The Rewards of a Righteous Person

Matthew 10:40-42

A Sermon Prepared for the Hollywood Presbyterian Church

June 26, 2011

Rev. Stephen A. Herring

I just returned from a trip to New York City.  I took my mother and my stepfather, Phil up there to attend my Aunt’s funeral.  Her funeral was in Brooklyn.  We stayed in Manhattan on the upper west side.  Phil has a hard time getting around these days.  He moves very slowly, so it took us a long time to get anywhere.  Several things impressed me about the city.  First, there are a whole LOT of people up there.  The second thing I noticed was that these enormous oceans of people are all on their way somewhere in a big, big hurry.  When you are with someone who can’t move quickly, you notice just how fast everyone else is moving. 

The most important thing I noticed was a more humbling lesson.  Everyone I met was nice to us.  They were all polite, and they went out of their way to be helpful.  Getting on trains or getting off trains, getting cabs, getting into cabs, getting out of cabs, getting on subways, getting off of subways, at every turn someone was extending a hand to be helpful.  We spent a lot of time riding cabs, so I had a chance to visit with various cab drivers.  I met people from all over everywhere, from Egypt, Africa, Pakistan, and South America.  I met Jews, Christians, and Moslems, and others who would be none of the above.  All of them were good, polite, helpful people.  I was worried and anxious about this trip, but there was nothing to worry about.  I never felt unsafe or uneasy even for one moment.      

It is so easy for us to think negative thoughts about places we are not familiar with.  It is so surprising when we worry that there might be some problem or that something dreadful might happen, only to find out that everything is just fine.  It is easy to imagine the problems we might have, only to find out that the people of the city of New York received us just fine, and we received them.  The only problems were in my imagination. 

In our gospel lesson today Jesus gives us the following statement:  “Whoever receives you receives me, and whoever receives me receives the one who sent me.  Whoever receives a prophet in the name of a prophet receives a prophet’s reward.  Whoever receives a righteous one in the name of a righteous one receives a righteous one’s reward.”  (Matthew 10:40-41) 

In order to understand these words we need to know three things.  First, we need to know what it means to receive someone.  Second, we need to know what it means to be a righteous one.  Third, we need to see what is meant by a righteous one’s reward. 

The word translated as “receive” means to take something into your arms, embrace, to welcome, or to take in hand.  People offer themselves to us all the time.  If we receive them we welcome them into our lives.  When a person receives you, according to this scripture, they also receive Jesus, and God who sent Jesus. 

To receive a prophet is to accept what a prophet says as something sent by God.  I can give you an example of accepting a prophet from my own experiences with the Book of Jeremiah. I have received the words of Jeremiah 1:5 and following.  “Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, before you were born I consecrated you; I have appointed you a prophet to the nations.”  I accept those words into my heart without reservation and with every bit of my energy.  I commit myself to those words.  I receive those words.  Likewise, I have completely accepted the words of Jeremiah 31:31-34.  Here the LORD says; “I will put my law within them, and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God and they shall be my people.”  These words have become part of me.  I have accepted them and they are part of my identity. 

To accept a prophet is to receive the reward of a prophet.  The word translated as “reward” means wage, or payment.  This is the word which describes what we get in exchange for what we do.  If we do good things we receive good rewards.  If we do bad things, we receive bad rewards.  If we accept a prophet we receive the wages, the reward, or the benefit that comes with that prophet.  So it is with any prophecy we accept into our lives.  Accepting prophecy brings the blessings of prophecy.  We also know that accepting prophecy can bring us trouble, because a prophet is never welcome in his own country.  On many occasions, accepting prophecy can get us cast out because prophecy stands in opposition to the dominant value systems of our society.  Either way, for a blessing, or for a curse, we who accept the words of the prophets will receive a prophet’s reward. 

Then we have the situation of accepting a righteous person.  There is no word we know which gives us a harder time than righteousness.   Righteous people work hard to live righteous lives, and so they naturally look badly on those whose path of righteousness is not the same as theirs.  If I choose a path through life which involves sacrifice for me to be submitted to the code of conduct which I believe will be acceptable to God, I may not look kindly on those who choose not to follow the path I have found so rewarding.  Things get confusing for us because one person’s path of righteousness is unacceptable to those who walk a different path.  Just look at Christians, Jews, and Moslems.  All three religions have great diversity in the paths of righteousness believers may choose to walk.  Within each religion people disagree with each other about the details of the paths they walk.  One Christian wants to walk a path called “holiness”.  Another wants to be Orthodox, or Roman Catholic, or Baptist, or Jehovah’s Witness.  Jews have all sorts of different ways of living out the righteousness of Torah.  Likewise Moslems seek to walk the path of righteousness set for them by their prophet.  Meanwhile, no one can agree on which of these paths are pleasing to God and which are not.  There is one thing we all know for absolute certain by our own experience.  A righteous person will receive the rewards of the path they choose to walk.  Were it not so, they would choose another path.    

