4th Sunday after Pentecost
Jul 6, 2025
Luke 10:1-11, 16-20
When I worked for Compassion International, God turned my understanding of mission and hospitality upside down. Shook the “white savior” notions out of me in profound ways. Everywhere I went, in the world and in the US, many of the poor had a dependence on God, a depth of faith and love of God and neighbor I had not seen much of in places where most folks were fairly comfortable. I learned how to be a guest and receive true hospitality from those Jesus cherishes and the world dismisses.
Here in Chapter 10, Luke gives us a glimpse of the demands of discipleship and a model of mission and evangelism. He sends 70 disciples out. (Some texts say 72.) Luke’s readers would catch on to that number, 70. Seventy corresponds with Moses’ commissioning of seventy elders, who are to share in his work. There’s 70 years in exile in Jeremiah. Seventy corresponds to the number of nations outlined in Genesis 10, a connection Luke makes throughout his Gospel that salvation is open to everyone and every nation.
The point is Jesus sent out the people that followed him. They didn’t stay comfortably safe within the folds of Jesus robe or the community. They were sent out two by two. What looks like an overwhelming and neigh impossible objective, Jesus takes a small group of unqualified ragamuffins and asks them to turn the world right side up. I was struck by the fact that 70 is the average Sunday attendance at St. Christopher’s. How in the heck can only 70 people make a difference in their world? Jesus shows us how. It’s always a remnant. God is always making what we think is impossible, possible. Making a way out of no way.
Nevertheless, he sends them out to prepare the way in these villages that he will soon visit himself. They are sent unencumbered by any possessions. Now, if any of you have ever planned a mission trip or a work project, you know that doesn’t make any sense whatsoever. It makes sense to us that bringing necessary supplies would help provide a measure of success to the campaign. But this isn’t how God works. At times, God sort of disregards our need for a plan, our rational ideas of how to be successful, and instead teaches us to let go and trust God.
The lesson is, they cannot succeed by being well- (or even poorly-) equipped; they succeed by dependence on the power of God. This is not just a record of a particular group and what they experienced, but a model for the missional life to which the readers of the Gospel were (and are) being called. What we are being called to.
So Jesus sends them out and says, “There is a lot of work to do in this world and very few willing to be the laborers. So go. Oh, and by the way, I’m sending you like lambs to the wolves.” Now, I was taught you don’t get people to sign up if all you tell them is it’s going to be really hard and you’re going to face some ferocious opposition. But no, Jesus tells it like it is–Carry no purse, no bag, no sandals. Stay focused, don’t get sidetracked, greet no one on the road. In spite of that, his disciples were willing.
And what is the message the lambs bring to even the wolves? It is not one of shrinking fear nor is it one of aggressive hostility. Jesus’ message he asks his lambs to carry is: Peace be upon your house. Peace. The mission is holistic—preaching, teaching, and healing. The gospel of peace will take the seventy into direct conflict with the forces of evil, whose power falls before the divine mission. Evil knows it will no longer have the final say and because of that, the wolves will fight back. Even so, they are to go peaceably, with the message that the kingdom of God is near. And Jesus is frank. You are lambs, signs of peace, going into the world of cruelty and aggression. We Christians are, particularly in this outraged addicted internet culture of ours, called to calmly and cooly walk away from rejection, hostility, and attacks rather than seeking revenge, one-uppijng, dunking, and escalating the hostilities. You are an instrument of peace.
I’m always reminding us that following Jesus is risky business. It also requires us to be vulnerable and I think folks like that even less than taking risks. In verse 5 Jesus instructs them, “Whatever house you enter, first say, `Peace to this house!’ Remain in the same house, eating and drinking whatever they provide. Do not move about from house to house. Whenever you enter a town and its people welcome you, eat what is set before you; cure the sick who are there, and say to them, `The kingdom of God has come near to you.’”
Now we Jesus followers like to be the ones to offer hospitality but we do not do well very often when we are to receive hospitality from others, strangers or friends. Think about it. The one who is able to offer hospitality is the one who has control, who holds power. When we are the recipients of hospitality, we are more vulnerable. And that’s what Jesus wanted his disciples to learn and to experience. Why they had to be dependent on the hospitality of others. Dependent on God. No one is to have power over the other. The disciples came to bring a hopeful message of peace, to heal the sick, and tend to the wounds of the people, and they are to allow others the gift of being able to offer back from what they have. No matter how meager, we are to receive it with joy and gratitude. Even if we think we can do it better.
I have eaten so many meals around the world offered by the poor and it would have been offensive to decline their generosity. Those families sometimes sacrificed a week’s wages to feed us and we needed to receive it gratefully and with joy. Eat what is put in front of you, Jesus tells his disciples, like a parent to a child. Yield the gift of hospitality to those we seek to serve in order to honor their dignity, too. Jesus wants us to be the guests of the poor, to learn the lessons from people who understand faith and love and struggle at a depth many of us have not yet experienced. We are to be with the poor, not observers. In the Kingdom of God we are interdependent. That raw, open vulnerability is when Christ and Christ’s followers are truly one.
When the disciples were not welcomed with their message of peace, then they were to wipe the dust off their feet in protest and move on. No violence, no retaliation. Even in the unwelcome spaces they were to still speak a message of peace–”Yet know this: the kingdom of God has come near to you. Peace be with you.” The reign of God has triumphed and will triumph, although not by the expected means of wealth, power, and violence. Even the disciples’ temptation to revel in their victory is set aside by Jesus, our tendencies that lead to triumphalism. Jesus warns against any sort of posturing and preening: the seventy should “not rejoice at this, that the spirits submit to you, but rejoice that your names are written in heaven.” Let it be enough that you belong to God for an eternity. Dust off your feet and move on. Don’t get sidetracked arguing with the wolves! Let God deal with the reckoning for those who worshipped wealth and power over caring for the poor. We’ve got work to do together.
Peace is not passivity in response to injustices and needs of our neighbors. “Let’s not rock the boat” is not a peace that Jesus refers to which perpetuates suffering. In the context of the Roman occupation, where the Romans brought plunder and death, the followers of Jesus here are being told to bring life, to restore relationships, to offer the peace that Jesus brings. This kind of peace is hard work in our hearts and in the world.
You may remember that the Romans brought what they called Pax Romana (Roman Peace) to the lands they occupied, but that peace came at a cost to the poor, the disenfranchised, the widows, and the infirm. The Pax Romana really was only for the healthy, wealthy, and powerful. As long as things were okay for the elite, then they didn’t really care about the rest of the population and their suffering. And it upset these powers for Jesus to call them out and point to the kingdom of God where the faithful were healing, restoring, feeding, and eating with outsiders and the discarded.
Jesus sends us out. We gather together to worship our God and receive Christ in us so that we can go out into the world as the hands and feet of Christ. We have the work of peace and healing to do. There is a prayer in our prayerbook that gives guidance: “Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is hatred let me sow love. Where there is injury, pardon. Where there is doubt, faith. Where there is despair, hope. Where there is darkness, light. And where there is sadness, joy.” This is the kind of instrument we are to be in the world and for our neighbors. Instruments of peace. The kingdom of God has come near to you.
Magdalena's Musings 