Christ & His People / A Cup of Cold Water (9/24/2023)

Christ and His People in Matthew 10:40-42

All right, let's once again turn to the Gospel of Matthew chapter 10. Matthew chapter 10, we'll finish this week, finish the chapter by covering the final three verses. So this is verses 40 through 42.

And at least in the New King James version, it titles this, this last section, a cup of cold water. So that's the title of the message, a cup of cold water. The idea here is that you cannot separate Christ from his people.

If you give a believer a cup of cold water, it's like you're giving Christ a cup of cold water. So how you treat fellow believers in a very real way, that's how we would treat Christ himself. Do you remember in the book of Acts, just to kind of prove this point from the beginning, you remember in the book of Acts when Saul of Tarsus was persecuting Christians, he was persecuting the church and then the Lord confronted him on the road to Damascus.

You remember what Jesus said? He said, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me? He didn't say, why do you persecute the church? Why are you persecuting my people? He said, why are you persecuting me? So what does that tell you?

Christ is one with his church. Christ is one with his people. So let's begin reading Matthew 10, verses 40 through 42. Jesus says, he who receives you, receives me. And he who receives me, receives him who sent me.

He who receives a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward. And he who receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward. And whoever gives one of these little ones only a cup of cold water in the name of a disciple, assuredly I say to you, he shall by no means lose his reward.

And may the Lord bless his holy, inerrant and infallible word. Amen. Amen. So before I explain and expound upon these verses, and by the way, the same concept applies, I think that's what a sermon is.

You're reading from scripture and you're expounding upon the scripture. So just as Christ is connected to his people, in order to be a Christian, you have to be in covenant with Christ. So in order to have a sermon, what is being said needs to be connected to Christ and his word, right?

It needs to be connected to the Bible. But a few things come to mind right away. First is the new commandment that Jesus gave. He said in John 13, 34 and 35, a new commandment I give you that what? That you love one another as I have loved you.

And you also should love one another. By this, all will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. So to be a Christian, it's not only about Christ. Now it is mainly about Christ.

Everything revolves around Christ. But to be a Christian, we not only have fellowship with the Lord, we have fellowship with his people. We have fellowship with his body. The church is the body of Christ on earth.

Where is Jesus today? On one sense, he has ascended into heaven. He is seated at the right hand of the Father. But he is also present on the earth through his spirit and dwelt church. I think we live in a day and age, and the scripture really predicted this, that in the last days, men would be lovers of self.

Does this sound accurate to you? People are worried about themselves, always focused on themselves. And of course, that's a temptation for anybody, really. But what the Lord does and what his word does, it always directs attention away from you or away from me.

And the attention is directed towards Christ and towards his people. So what is the great commandment in the law? Case in point. We should love the Lord our God with our whole heart, soul, mind, and strength.

That's the first commandment of the law. And the second is like it. Love your neighbor as yourself. So it's all about Christ, yes, amen. But part of that is it's about his people, because we're all in this together.

You heard that phrase a lot a few years ago. We're all in this together. Yeah, well, this is a different thing. We truly are in this together. So that's what the Lord wants from us. He wants us to love him.

I don't think you're going to get any objection from a believer. God wants us. Christ wants us to love him. But we start by having fellowship with his body, the church. And that's where we get to love and serve one another.

So love God by loving those made in his image. Now who is made in the image of God? That's all people, right? So we should have a benevolence for all men. And that's true. And God wants all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth.

But especially the body of Christ, where we are called, given that new commandment, that we are to have a special love for fellow believers. When you believe on Christ, God is now your heavenly father.

And because God is your heavenly father, fellow Christians are what? Your brothers and sisters. And who do you love more than your family? So you can look at this passage. It's connecting Christ to his people.

You can't separate them. We love Christ. We should love his people. And that's a consistent message you see throughout the New Testament. Now there are some people who didn't grow up with a family. Or maybe there were some people who didn't feel much love from their family.

But there is great love to be found in the family of God. Jesus said in Mark 3 35, for whoever does the will of God is my brother and my sister and my mother. So the connection that the Lord has with his people, the love that he has for them and for us is very strong.

And I hope you feel that love, that God truly loves you and cares about you. What have we read in this chapter? The very hairs of your head are what? Numbered. God loves, Christ loves his people. So I put it this way, Christ and his people, it's a package deal, right?

Christ and his apostles, it was a package deal. If Jesus sent them out and they preached in a city and the people rejected the message of the apostles, who were they really rejecting? Christ. So this works or cuts both ways.

God is connected with his people as far as accepting them and loving one another, but also to reject God's people or to mistreat or despise the people of God is to reject and despise the Lord himself.