What happens if we enlarge our definition of righteousness?  What if righteousness means walking a path of relationship with God.  What if it is all that simple?  Each of us has the choice of taking a path in our own time, in our own way that leads us into a proper relationship with God.  If we are in a proper relationship with God, we know it,  and we receive the blessings of the path we have chosen to walk.  If others choose to walk a different path that does not mean their path cannot lead them to the same destination. 

As I interpret the teachings of Jesus here, our task is to receive the righteous person and to receive the rewards of a righteous person.  This means we should be open to the wonderful ways all our brothers and sisters find a relationship with God.  We should be open and we should not judge them. 

To see the implications of this message we need to take a minute to look at heaven and hell.  If what I have just said is true, does this mean that any path that leads a person into relationship with God can lead to heaven?  Does this mean any path which leads us away from relationship with God can lead us to hell? 

To answer these questions let us look at what we choose to believe about heaven.  Let’s take a little survey here around the following difficult question.  Will dogs go to heaven?  There are several ways to work that question.  You can look at it in terms of church dogma, in scriptural terms, or in terms of your own experience.  My answer to the question is simple.  If I get to heaven, and I see a sign saying “NO DOGS ALLOWED”, I am going to go where the dogs are.  The answer I choose is of course there are dogs in heaven because without them it would not be heaven.  That is not an answer from a book.  That is an answer from the heart. 

We should also look at hell.  Hell is where we are when we are separated from God.  We choose to make a really big deal about hell.  We do this because we like to scare people and we like to separate ourselves from people who are not like us.  Some Christians use hell as a place to put everyone they disagree with.  I have two personal beliefs about hell.  First there are not nearly as many people there as the TV preachers would lead you to believe.  This is because it is in our nature to desire a relationship with God according to the culture in which we are born.  Cultures are made up of languages and symbols, and those languages and symbols are designed to lead people into a righteous relationship with God.  Because so many of us want to keep others out of our heaven, we might be a bit disappointed to find out that the Savior of the World has saved the world by the power of his unlimited love.  (See John 3:16-17) 

My second belief about hell is that there is a hell.  Hell exists and hell is real.  Again, we can look at this on a doctrinal, dogmatic level, or we can look at it on a scriptural level, or we can look at it on a practical level.  I know there is a hell because I have been there.  Think for a moment about the unmitigated terror of feeling separated from everyone including God.  The path to hell begins with negativity.  It begins when we separate ourselves from each other.  We can catch a glimpse of it if we think for a moment that we are totally alone with the pain and grief we bear.  Think of those moments when you have felt totally cut off.  Think of those moments you have felt totally alone, as if no one knew the pain or the sorrow or the frustration or the disappointment or the failure within your heart.  That darkness is the darkness visible[1] which illuminates the path to hell.  You don’t get to hell by following the light, but rather by following a strange, attractive darkness of separation and negativity.  Once you start thinking that way it becomes easier and easier to continue to think that way.  We descend into hell when we allow our own negative experiences to have defining power over us.  Hell is not a place for people who follow the wrong dogma.  Hell is a place for people who choose to give too much power to their own bitterness, anger, and disappointment. 

The amazing truth is that this hell of separation and its attendant legions of demons and dread are only an illusion.  That’s right, an illusion.  I know this because I receive and I accept the words of Psalm 139:  “Where can I go from your Spirit?  Or where can I flee from your presence?  If I ascend to heaven, you are there.  If I make my bed in Sheol, behold, you are there.  …  If I say, let only darkness cover me, and the light about me be night.  Even the darkness is not dark to you, the night is as bright as the day, for darkness is a light with you.”  (Ps. 139:7-12)  These words assure me that my hell is only an illusion, that all I need to do is to look upward towards the Saving Light, the One True Light which is the life of us all.  For me this light is Jesus Christ.  The words of Psalm 139 provide me with the blessed assurance that Jesus has basically destroyed hell for all time.  The door to hell is off the hinges and the way is clear for any who would rise to his light. 

Some people say that this sort of teaching detracts from our motivation to do the work of evangelism and leading souls to Jesus.  I say that it is more important for us today than it has ever been to reach souls for Jesus.  We need to be about the work of rescuing people from the prisons of their own negativity and dark imaginings.  We live in a world full of fear and worry, darkness, and dread.  We live in a world where negative teachings are addictive.  We need to teach people to rise above all that negativity.  The only way I know to do that is by the words and teachings and forgiveness of the Lord Jesus.  By accepting Jesus as Lord and Savior a person agrees to leave the darkness and fear and sin behind. 

Seen properly, this world is also a really great place.  It is a place full of the deepest and most wonderful blessings.  It is a place where a person from another place, another faith, another culture entirely can reach out to us and accept us.  This world is a place where we can accept them.  This world is a place where we can all receive the blessings of various prophets.  This world is a place where we can be led in paths of righteousness, where we can meet all sorts of wonderful, righteous people.  This is a place where we can receive the rewards of a righteous person.  Above and beyond, in and around and through it all, Jesus rules and his love is triumphant.  Amen. 

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[1] The phrase is borrowed from Milton, Paradise Lost.