits us or how to help our church “dance” more attractively.  Jesus closes with one of the greatest promises in the Bible,

²⁸“Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. ²⁹Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. ³⁰For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”          

         The zebra could not decide if he wanted to be white or black and ended up with a bit of each.  Jesus invites those of us dancing in the “white zone” and those of us mourning in the “dark zone” to come to him, not to a doctrine or a theology.  We need his forgiveness when John’s message calls us to repentance.  We need his grace when Jesus’ message calls us to follow him.  Jesus calls us to a personal relationship that brings peace.  The zebra is beautiful.  You never see a skinny zebra.  As we worship together with all our gifts and come to Jesus, we are beautiful too and free to appreciate each other’s uniqueness.

Let the people of God say, “Thank you, Lord!”

First Reading: Jeremiah 28:5-9

⁵The prophet Jeremiah spoke to the prophet Hananiah in the presence of the priests and all the people who were standing in the house of the Lord; ⁶and the prophet Jeremiah said, “Amen! May the Lord do so; may the Lord fulfill the words that you have prophesied, and bring back to this place from Babylon the vessels of the house of the Lord, and all the exiles. ⁷But listen now to this word that I speak in your hearing and in the hearing of all the people. ⁸The prophets who preceded you and me from ancient times prophesied war, famine, and pestilence against many countries and great kingdoms. ⁹As for the prophet who prophesies peace, when the word of that prophet comes true, then it will be known that the Lord has truly sent the prophet.”

Psalm: Psalm 89:1-4, 15-18

Your love, O Lord, forever will I sing. (Ps. 89:1)

 ¹Your love, O Lord, forever will I sing;
  from age to age my mouth will proclaim your faithfulness.
 ²For I am persuaded that your steadfast love is established forever;
  you have set your faithfulness firmly in the heavens.
 ³“I have made a covenant with my chosen one;
  I have sworn an oath to David my servant:
 ⁴‘I will establish your line forever,
  and preserve your throne for all generations.’ ” 
 ¹⁵Happy are the people who know the festal shout!
  They walk, O Lord, in the light of your presence.
 ¹⁶They rejoice daily in your name;
  they are jubilant in your righteousness.
 ¹⁷For you are the glory of their strength,
  and by your favor our might is exalted.
 ¹⁸Truly, our shield belongs to the Lord;
  our king to the Holy One of Israel. 

Second Reading: Romans 6:12-23

¹²Do not let sin exercise dominion in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions. ¹³No longer present your members to sin as instruments of wickedness, but present yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life, and present your members to God as instruments of righteousness. ¹⁴For sin will have no dominion over you, since you are not under law but under grace.

 ¹⁵What then? Should we sin because we are not under law but under grace? By no means! ¹⁶Do you not know that if you present yourselves to anyone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death, or of obedience, which leads to righteousness? ¹⁷But thanks be to God that you, having once been slaves of sin, have become obedient from the heart to the form of teaching to which you were entrusted, ¹⁸and that you, having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. ¹⁹I am speaking in human terms because of your natural limitations. For just as you once presented your members as slaves to impurity and to greater and greater iniquity, so now present your members as slaves to righteousness for sanctification.
 ²⁰When you were slaves of sin, you were free in regard to righteousness. ²¹So what advantage did you then get from the things of which you now are ashamed? The end of those things is death. ²²But now that you have been freed from sin and enslaved to God, the advantage you get is sanctification. The end is eternal life. ²³For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

Gospel: Matthew 10:40-42

 [Jesus said to the twelve:] ⁴⁰“Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. ⁴¹Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward; and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous; ⁴²and whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple—truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.”

Children’s Sermon:  Let’s sing the Zacchaeus Song we learned as young children:

 Zacchaeus was a wee little man

 and a wee little man was he. 

He climbed up in a sycamore tree

 for the Lord he wanted to see.

  And as the savior passed him by,

 he looked up in the tree.

  And he said,

 Zacchaeus you come down for I’m going to your house today.

Let us pray.  Lord may the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in your sight, my Rock and my Redeemer.

SERMON

         Discipleship Part 3, the “welcoming moment.” Two weeks ago on Pentecost 3 we read about Jesus sending out his disciples and read the texts as applying to us.  We are God’s plan, the messengers of the news that the kingdom of heaven is near. God feels compassion for his sheep that are helpless and harassed without shepherds.  God is not sitting up in heaven, waiting for us to earn our way to him.  We do not go to Him, He came to us in Jesus Christ and has opened the door to relationship. Now we, his messengers, you and I, extend that invitation of relationship to all people.  People are invited to a God who is just but that justice is tempered with love.  He is a God who wants to be known, to be loved and to be worshipped!

         Last week, we reflected on the implications of being sent.  The kingdom of heaven will clash with the kingdom of this world and we will face challenges when we give the message but we do not need to be afraid.  God has not kept secrets from us and has sent the Advocate, the Holy Spirit, who walks with us and will give us the words to say.  We do not need to fear people who destroy the body but we need only fear the Evil one who can harm our souls.  We are more valuable to God than the common, ordinary sparrow.

