4th Sunday after Trinity
“and 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”
Summary
Today’s gospel, Matthew 10:40-42, is all about welcome but also about the rewards we will receive from offering welcome. The nature of the reward depends upon the nature of the welcome.
The reward for welcoming the prophets and the righteous will be the same reward which they receive; both positive and negative, both awesome and exhausting.
Prophets, those who speak out against injustice, encounter conflict and opposition; the righteous, encounter the kingdom of God, because, of course, that is what they are working to change the world into.
The reward of welcoming “the little ones”, the least, the lowest and the over-looked, is not mentioned.
This is because they themselves ARE the reward.
The word welcome means to take and to hold, to receive and to accept as you would a gift or an honour. To truly welcome someone is to open ourselves to all that person is and all they bring, to value them, to learn from them and so to receive, from them, the presence of God their maker in our midst.
FIRST READING
Romans 6:12-23
Therefore do not let sin reign in your mortal body so that you obey its evil desires. Do not offer any part of yourself to sin as an instrument of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer every part of yourself to him as an instrument of righteousness. For sin shall no longer be your master, because you are not under the law, but under grace.
What then? Shall we sin because we are not under the law but under grace? By no means! Don’t you know that when you offer yourselves to someone as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one you obey – whether you are slaves to sin, which leads to death, or to obedience, which leads to righteousness? But thanks be to God that, though you used to be slaves to sin, you have come to obey from your heart the pattern of teaching that has now claimed your allegiance. You have been set free from sin and have become slaves to righteousness.
I am using an example from everyday life because of your human limitations. Just as you used to offer yourselves as slaves to impurity and to ever-increasing wickedness, so now offer yourselves as slaves to righteousness leading to holiness. When you were slaves to sin, you were free from the control of righteousness. What benefit did you reap at that time from the things you are now ashamed of? Those things result in death! But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the benefit you reap leads to holiness, and the result is eternal life. For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.
GOSPEL
Matthew 10.40-42
‘Whoever welcomes you welcomes me, and whoever welcomes me welcomes the one who sent me. Whoever 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; and 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.’