So God has poured out his love upon humanity, he has poured out his love on us. How? Romans 5, 8, God demonstrates his love toward us that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. And he says, greater love has no man than this, that a man would lay down his life for his friends.

And that's what Jesus did for us. So then knowing this, we should take that same love and feel that same way about fellow believers. Now that's a little harder though, right? Because God is perfect and his love is perfect.

We're not so perfect. Matter of fact, we fall far short of that. So it's a little harder for us to show that same love. Should we though, isn't this what we're commanded? It's not a suggestion. So really maybe a test, you can look at it this way.

And I preached on Sunday night a couple of weeks ago in Greenfield and I went over this first John, the epistle of first John chapter one, there's like a test of fellowship. So we could say this. We know that someone is of God when they love the people of God.

The people of this world don't love Christians. That's the, that's the kind of the vibe I'm getting. I don't know. Is that, is that an accurate thing? Living in Western Massachusetts, you kind of feel that.

So the world doesn't really love us, but it's that much more important in this place, in this time that we show kindness and love for one another. So we should ask ourselves, how are we treating Christ?

How do you treat Christ? So what do you mean? He's not here. If he was here, I'd be, I'd be waiting on him hand and foot. If Christ were here, think about that. If he were here, what would you do for him?

The Christian's answer would be, I'd do whatever he wanted, right? Well, okay. Are we fulfilling that with one another? Are we serving one another? Are we there to help one another? Because you can't separate Christ from his people.

Here's a verse, Acts 11 26. You can make a note of this if you don't have this memorized. Something happened at Antioch. What was it? Believers were first called by this name in the city of Antioch. What was it?

Christians. Okay. So it says the disciples were first called Christians in Antioch. So now we bear his name. So whatever your name is, you know, you identify a certain way, maybe as an American, but our primary identity is what?

It's in Christ. So we are Christians. So hopefully that idea, all of this helps clarify what Jesus said here in Matthew chapter 10. So giving someone a cup of cold water, it's like you gave it to Christ, right?

Let's go through these verses a little more closely. Matthew 10 40 through 42. He who receives you receives me and he who receives me receives him who sent me. So basically just as God and Jesus are a package deal, so are Christ and his disciples.

If somebody rejects Christ, are they rejecting God? I think we talked about this last Sunday, how there's all sorts of people who say, well, I believe in God, but I don't believe in Christ or yeah, that there's a disconnect somewhere because God has revealed himself in the person of Christ.

He is the image of the invisible God. So to reject Christ is to reject God because Christ is the only God that exists in human form. So you can't disconnect God, the father from God, the son, but also you can't disconnect Christ from his disciples.

And that's what he's saying here in verse 40. So the immediate context here is for the disciples, for the apostles. I think we covered this a month or two ago, Hebrews three, one, it calls Jesus God's apostle.

We don't typically think of Jesus being an apostle, but he is God's apostle. So to accept Jesus is to accept who God to reject Jesus is to reject God. Very clear. But now it moves from that to, are you going to receive his disciples?

This is another thing I hear often for maybe, I don't know if it's this generation, if that's always been the case, but I've heard many professing Christians talk about how much they dislike the apostle Paul.

Who's heard this? Yeah. I mean, they have an issue with Paul. They don't like Paul, but I'm just saying if you reject Paul, who are you rejecting? Because Paul was Christ's messenger. You can't separate the two.

So here's an illustration. Think of the word ambassador. This is how we would understand it today. And I'm always really hesitant now these days to use like the government and the president as sort of an example, but try to follow me.

Basically the United States, we have ambassadors. So if an ambassador from the United States goes to a foreign country, their message is the president's message, right? That's the way it works. So to reject the message of the ambassador is to reject the president and the United States government.

Clear enough? Right. And how you were to treat that ambassador, I mean, this is the type of thing wars can be fought over. Let's say an ambassador came to a nation and he didn't come home, right? What you did to him, it's like you're doing to the whole country because you can't separate the two.

He is an official messenger. Well, that's the way the disciples were. However you view them, however you treat them, if you accept them and their message, reject them. It's like accepting or rejecting Christ himself.

And as I like to point out, you don't know anything about Jesus except what the apostles wrote in the New Testament scripture. So that's the primary context here. But you try to make application to today and it can be extended to believers today.

Who are the representatives of Christ today? Right now? Yeah, we are certainly collectively the church of Jesus Christ on earth. We are God's representatives. We are ambassadors. Now you personally, yeah, you can be seen that way because again, you are called by his name.

