Last week we were focused on our individual, personal response to Jesus’ call. This week our attention shifts to the external impact of this call – what does it mean for us and the people around us, the people we come into contact with?
We are very used to the idea that Jesus’ message included the demand to pass it on to others, but this was a huge innovation for his followers coming from the Jewish tradition. The Jews had no tradition of proselytizing or evangelization. They didn’t look to have others convert to their faith, although people certainly did – but it wasn’t (and still isn’t) a key part of Jewish identity. For Christians it was (and is?) very different. From Pentecost onwards there was a strong focus on “preaching the good news” – actively reaching out to people to tell them about Jesus and what he had done. Unfortunately, over time that evolved into forcing people, which certainly wasn’t part of early church tradition.
In the story we hear from Luke today (Lk 10:1-12, 17-20 ) Jesus is sending his disciples ahead of him to tell people ‘The kingdom of God is at hand for you’ and providing fairly detailed instructions for how to go about this. Matthew uses exactly the same material in his account of Jesus sending the 12, the Apostles (Mt 10:5–15). Both evangelists have the same source but chose to present it in different contexts to fit with their overall narrative. It’s not clear to us what Luke saw as the significance of sending out 72 (or 70), but this presumably meant something to his audience. It’s also likely that some of the details that Luke provides relate more to his experience of evangelization in the early church than to the specifics of what Jesus did. What is clear is that this innovation of expecting disciples to go tell people about Jesus, actively, was a core element of the early Christian perspective.
We should also note the framework that Jesus provides for this encounter with the wider world. It doesn’t depend on the capabilities of the messengers – they carry nothing (except the message). And the first part of the message is “peace” – always the first part of the any encounter with Jesus. And if the message is rejected, then what? Turn away and move on. Here we have an echo of Jesus’ response to James and John last week. When they came to an unwelcoming village they wanted to “call down fire from heaven to consume them”, but Jesus just moved on.
In today’s passage Jesus does point out that refusing to acknowledge the coming kingdom is a problem – but it’s not our problem to fix – we should just let go and move on. When the disciples return, pumped up from their success, Jesus is quick to point out that they should not be pleased because he has given them power to spread his message, but because they themselves are amongst those that have heard and believed. If we are given the opportunity to help others it doesn’t make us any better than them.
Paul often returns to this idea – it’s not his success, his effort, his ability that counts. There is nothing for him to boast about in all that he achieved: “May I never boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Gal 6:14-18). One gets the feeling that Paul may have felt tempted to boast of his accomplishments – and by our standards he would have been well justified in doing so!
We may not feel we have accomplished much in that regard and therefore not have much temptation to boasting. But we do have a temptation to judging. We do want to believe our way is “better”, and thus we are somehow better. But Paul notes: “through (the cross of Jesus) the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.” We are through with judging ourselves or others. We are a “new creation”, newborn babies. That experience, that reality, is what we carry with us as we move about in the world. And we will find some people who want to share in our experience, and others who don’t. We should always be willing to share that experience, which starts with peace. But we also need to be willing to move on if we don’t get a favorable response. The rest is in the hands of God.