He that receives you receives me, and he that receives me receives him that sent me.
Jesus is sending His twelve disciples into a world that will not welcome them, and He ends His instructions by tying their welcome to His own, and His own to the Father's. So what is a person doing when he opens or shuts his door to a servant of Christ?
The messengers carry the testimony of a Lord the world has rejected. A welcome given to them travels much further than the doorstep.
Whoever received this testimony, in the person of the disciples, received Christ, and, in Christ, Him who sent Him. So God was acknowledged in the person of His witnesses on earth, and He would give a reward to whoever received them, a reward matching the testimony they carried. Whoever acknowledged the testimony of the rejected Lord in this way — even if only by giving a cup of cold water — would not lose his reward. In a world set against Him, whoever believes God's testimony and welcomes the man who carries it confesses God as well as His servant. The rejection of Christ made Him a test, a touchstone.
The disciples had no standing of their own. Their weight at a village door came from the One who sent them.
It is like the Lord's own words, "Whoever receives you receives me" (Matt. 10:40). The power given on earth represents the authority that stands behind it.
Set beside other sayings of Jesus about being for Him or against Him, this verse leaves the hearer no third option.
"Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters." (Luke 11:23.) Here there is no room for indifference or neutrality... In all these passages there is not the slightest hint of neutrality... We must be either against the Lord or for Him. We must receive Him or reject Him. We must be either gathering with Him or scattering.
If receiving reaches all the way up, so does refusing. Samuel, a prophet in Israel, learned this when the people refused his message.
To reject a servant whom the Lord has truly sent out, who is doing His will and standing for Him, is to reject the Lord Himself... In exactly the same way the Lord Jesus identified Himself with His disciples... Blessed is the servant who, by grace, is so hidden behind his Lord that he is taken up with the Lord's aims and interests, and thinks only of HIS honour and HIS claims. Such a servant will understand, as Samuel did, that when people refuse his message they are rejecting God's word and not his own.
The principle is not aimed only at outsiders. Believers can dishonour the Lord by how they handle the person He has sent them.
Even believers are sometimes very unwise in the way they criticize the message, or the man himself, when the Lord has sent him to press the truth of His word on consciences and hearts. It is not right to flatter a man because he is the Lord's servant. But it is also very wrong to treat him with disrespect, for in this we show our disrespect for the Lord.
Does the promise depend on the messenger turning out well? Judas was one of the twelve, and he betrayed the Lord.
Did Judas betray the Lord? That sealed his own doom, but it did not touch the authority or the grace of Christ, or of God Himself. If they received someone Christ had sent, whatever his end turned out to be, they received the Son, and so the Father. They did not share in the guilt or danger of the punishment of a servant who dishonoured his Master to his own ruin.
The tone here is encouragement, not pressure. So what place should reward have?
What wonderful dignity there is in verse 40, and how wonderful the Lord's rewards are! They are rewards of grace, but they are not held out as motives. The motive should be the glory of God and love for Christ.
The next two verses keep stepping down the scale.
It is very sweet that the disciples are called "little ones." There is a step-by-step order in verses 40-42: first, Himself; then a prophet — one who reaches the conscience and brings the soul into the presence of God; then the righteous man; and last, the one who gives a cup of cold water to one of these little ones... Where love to Christ moves the heart to show even the least possible kindness, the Lord will not forget it.
- Chain. Welcome the messenger and you welcome Christ. Welcome Christ and you welcome the Father who sent Him. One line runs from a doorstep to God.
- Authority. The messenger has nothing of his own. The power given to him on earth stands for the authority behind it.
- Choice. The chain forces a decision. Receive Him or reject Him. There is no neutral ground.
- Warning. The chain runs backwards too. Refuse a servant the Lord has sent, and you refuse the Lord. Disrespect for His messenger is disrespect for Him.
- Reward. The chain reaches down to a cup of cold water. The Lord remembers the smallest kindness done out of love for Him. The reward is grace, never the motive.
He that receives a prophet in the name of a prophet, shall receive a prophet's reward; and he that receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man, shall receive a righteous man's reward.
The Lord turns from His messengers to the people who open their doors to them. A welcome given to God's servant, He says, earns the same reward as the service itself.