         People were created with free will and have choice.  As messengers, our responsibility is not to save people.  Salvation comes from what was done by Christ on the cross.  We are to faithfully proclaim the truth.  Some  however will choose not to believe.  Also, following Christ may feel like we are loosing our lives as we obey but the truth is that as we refuse our inborn self-centeredness, we gain life.  In loosing our life for Christ, we save our life.

         WHEW.  What more is there to say?  The last three verses of Matthew 10 is our text for today.  They talk about that “welcoming moment” when we realize we could share and the rewards of being a disciple of Jesus when we do share.

We have the honor of being messengers.

“Whoever welcomes you welcomes me,

 and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me.”

Rejection is not personal.

         We are God’s plan and we are God’s messengers.  I think we use the phrase, “Don’t kill the messenger.”  This week the mailperson delivered a letter from the IRS saying I owe money for 2022 because a reliable, well-known tax organization filled out my return with me and a mistake occurred.  For some reason an income blank was not filled in and I am responsible.  Shooting the mailperson of that letter will not eliminate the debt.  The organization that I think made the mistake does not own responsibility because I signed on the line.  I am held guilty and I have given all my explanations but the truth is still in the letter.  Money is owed.

         In the same way we can deny our status as a “sinner.”  I was too young to understand.  My spouse is a jerk and made me do it.  I didn’t know the gun was loaded.  I needed the money more than the IRS.  My neighbor is far worse than myself.  In Kenya people would say that they made a “mistake” and did not “sin.”  Adultry is sin.  Lust is human and forgiveable.

         We are messengers when we share with another our experiences of a God who wants to be involved with his sheep and who walked through death for them.  Jesus invited Zacchaeus down from the tree and said he wanted to go to Zacchaeus’ house. Had Zacchaeus refused it would have missed an opportunity to get to know Jesus.

          It is easy to feel like people are rejecting us and judging us because of the truth we carry but their rejection is really a rejection of God.  Welcoming the messenger, welcoming us, is welcoming God.  We have the privilege of informing people that the God of the universe loves them.  It is a great honor to tell someone the person is loved, forgiven, valued and need not be helpless and harrassed.  It is an honor to be an Ambassador for the United States and a greater honor to be an Ambassador for the God of the universe.  Jesus called Zacchaeus down from the tree and wanted to eat with him. The slave girl who told Naaman’s wife there was a prophet in Israel who could cure her husband’s leprosy, was written up in history.  In Acts 23 Paul’s nephew hears about a plot to kill Paul and goes to Paul and to the authorities reporting.  Paul’s life is saved and we are blessed.  Being a messenger for God is an honor.

         So perhaps the first question facing us today is to ask how our “approach” to sharing is working?  Are we embarrassed to share the message we have been entrusted with?  Are we more concerned about acceptance and popularity than the other’s plight? Are we focused on ourselves or sharing with another the joy we have experienced?  Perhaps if our walk with Christ is lukewarm, our sharing will be lukewarm also.  It’s a thought.        

         So now let’s dig a bit deeper.  The Zacchaeus song we sang is built on his story found in Luke 19:1-10.  What do we know about Zacchaeus?  He was short, the chief tax collector and wealthy.  He had little reason to need Jesus and good reason to believe that Jesus would never visit him.  Too much past, too much baggage.  But he was curious so he climbed a tree just to get a glimpse from afar, from a safe social distance.  Zacchaeus is confronted by a moment of welcome.  “Zacchaeus, you come down for I’m going to your house today.”  Jesus wants to visit him.  Zacchaeus has to make a decision about whether he is going to welcome Jesus.  The Bible says Zacchaeus “welcomed him (Jesus) gladly.”

         Likewise a “welcoming moment” is a time when we decide we are going to share the our truth with another. My imperfections and the imperfections of the other are not important.  My excuses of being too short, too wealthy, or an outcast don’t matter.  The question is the openness of my heart to share and of the heart of the other to receive the message of Jesus.  It is an honor to be the bearer of good news.

Often the messenger “is tipped!”

¹Whoever welcomes a prophet in the name of a prophet

will receive a prophet’s reward.”

         You might think of the Dominos Pizza guy at the door but how it applies to disciples is not so obvious.  The words, ”prophet’s reward”, is not used elsewhere in Scripture.  The prophets often seem to get a questionable welcome, especially when speaking truth to power.  We might think of Elijah being thrown in the cistern.  The prophet by definition is “prophesizing,” speaking God’s words about a situation or about the future and if what they say does not come true, they are killed.  The disciples were thought to be modern day prophets. When we share, we are speaking about truth the world does not acknowledge and about a future the world cannot see but must accept by faith.

