2024.08.17 Hopewell @Home ▫ Matthew 10:34–42

Read Matthew 10:34–42

Questions from the Scripture text: What does Jesus warn them not to think (Mt 10:34)? What did He come to bring to the earth? Whom did He come to set against one another (Mt 10:35, Mic 7:6)? And who would become one’s enemies (Mt 10:36)? What allegiance must be first in disciples’ lives (Mt 10:37)? What if it’s not? What must a disciple take in order to follow after Jesus (Mt 10:38)? What if he doesn’t? How can one lose his life (Mt 10:39)? How can one find his life? Whom does one receive, if he receives an apostle (Mt 10:40)? Whom else does he then receive? Who receives a prophet’s reward (Mt 10:41)? And who receives a righteous man’s reward? And who receives a disciple’s reward (Mt 10:42)?

What difference does Christ make? Matthew 10:34–42 looks forward to the morning sermon in public worship on the coming Lord’s Day. In these nine verses of Holy Scripture, the Holy Spirit teaches us that Christ brings great cost into the Christian’s life, but greater reward.

Avoiding a great mistake about the world (Mt 10:34–36). Jesus now warns against thinking that He came to bring peace on earth. Although there is goodwill among men who are at peace with God (cf. Lk 2:14), this is not what Jesus brought to the earth more generally. The peace that He brings is entirely in Himself, and if someone else does not have Him, the difference that Christ makes is intolerable to that person.

Jesus came to bring a sword. He came to make such a difference in His people that no other connection can ultimately bridge that gap. The more you are like Christ, the less unbelievers will understand you or, eventually, be able to tolerate you. Dear reader, do not think that becoming Christlike will somehow win you widespread affection and admiration in this life.

Avoiding a great mistake about the Christian life (Mt 10:37–39). But what if this sounds undesirable to you? Can one have just enough Christ to be “saved,” but not so much that it makes trouble with the family, or enemies of unbelievers from his own household? Does Christ have to cost us so much? Yes! If we are unwilling to pay that cost, we are unfit for Him (Mt 10:37). Indeed, a believer who is fit to belong to Christ must take his cross to follow Christ (Mt 10:38). A cross means suffering, but it’s not just that we would be willing to suffer for Christ or even die for Christ.

A disciple must take his cross—the cross upon which he himself is to be crucified. There is a comfort in knowing that our cross has been selected for us by providence. And there is a devotion in carrying it yourself to place yourself upon it. We must be willing to lose everything that we were or had apart from Christ, so that we can find an entirely new self in Him and an entirely new life in Him (Mt 10:39). If you are still who you were, still in yourself, still for yourself, you are not fit to be His disciple. You must be a new person, entirely in Him, entirely for Him.

Avoiding a great mistake about Christian sacrifice (Mt 10:40–42). We may think that the Christian life is one of self-denial, but it’s quite the opposite. Just receiving an apostle, or a preacher, or a righteous man, or even one of Christ’s little ones… is receiving Christ—receiving God Himself—and being rewarded accordingly! Indeed, there is a great disproportion between “sacrifice” (cup of cold water) and reward. We can never lose so much that God’s reward won’t dwarf that loss (Mt. 19:27–29). In the near context, the reward is Christ’s own confessing us before His Father (Mt 10:32). We receive the Father and the Son; the apostles, preachers, righteous ones, and little ones; and along with them, everything else in heaven and earth.

Questions for Application

Who has despised and opposed you for the Lord Jesus’s sake? What relationships has Christ cost you? How are you different than you were outside of Christ? How does it appear in your life that you are in Him rather than in yourself? How does it show up in your daily life that you are not living for yourself but for Christ? What has this cost you in this world?

Sample prayer: Lord, thank You for making us Your own, and for giving Yourself to be our own. Please help us to endure what relationships we might lose or attacks we might suffer for Your sake. Forgive us for the extent to which we continue to find ourselves unwilling to pay the cost, and give us a glad confidence and high esteem for the reward that we shall have in You Yourself in Christ, through Whom we ask it, AMEN!

Suggested songs: ARP73C “Yet Constantly I Am with You” or TPH508 “Jesus, Priceless Treasure”