Matthew 10: 5-14
Today’s passage tells us about a time that Jesus sent out his disciples. What Jesus asked of the disciples was to preach the kingdom of God, to heal the sick, to raise the dead, to cleanse the outcast, and to cast out demons.
Since we have been hearing and reading this story about the sending of the twelve disciples for so long now, we may take their job description for granted. However, the disciples were given and told exactly the same things to do that Jesus himself had been given to do.
Jesus could have insisted that the disciples remain his assistant, but he did not. Instead, Jesus transferred his ministry to the disciples while he was still alive.
Imagine what the disciples felt when Jesus sent them out with so much power and so few accessories? Are the disciples called to be beggars or miracle workers?
The way Jesus set it up, the disciples could not provide for others out of their own abundance, but they could only provide for them out of their needs.
Still, it is so important for us as believers to live out the word of God in the same way as we talk and believe. Preaching the kingdom of God on Earth without doing anything about it may be just either politics or ideology.
In addition, good works without good news is no more than social welfare, but to proclaim the kingdom of God on Earth while acting it out—that is powerful, and that is what Jesus sent his friends out to do.
Healing, forgiveness, restoration, and resurrection—we are given exactly same things to do that Jesus himself had been given to do. Those are the only things we really have to share with the world, which is just as well, since they are the only things the world really needs.
We are not just called to be consumers of God’s love, but to be providers of God’s love by preaching the kingdom, healing the sick near and far, raising the dead, cleansing the outcast, and casting out demons. We provide what we provide for others, not out of our own abundance, but from out of our need.
Let’s keep striving to scatter from here to be salt and light as well as we work hard to get together.
Let’s keep being a provider of God’s love instead of being a consumer.
Let’s keep providing for others out of our own need-healing, forgiving, restoring, and resurrecting.
Thanks be to God.