You are a what? A Christian. So that term has people debate what that means. Like a Christian is a little Christ or a Christian is of the party of Christ. However you define that. But you are called by his name.

So this is a very serious thing. How I talk, how I behave, I am representing Jesus and we can either represent him very well or poorly. And obviously this is a big problem. And this is what the world would say.

And I think to a degree they're right in some ways, not totally, but Christians, sometimes we don't represent Christ well. Well, that's, that's a criticism we need to sort of take to heart. So the application is for us.

We now represent Jesus because we are his people. So if you want fellowship with God, if you want fellowship with Christ, you do that by placing your faith in the Lord. You have fellowship with his church.

The church is the primary way we have fellowship and communion with Christ. We are told in Hebrews 10, 25, not to forsake the assembly. And we understand it's not the building. It's not this place necessarily.

It's not an institution as much as it's the people. I think as believers, we realize more and more, we realize we need one another. Isn't this something that came out of the COVID era, right? That people realize how much I need fellowship, how much I need interaction with other people, how valuable the church is because when people were told that they couldn't meet, of course, we didn't listen to that here and we're not going to listen the next time either.

By the way, just letting you know, I mean, unless they're really piling up bodies in the streets, then we'll see the danger. But the point is we need to gather. We need friends. We need fellowship. We need one another.

And by having fellowship with God's people, we're having fellowship with who? Yeah. By having fellowship with Christ and his people, we're having fellowship with Jesus. That's why communion was meant to be taken together.

I'm not against someone taking it, just two or three people where two or three are gathered together. There I am in the midst, Jesus said, but really communion, think about the word, it means fellowship.

You're supposed to do it together as a body and Christians would come together and have meals with one another. And it's just, it emphasizes the importance of the connection God has and Christ has with his people.

Now one of the difficulties is that some Christians, I think this is a complaint somebody might have, maybe not a complaint, but a challenge we'll say, they say, well, Jesus is easy to love. When I read about Jesus on the pages of scripture, he's easy to love.

God is easy to love. Knowing what Christ did for me, he's easy to love. Christians though are not as easy to love. Now, is that true? I think that's, that's probably true. But does that give us an excuse to say, well, I don't need to gather.

I don't need to have fellowship or, you know, the danger there is that you start thinking that maybe you're better than others. You might have a better testimony just as far as your walk, your walk might be more faithful than someone else.

But this isn't a contest, is it? Here's a few principles. The message of scripture is that Christ died for our sins and rose again. If we had been forgiven like that, then we should forgive like that.

So if there's some personal issue between you and a fellow believer, Hey, God has forgiven you of what? A few of your sins. Yes. Just the ones in the past, but the ones in the future, you know, you need to atone for them yourself.

Is that the way it works? No. The Lord has forgiven you of all your sins, past, present, and future. So if God has forgiven you like that, yeah, you should forgive others. Was that in the scripture reading, you know, when Peter asked how many times must I forgive Lord up to, up to seven times, I don't have to forgive this guy four or five, six, seven times.

Jesus is like, yeah, 70 times, seven, Peter, like forgive and forgive some more. Here's another thing. Yeah, it's true. There are some people that are hard to love all acknowledge. We had one guy used to attend here.

He says, some Christians, you have to love from a distance. I mean, you're not, again, you're not going to be best friends with every single person. I get it. But remember this, if you think there's another believer that's hard to love, you're not as easy to love as you think you are.

Okay, let's just, uh, I'll say that about myself, but, uh, you know, we all can have our moments, right? So we need to keep that in perspective, but hopefully we're seeing the message here that Christ is directly connected to his people.

Supporting Christ’s Messengers and Receiving Their Reward

Verse 41 and he who receives a profit in the name of a profit shall receive a profits reward. And he who receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man's reward.

One commentator puts it this way, verse 41, he says, we can share in the reward of God's servants by supporting them in their work, even seemingly insignificant works of kindness, like giving them a cup of cold water will be rewarded.

So the only way for a profit, cause he's talking about profits in verse 41, the only way for a profit to effectively minister is to have support from other people. You think the prophet Elijah and Elisha or even Peter and James and John, do you think they were working 40 to 60 hours a week at their job and just giving the Lord whatever they had left over?

No, I mean, they were full time in ministry and the only way they can do that, if they are supported by other people, what's the point, whatever reward they receive. And you have to imagine the profits would receive quite a reward.

Who else will be rewarded? Those who supported them, those who encouraged them, those who gave them a cup of cold water, even something as small as that. This is the way that God has set it up. He has set up the ministry in such a way where it only works when we're all working together.

