Today we finish off this powerful address, recorded for us in Matthew chapter 10, which Jesus first gave to His disciples. And it has been pretty alarming stuff. If you’ve been with us on previous Sunday mornings, we’ve looked at warnings like that at the beginning of verse 22: “All men will hate you because of Me ... ” But these final verses, which we are looking at today, are not to frighten us, but to encourage us. This is how Jesus begins verse 26: “So do not be afraid ... ” And then again in verses 28 and 31 He says: “Do not be afraid ... ” So, as you will see from our service sheet, that’s both our overall title and the title of our first point.
(1) Do not be Afraid (vv. 26-31).
Actually, in the context, Jesus doesn’t say there is nothing to be afraid of, He says there is only One Person Whom you need fear. Fear, the psychologists tell us, is one of the basic emotions that have helped the species survive (along with sadness, joy, anger, surprise, disgust etc). It may trigger physiological responses that we find uncomfortable (like palpitations, sweatiness, breathlessness, dilation of the pupils etc.), but it can be helpful when it’s an appropriate reaction and it’s expressed in an appropriate way. It becomes debilitating when it’s focussed on wrong objects. For example, we all know how detrimental the fear of what other people think of us can be, the fear of looking a fool in other people’s eyes.
One dark winter evening, a crowded commuter train full of tired city business men and women was heading into Dorking station, when it stopped unexpectedly in the countryside outside the town. It was in those days when virtually every man in a carriage like that would have been wearing a pin-stripe suit and a bowler hat, carrying a rolled umbrella and a briefcase, and reading The Times newspaper. One of them had fallen asleep, and he woke with a start, obviously thought he was about to miss his stop, leaped to his feet, opened the carriage door and stepped straight out into the darkness. There was a strangled yell; and a few moments later he struggled back up into the carriage, bruised, dishevelled, red-faced with embarrassment at the raised eyebrows above The Times newspapers up and down the compartment. He said, “Terribly sorry. Made a complete fool of myself there – got out on the wrong side!” Whereupon he walked across the compartment, opened the opposite door and did exactly the same on the other side.
Fear of making a fool of myself is usually debilitating in life. In fact, all fear of other people is unhelpful for the Christian, according to Jesus: “So do not be afraid of them. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What I tell you in the dark, speak in the daylight; what is whispered in your ear, proclaim from the roofs” (vv. 26, 27).
(a) Look on
Notice Jesus is saying, “Look on, there is a new day dawning; and it is what the light of that dawn reveals that matters. There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What I tell you in the dark, speak in the daylight ... ” The truth will emerge at the end. So it’s wise to declare it now. One day all our friends will know that there is a God. They will all know that they are accountable to Him. If we’re Christians we know that now. It may have been whispered to us in the dark, but we are to declare it openly. Because a day will come when it will be apparent to everyone. We should not keep that truth to ourselves: “ ... what is whispered in your ear, proclaim from the roofs.” Look on to the end, says Jesus, don’t fear what is happening in the here and now.
(b) Look up
Secondly, He says, “Look up. Do not be afraid of those who kill the body but cannot kill the soul. Rather, be afraid of the One who can destroy both soul and body in hell” (v. 28). Death is not the end, nor is it the worst that can happen to us. It’s the worst that man can do to us; but God can destroy both soul and body in hell. Lesser fears are rightly driven out by that greater fear. Fear of what other people think of us, what other people can do to us, is self-interested and usually cowardly. But fear of God is a healthy response of awe and obedience in the face of the Almighty. Fear of hell is more logical and more healthy than fear of looking a fool. And yet for most of us it’s fear of looking a fool that drives us along in our lives, rather than fear of what will emerge on that day.
And Jesus invites us to consider also the nature of this One Whom we ought rightly to fear: “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows” (vv. 29 - 31). In Hamlet’s words, there is a special providence in the fall of a sparrow. And if the life of the teeniest bird is enfolded by the will of God, how much more are we wrapped up by that will! We find it so hard to believe that God prefers the human race to the world of Nature. But Jesus often teaches us in this way: if God looks after the world of Nature like that, how much more will He look after you! After all, God cares so much for humanity that He sacrificed His Son for us – not for the world of Nature. And in the light of that, can’t we trust Him to look after us?
Do you see the logic of what Jesus is saying in these verses? I don’t know if you’ve ever been irritated when somebody won’t trust you to do something you could easily do and have often done. It’s like a car journey when you’re travelling with somebody who insists on giving you directions when you actually already know the way perfectly well: “Turn left at the next roundabout” I know that; you don’t have to tell me! It’s a poor illustration: but how much more irritating it must be for God when we cannot trust Him with our worries and fears.
