You’re Included (Fourth Sunday after Pentecost)
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At first glance, today’s Gospel story is kind of unnecessary. We already know this. In last week’s Gospel reading, Jesus sent the 12 disciples ahead of him to every place where he intended to go. And they went, and did what Jesus asked them to do, and then Jesus went there.
And in today’s Gospel reading, Jesus does it again! In the field of biblical study called “literary criticism” this is referred to as a doublet. That is, Luke tells the story of Jesus doing something. And then, shortly thereafter, Luke tells the story of Jesus doing it again. This “doublet” technique happens several times in Luke’s Gospel, and those “doublets” are often unique to Luke. For example, Luke, like all the other Gospel writers, tells the story of the feeding of the 5000. But later, just in case you missed the point, there’s the story of the feeding of the 4000!
So what’s up with these “doublets”? Maybe Luke was just so impressed with some of these stories, he had to write them down even though it took up vital space. Some scholars think that Luke just made up additional stories – or repeated versions of the same story twice. But maybe, Luke does this to make the point that some of these things that Jesus does are not simply one-off events that we should find interesting and then move on.
Sometimes, there’s a deeper point that you’re not supposed to miss. And I wonder if that’s the point of today’s story. After all, it would be easy to read the story of the 12 apostles heading off to prepare the way for Jesus and think, “it’s great when important leaders whose names we know go off to serve God!”
But in today’s story, Jesus sends a whole flock of people – 70 or 72 depending upon the various manuscripts. We don’t any of their names. We don’t know if they were Jews or Gentiles. We don’t know if they were men or women. And we never hear about them again!
And yet, they’re all included in the people whom Jesus sends into the world ahead of him. They’re all included in doing the work of Jesus when he’s not physically present with them. And they’re all included in the “kingdom of heaven”, even if they’re not famous and we never hear about them again.
They’re all included in the story. They’re all important to the work of Jesus. And maybe that’s the point that Luke is trying to make – that we’re all included, too.
And to understand what we’re included to do and to be, it’s important to also understand the details of what Jesus sends the 70 to do. Jesus sent them with three instructions. And those three instructions were to be about doing the very things Jesus himself had done and would do in the future. Whenever any pair of the 70 arrived in a place that was at all willing to receive them, they were to do three things:
- Eat what was set before them – that is, they were to enter into table fellowship with those they met; they were to create community. And that may not sound like such a big deal, but it’s the first thing that Jesus often did, and it’s what often got Jesus in trouble (that is, he associated with the “wrong people” – whether those people were “sinners” or “tax collectors” or sometimes even Pharisees…
- Cure the sick – that is, they were to care for people’s physical, real world needs; it wasn’t really about “playing doctor”; Jesus knew that all too often, people who claim to be religious just want to “convert” people to their way of thinking or acting – that is, the religious people often care deeply about their agenda, but not so much about the people they’re supposed to serve; Jesus tells his disciples to share God’s love not only by creating fellowship, but by genuinely caring for people and the needs of those people – and that’s what Jesus did as well …
- Announce that the kingdom of God has come near – finally, and only because they’ve built community and showed genuine care – the disciples are to make it clear that they do all of this because God has acted in their lives, not because they want to be popular or because they’re just nice people; and they don’t have to be prophets of the future – they’re just supposed to talk about how God has already come near to them in Jesus …
These were the three things that Jesus did in his ministry. They were the three things that he called his disciple leaders to do. But they were also the same three things that Jesus called everybody to do – even these 70 unnamed disciples.
And maybe that’s why Luke included the second story. He wanted to make sure everybody understood that sending people to be emissaries of Jesus isn’t something just for a select few. It’s Jesus’ call to everybody. It’s Jesus’ call to us.
And that doesn’t necessarily mean we need to leave home and travel around the countryside. But it does mean that Jesus calls us to be his representatives by being people who:
- Work to create community with our friends and neighbors and co-workers – Jesus didn’t tell the 70 to have any particular agenda involved in doing this other than to be good neighbors. And it’s always the case that people can’t trust you unless they have a relationship with you. And often, the best “witness” done by many Christians was and is when people really know you and see your faith at work in your life; that’s WAY more important than telling others what you think God wants them to do…
- Care for other people’s actual needs – I’ve known folks who think that whenever Christians spend too much time caring for people who are hungry or poor or needy in some way that we aren’t really focusing on our “spiritual” calling; and yet, these were the very things that Jesus did before he preached to anybody; and we too, live in a world where way too many people are interested in their own agenda, instead of the needs of others; could it be that Jesus wants us to simply show, by our caring actions, that God is at work in the world when we care about others’ needs instead of our own…?
- Announce God’s kingdom simply by finding gentle and non-threatening ways to talk about how we’ve felt and experienced God in our own lives? That was what those 70 were told to do – announce how the kingdom of God had already come near in their lives. To talk about who Jesus was for them. And sometimes, that happened simply by the way they were willing to spend their time and effort investing themselves in other people’s lives the way Jesus had invested himself in their lives….
And so I think this second story – even if it seems like a repeat – is important because it reminds us that Jesus sending people into the world to share his love and presence wasn’t just something Jesus did long ago, but something Jesus is continually doing.
And this story reminds us that we’re included, too. We are all included in the people whom Jesus sends into the world ahead of him. We are all included in doing the work of Jesus so that Jesus can be seen and experienced through our work, our words and our attitudes. And we are all included in the “kingdom of heaven” because of God’s love and our baptism into Christ, even if we’re not famous for what we do, and nobody else knows our names!
Amen.