No one man can do it. So you can take the greatest Christian preacher, the greatest Christian missionary, the greatest prophet, whatever reward he has, those who helped him and supported him, they shall share in that reward.

That's basically what the Lord is saying in verse 41. How would you have supported an apostle or an evangelist back in Bible times? You know, today we have hotels and, you know, restaurants and the primary, the easiest way to do it today is to give to their ministry.

But back then, that really wasn't what they were interested in. You could take them in, right? Take an apostle in, take a prophet in, you could feed them, you could encourage them, give them a place to stay for the night, support them in any way, even the cup of cold water.

And in doing so, you became a partaker in their ministry and by extension, a partaker of their reward. Hopefully that should make you look at it totally different. When you support a ministry, when you support even, you know, some of these, well, the missionaries we have on our list here, or just someone who's an evangelist going around preaching the word, you want to bless them because that's how God, he is using them to bless others.

Now, obviously people can take advantage of this and we're going to talk about that in a moment. Let's turn to 2 John right now, actually. But certainly for the true prophets and the true apostles, by blessing them, you're going to get a blessing yourself.

So the idea of God is connected, Christ is connected to his people. If you mess with God's people, what are you doing? You're messing with God. You could look at it that way. When the prophets of Baal opposed Elijah in the book of 2 Kings, or was it 1 Kings, who were they opposing?

They were opposing the Lord himself, right? So there is this direct connection. I think people today lose sight of this and people don't want to talk about this because of all those who take advantage of it.

Like I'm the man of God and you need to do whatever I say and give me money. Like that's what the guys on TV tend to do. So we kind of like back off from this truth, but it is a truth. Opposing a minister of the gospel, just take Paul as an example.

If you opposed Paul in the book of Acts, whose side were you on? You weren't just some concerned Christian with discernment. No, you were fighting on the devil's side, right? All right. So 2 John, you're in 2 John, so this is a short book and it talks about those who would take advantage of this.

2 John, it only has one chapter. Look at verse 7. John writes, for many deceivers have gone out into the world who do not confess Jesus Christ as coming in the flesh. This is a deceiver and an antichrist.

So what John is saying that there are people out there who are preaching and they're actually preaching the name of Jesus, but in fact they are antichrist. So they didn't go around saying, hey, we're against Jesus.

We're against Christ. Come and follow us in our rebellion. They didn't do that. Instead they undercut the person and work of the Lord. So he says, watch out for them. They are a deceiver and an antichrist.

And these false teachers back then were usually not connected to a local church. They were kind of itinerant preachers going from here to there. And that's typically what the false teachers do today. They will go, they'll kind of bounce around or they're online or on TV and they're often not connected to a local church.

But look at verse 8, you yourselves or look to yourselves that we do not lose those things which we worked for, that we might receive a full reward. Do you see that idea of receiving a reward? We need to make sure you're supporting the right, the right ministries.

Whoever transgresses verse 9 and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ, he does not have God. So you notice that if you don't have the true Jesus, what does that mean? You don't have the true God either.

He who abides in the doctrine of Christ has both the father and the son. Father and son, package deal. Verse 10, if anyone comes to you and does not bring this doctrine, so if they're not preaching the true doctrine of Christ, that Jesus was both truly man and truly God.

If they come and teach a different gospel of salvation by faith plus works, if they're not upholding the true person of Christ, his nature, his work. If anyone comes to you and they do not have that true doctrine, John says, do not receive him into your house nor greet him.

Why? For he who greets him or says, God bless you or welcomes them in, they share in his evil deeds. I mean, this is a very sober warning. So just as supporting Peter, James, John, Paul would cause you to receive a blessing, supporting a profit, you would share in that profits reward.

Well, what happens if you support a false teacher? I mean, you share in the curse. I mean, that's what he's saying. So we can either share in the blessing or share in the curse, or at the very least, you become a partaker of their evil deeds.

This is something that we need to take heed as they say that take heed to this message. So no one was ever blessed by giving a false teacher money. If people are deceived, they do it. No one is ever blessed by that.

So we cannot allow them in. And this was the message from a few weeks ago that we are, what did Jesus say? We are sheep living in the midst of what? Yeah, we're sheep in the midst of wolves. I think a lot of Christians are very trusting.

We have a good nature now that we've been born again. We want to kind of see the best in people. And that's a good thing, but we have to be wise, right? Wise as serpents, but harmless as doves. Because the wolves, what do they want to do?

Devour the flock. So these are some important truths. You cannot separate Christ from God. You cannot separate the Lord Jesus Christ from his people. But just as the Lord has his servants, the devil also has his servants.