Look again at those verses: “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows”. If He bothers to count the hairs on our heads (and which of us here has done that? None of us – not even those of us for whom it is less of a challenge! There isn’t a person in the building who has counted their own hairs. And there isn’t a person in the building for whom God does not know exactly how many hairs there are on your head at this moment! Isn’t that a staggering thought?) – if He cares that much about you, can’t you trust Him?
With God, fear and trust are not incompatible; indeed, they go hand in hand. The people in this building at the moment who most fear God are the people who most trust Him. The people in this building at the moment who most trust God are the people who most fear Him.
So, says Jesus to us, Don’t be Afraid – Look on to the end, to what eventually will emerge in the daylight of that dawn, and Look up to the God Who made and loved us, and Who is the only right object of our fear. Fear Him, but fear nothing else and no one else.
The negative, ‘Do not fear’ is followed by the positive, ‘Do identify with Jesus’.
(2) Identify with Jesus (vv. 32, 33)
“Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.” Jesus is the One Who bolts time and eternity together. We acknowledge Him here on earth; He acknowledges us before God in heaven. “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven.” Isn’t that a wonderful thought? Think of being acknowledged there! Whom do you want to be associated with? Think how proud some people are to be associated with a sports team – the insufferable (currently) Manchester United supporter; the grin on the face of our Australian friends at the end of the Rugby World Cup. How can that be compared with being on Jesus’ team? When the Son says to the Father, “She’s one of mine. He’s one of mine.” “Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven. ” We think it is difficult to acknowledge Jesus on earth, don’t we? But you think of the consequence of that. If you and I stand up on earth and say, “I’m part of Jesus’s team”, and in heaven He says to the Father, “He’s one of mine. She’s one of mine.” I think it’s a stupendous thought for us this morning.
But then think of the pain of not being acknowledged. Think perhaps of a situation when somebody who is very near and very dear to you refuses to recognise you, won’t acknowledge you, disowns you. Perhaps it’s hard to think of that sort of situation: maybe when you come to your wife and she doesn’t know you. Or think of a son or a daughter or a parent or a close friend. It’s very painful indeed. Now none of them loves us as Jesus loves us, so what pain there must be in verse 33: “But whoever disowns me before men, I will disown him before my Father in heaven.”
Jesus Christ is offering us a relationship beyond all others; and we are invited to acknowledge that by putting Him first and loving Him most.
(a) Love Jesus most
“Do not suppose
that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace,
but a sword. For I have come to turn
‘a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
a daughter-in-law
against her mother-in-law—
a man’s enemies will be the members
of his own household.’
Anyone who loves
his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; anyone who loves his son
or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me ... ” (vv. 34-37). The
home and the family can be a source of great love and a source, as we know, of
great unhappiness. In our generation we know all about inter-generational
strife. It’s not an easy age in which to bring up children because of the
absence today of any agreed moral framework for parental discipline.
One doctor was working in casualty and was dealing with an extremely active three-year-old with a cut eyebrow. It was taking three nurses to hold the screaming toddler still. As he examined the swelling and the discolouration of the eye beginning to appear below the cut eyebrow, the doctor said to the mother (over the top of the yells and screams), “He’ll be lucky if he gets out of this without a black eye.” The mother shook her head ruefully and said, “Do what you have to do, Doctor; he’s a terror at home too!”
Of course, these
verses are not referring to that sort of inter-generational conflict. It is the
fact that the closest of all human groupings may be divided by Jesus. “Anyone
who loves his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; anyone who
loves his son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me ...” It’s
not that we love our nearest and dearest less. I was once explaining the gospel
to someone who said, “If you’re suggesting that I should love Jesus more than I
love my husband, I can’t possibly do it.” I couldn’t think of an answer at that
time, but of course it came to me later: “If you did love Jesus more than you
love your husband, you would love your husband a great deal more than you do at
the moment.” Love for Jesus is not the enemy of family affection; but
discipleship will divide families: “Do not suppose that I have come to bring
peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come
to turn
‘a man against his father,
a daughter against her mother,
a daughter-in-law
against her mother-in-law—
a man’s enemies will be the members
of his own household.’ ”
I think most of us here know the truth of that saying. If you’re a Christian you will have experienced this division which goes right through the middle of the closest human ties. Maybe you’re a Christian student who is going to go back to a non-Christian family for Christmas. Christmas has a great way of pointing it up for us, doesn’t it?— when you’re sharing a household with people who take a completely different attitude to Jesus Christ. I think most of us in the building know only too well the division that Jesus brings to families. It is intensely painful, this frighteningly indiscriminate division. That’s one reason why, in this church, we will never knowingly preside over the marriage of a Christian to a non-Christian. We’re not going to sow that division into marriage and family life right at the very heart of things (and so the importance of a Christian not dating a non-Christian). It is intensely painful this frighteningly indiscriminate division. But it is a powerful evidence to the reality of a relationship with Jesus. It supersedes all human relations, as we learn that to identify with Jesus is to love Him most and (secondly) to live His way.