         I think of the story of the widow of Zarephath.  There was drought and she went out to collect wood for her last meal with her son before they would starve to death.  She was expecting death.  Instead she met Elijah, a prophet from “the other tribe” (for she was Sidonian, living in the Phonecian coast and Elijah was from Israel.) who requested a drink of water and a piece of bread.  1 Kings 17:7-16.  This was a “welcoming moment” for the poor widow.  How would she welcome the visitor?  She had nothing the world would feel is necessary for a proper welcome and she had no future.  She had no husband to entertain him.  She lived in poverty and probably had social rules about welcoming strangers.  But she did.  She shared her little and was rewarded with food to the end of the famine.  Elijah also benefited because he had food to the end of the famine.

         The prophets often found themselves in difficult situations but people who helped the prophets were rewarded.  Perhaps we can read into this that as hard as it is to be the messenger of God’s words, the outcome for the person who receives the message is blessing and the person who sees another being blessed is also blessed personally.  Zacchaeus received Jesus and was so changed he promised to pay back those he had overcharged and many were blessed.  I suspect Jesus was blessed at seeing Zacchaeus’ joy.  To be able to give life is rewarding.    

Messengers “pay forward”

“and whoever welcomes a righteous person in the name of a righteous person will receive the reward of the righteous”.

         This verse makes me think of Peter and Cornelius in Acts 10.  Let me start by saying that we are only righteous because of Christ.  None of us are righteous in and of ourselves, Rom 3:16, “All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”  As we become part of the body of Christ, his righteousness is credited to us.  There is a bit of a theological debate about baptism but the base line is that we are not righteous ourselves.  We are the recipients of righteousness.

     Cornelius is a Roman centurion, a god-fearing man living in Caesarea, praying and an angel comes and tells him to invite Peter who is visiting in Joppa.  Meanwhile Peter is in Joppa, resting on a housetop, dreaming of a sheet being lowered from heaven full of animals and being commanded to eat. As he ponders the implications of the dream, Cornelius’ messengers arrive and invite Peter to meet with Cornelius.  What a beautiful picture of the “moment of welcome” that becomes a guideline for “welcoming moments.”  Despite racial differences, despite social differences, despite the religious difference, Cornelius opens his house to Peter.  He even invites all his own relatives, believing Peter is the true representative of God.  Peter, on the other hand, must open his heart and break the social norms of his faith to meet with “a gentile.”  This welcoming moment is pivotal in the story of Christianity.  Cornelius and his household open their hearts to faith, experience the Holy Spirit, believe and are baptized.  Peter returns to Jerusalem and is confronted for his actions.  The young church struggles to understand but opens its door to the Gentiles.  We are the inheritors, perhaps the reward of this welcome.

         The end of James 2 tells how Abraham, the “Father of the Faith,” and Rahab, “the harlot,” both believed God and it was credited to them, regardless of their social status, as righteousness.  Abraham was given the title, “Friend of God,” and Rahab married a prince in Israel, became the grandmother of Boaz who took Ruth and they all became part of the line of David.  When we accept the role of messenger of God, we do not know where the ripples will end but God knows and rewards.  Sharing our faith is investing in our future and others we may not know.

         Zacchaeus was not a righteous man but he heard Jesus wanted to eat with him.  He welcomed Jesus and believed.  Not only did he believe, he too is included as one of the great stories of the Bible.  We may think we are too short or too stained with sin but righteousness is not because we are good people but because God is a good God and offers to share his righteousness with us. 

^“42and whoever gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones in the name of a disciple

—truly I tell you, none of these will lose their reward.”

         So let’s step back and try to get the big picture.  We are sent forth as disciples, representative of God, given a message to deliver to people who may or may not receive it.  When we come to that “welcoming moment” of sharing our truth, we are standing on a threshold.  I must choose if I will be transparent and represent all God has helped me to be or will I put on my mask to protect me from the potential rejection I anticipate might happen?  Likewise the other person must decide if that person will meet me with an open heart? 

         The world would have us think that “welcoming moments” depend on my ability to impress you with who I am.  Jesus says these encounters depend on my willingness to share the truth I know about God with another and the other’s willingness to receive.  It is a moment when the Holy Spirit is moving.  I may be too short, have a shoddy past, be poor on the verge of starvation with no resources or I may be endowed with the status and wealth of this world but regardless of my “baggage”, “welcoming moments” challenge me to open my heart to another and share.  Good news is like a glass of cold water on a hot summer day. 

         The reward:  the other is blessed and their lives are turned around.  Zacchaeus shared his wealth.  The widow of Zaraphath and son were saved in the drought.  Cornelius and his household believed, were baptized and the Christian church opened its doors to the Gentiles.  It is possible we will be rejected, even killed, but they do not reject us but He who sent us. They can kill the body but they cannot kill the soul. It is an honor to be Christ’s ambassador.  It is an investment in another and in our future.  God is watching and God rewards.

Let the people of God say, “AMEN!”