And you really can't separate him from his messengers either. So you either become a partaker of Christ's reward or the alternative. So this same principle applies today. Christ being connected with his people.

I want to leave you with an application. How do I become a partaker of this reward? How do I receive this blessing from Christ? Well, believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shall be saved. Do you know this?

The most important thing that if there's anyone here, anyone listening on radio or internet, if you have never placed your faith in Jesus, there is no eternal reward except for the person who has trusted in Jesus.

What do we need to believe? Jesus was the son of God. He is the son of God. Born of a virgin. He came into this world and died on the cross for our sins. Our sins separate us from God. But Jesus died and paid that penalty.

And on the third day, he rose again. And it's trusting in him and his work. If you do that, you will receive a reward. You will receive, actually, it's a gift. And what is the gift? Forgiveness and everlasting life.

That's the first thing. But let's say you're saved and now that you have believed on Christ, you've been baptized, now you want to start serving God. Well, now what? Well, the Lord might call you to ministry.

I mean, God called me to ministry. I wasn't expecting it. The Lord calls many people to ministry. But even if you're not actually in full-time ministry, do you realize there's a way to become a partaker of the reward?

So how do you do that? Look at verse 41. He who receives a profit in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet's reward. You know, you think of some preachers that are out there. How many of you donate to some maybe more nationally known ministries?

Hopefully, you know, and I think this congregation has discernment where, you know, you're not giving your money to Benny Hinn or anything, you know. But if there's a faithful minister, and there are a few on television, thankfully, there are some nationally known people, you realize by giving money to that ministry, you partake of the reward.

The average person hears the gospel and sound doctrine because it's on TV or radio or internet. You know, that takes work. It takes money. So you, when you donate, when you partake, or the local church, you volunteer, you help out.

Whatever you do for the ministry, you are doing it for who? Christ. And then even on a lower level than that, just helping out a saint in need. Just giving someone a cup of cold water will by no means lose your reward.

Isn't that a blessing to know? One last thing. I just have a couple minutes left. One more Old Testament truth. You remember Abraham in Genesis chapter 12. What did the Lord say to Abram at this time?

He said, I will bless those who do what? I will bless those who bless you. And then he said something else. I will curse those who curse you. You know, this is one of those things where, again, living in this area, especially in this day and age, there's so much opposition to the ministry.

And there's so much opposition to us as Christians. And sometimes we could get that bitter attitude, right? These people are, they're blaspheming. They're using God's name in vain. They're opposing the work of the Lord.

And we can start to maybe get angry at what they're doing. And I think there is a righteous indignation that you should be angry. But you should feel sorry for them. This principle, Abraham, I will bless those who bless you.

But I will curse him who curses you. Really, they are heaping up curses for themselves by opposing the Lord and his work. But let's end with this last point, just about helping a brother. Now, we've covered Christ and the gospel and his connection with the Father and then prophets and preachers in the ministry.

But now this final statement, this final statement. Jesus says about those who would give a cup of cold water, who are they giving the cold water to? What does it say? One of these little ones. Do you see that?

Who are the little ones? Well, I mean, look around. There are those great men throughout history. Elijah was not a little one, okay? The apostle Paul was not a little one. I tend to look at it this way.

We're the little ones. Or it could be a new believer, could be a new convert. Even if it's the most, on a human level, the most insignificant person in the church, that man would look at and say, okay, they're a believer, but they're like way down at the bottom.

You know, that's not the way the Lord looks at it. Doesn't he love that person? So if you help them with their needs, if you would bless them, the low man on the totem pole, so to speak. Is there a reward to be had?

Yes, there is. So let me leave you with that. Find ways where you can serve one another. Find a Christian, find a saint where you can bless them. Maybe they're going through some hard things and you know about it.

Call them up, encourage them. If they have a need, fulfill that need. Christ says, I say to you, he shall by no means lose his reward. Let's close. And Lord, we thank you that you have loved us. And because you have loved us, stir us up to love one another.

And Lord, I just pray for each and every person listening. Again, if there's someone who has never placed their faith in Jesus, that they would do that today and to not put it off any longer. And Lord, for those who want to serve, maybe they can just see a ministry that's already going on and they can start volunteering or donating or helping out in some way.

And Lord, there's so many blessings that we can receive by following you, blessing you and blessing your people. But Lord, even if it's just someone we might consider just a random person who has a need, maybe they're only thirsty.

And you say, well, what difference would it make giving them a cup of cold water? Lord, give us this mind to love one another, to love you, to serve one another as we serve you. Serving God by serving others.

And we pray it all in Jesus name. Amen.