(b) To live Jesus’ way
“Anyone who does not take his cross and follow Me is not worthy of Me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will find it” (vv. 38, 39). It is the way of the Cross that we’re called to live: “Anyone who does not take his cross and follow Me is not worthy of Me.”
That expression, ‘carrying/bearing a cross’, or ‘taking up the cross’, is much misunderstood and much misused. Jesus didn’t mean that we each have to put up with some awkward or tragic circumstance in life. He’s not talking about suffering from recurrent migraines or depression or a slipped disc or a difficult relative or something like that. You know how we say, “It’s just the cross I have to bear.” This is not an encouragement to persevere in suffering. There are plenty of encouragements in Scripture to persevere in suffering, but this is not one of them.
If this were now 1st Century Palestine, and I met you tomorrow carrying a cross in the market square, I wouldn’t see you again. You wouldn’t be carrying that cross on Tuesday and on Wednesday. A man carrying his cross was going to the place of crucifixion. It was a one-way route to the grave.
Verse 38 is explained by verse 39: “Anyone who does not take his cross and follow Me is not worthy of Me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.” The whole secret of human existence is wrapped up there in verse 39: grabbing on to my life, holding on to it, seeking to preserve it, to make it nice, to make it comfortable, to make it the way I want it to be is the one sure way to lose it for ever. Those atheistic geneticists who tell us that the one thing we’re here on earth to do is to survive, to project our genes down the gene pool, they’re talking about hell. They’re not talking about human life. The one principle of hell is ‘I am my own’ – hold on to me forever. But whoever loses his life for Christ’s sake is the one who will find it, according to Jesus.
Pouring out our lives for other people, that’s what your life is for. It’s to give it away. And if you’re holding on to it this morning, I have news for you: you will lose it for ever. In the words of one missionary martyr: ‘He is no fool who gives up what he cannot possibly keep, in order to gain what he cannot ever lose.’ It is an extraordinary logic, isn’t it? But every believer here this morning has begun to experience the truth of it. You give your life away in self-sacrifice, in pain, in suffering for others, and it comes back to you a thousandfold in the providence of the loving God who has numbered the hairs on your head, and who cares for you more than you and I care for ourselves.
Finally Jesus returns again to the specific theme of identification with Himself in those last three verses.
(c) Identification with Jesus
“He who receives you receives Me, and he who receives Me receives the One Who sent Me. Anyone who receives a prophet because he is a prophet will receive a prophet’s reward, and anyone who receives a righteous man because he is a righteous man will receive a righteous man’s reward. And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones because he is My disciple, I tell you the truth, he will certainly not lose his reward” (vv. 40-42). The identification couldn’t be more clear than it is in verse 40: “He who receives you receives Me, and he who receives Me receives the One Who sent Me.” I suggest (and I hope this isn’t an unkind supposition about you) that your and my commitment to God is not all it should be. Mine certainly isn’t; and I’m afraid I’m making that supposition about you too, this morning. But God’s commitment to you and me is total.
We may not feel ourselves to be prophets, or even righteous people, but God commits Himself to the ‘little ones’. Can’t we aspire to that – to be one of God’s little ones? And when we take Jesus as our Lord, God treats us as He treats His own Son, Jesus. That’s what this Communion is all about. God treating Jesus like me (when Jesus died for my sins on the cross and was punished by God for my sins, not His own). God treating Jesus like me, in order that God can treat me like Jesus (as if I had no sins at all). God commits Himself to me totally. What are those human fears of mockery and persecution, even of loneliness, suffering, ageing, grief, all the fears that your life and my life are full of, compared to the knowledge that Jesus acknowledges me before God in heaven? That the God who has numbered my hairs has committed Himself to me in total, unbreakable love? Amen.