The phrase points to the reason behind the welcome, not to any formula spoken over it. One writer tests it against a man who hosted Jesus without ever treating Him as a prophet:
Also, if one receives a prophet in the name of a prophet, that is, as a prophet, he will receive a prophet's reward. He takes to heart God's message sent by a prophet. So he will receive a reward like that of the prophet who speaks faithfully for God. If he receives a righteous man as a righteous man, that puts him in the class of righteous man, and so he will receive a reward. If he receives him with ulterior motives, that would be quite different, of course. Simon the Pharisee received the Lord into his house (Luke 7:36), but not as a prophet (vv. 3, 34), though he admitted He was a teacher (v. 40).
Another writer weighs the exact wording used here:
A remarkable use of this is in Matthew 10:41, "in the name of a prophet." Here the phrase is not the warrant for receiving him. It marks the place he is received into — the honour due to a prophet.
A prophet here is more than someone who announces the future. One writer traces the order of verses 40 to 42, starting with Christ Himself and working down:
There is a gradation in verses 40-42. First, Himself. Then a prophet — one who reaches the conscience. He is not merely someone who foretells future events, but one who brings the soul into the presence of God… Then one who is not a prophet: if he has a heart for a prophet, he will receive the reward as if he were a prophet. It shows that it is all of grace. Then again the righteous man, and he receives the seal of righteousness.
The verse extends a principle the Lord had just laid down about Himself and His messengers:
Then He identifies Himself in the fullest way with those He sent out: "he that receives you receives Me, and he that receives Me receives Him that sent Me." This principle He now extends beyond those He is addressing… That is, where mind and heart identify someone with the prophet or the righteous man, God will identify him too. The receiver of a prophet shall be blessed with the prophet.
If welcoming a servant counts as welcoming the Lord, then turning one away counts too. One writer draws that line, and adds a test that stops it from meaning we must trust anyone who claims to be sent:
When God sends a messenger He is pleased to identify Himself with His servant… This is a solemn thing for the people of God. The reverse is also true: if a man refuses one whom the Lord has truly sent, he refuses the Lord in the person of His servant. This does not mean we should receive everyone who claims to be sent by God. The test is, do such people speak the words of God? (John 3:34.)
One writer describes a woman in Israel who took a prophet in for the sake of the God who sent him:
She received a prophet because of Him who had sent him, because he was a holy man of God — and she did it with humility and complete self-forgetfulness. So she received a prophet's reward: the gift most precious to a Jewish mother, which she had not dared to hope for, even when she first heard the news.
- Receive as. The reward hangs on what you see the person to be: welcoming a prophet as a prophet, a righteous man as a righteous man. Motives change everything.
- Received into. The words describe the place you give him — the honour due to a prophet — not a formula you use to secure a blessing.
- Received by God. Where your heart goes out to the messenger, God links you with him. His blessing reaches you too.
- All of grace. The one who is no prophet, but has a heart for one, receives the reward as if he were one. Nobody earns this; God gives it.
- Refused, and refused. The principle cuts both ways: turning away a true messenger turns away the Lord. The test is whether he speaks the words of God.
And whosoever shall give to drink to one of these little ones a cup of cold [water] only, in the name of a disciple, verily I say unto you, he shall in no wise lose his reward.
Matthew 10 closes a discourse full of hard things: messengers among wolves, families divided, a cross to carry. It ends on a cup of water, and the point is not how much a person gives but who the receiver belongs to.
The ESV reads "because he is a disciple." Older translations render the phrase "in the name of a disciple." The wording is unusual in Greek, and it does not mean acting by someone's authority. It means welcoming a person as what he is.
In Matthew 10:41-42 we have the unusual phrase of receiving a prophet, a righteous man, and a disciple, "unto" each one's respective name, or as such. In English it is perhaps hard to avoid saying "in the prophet's name"; but it means receiving each one as such, and not acting in the power or authority of each, as in Christ's name.
So the cup goes to him because he is a disciple.
Verses 40 to 42 move down a ladder — Christ Himself, then a prophet, then a righteous man, then a "little one" — and the reward keeps pace at every step.
It is very sweet that the disciples are called "little ones."… There is a gradation in verses 40-42. First, Himself. Then a prophet — one who reaches the conscience, not simply someone who foretells future events, but one who brings the soul into the presence of God. Then one who is not a prophet: if he has a heart for a prophet, he shall receive the reward as if he were a prophet. It shows that it is all of grace. Then again, the righteous man, and he receives the seal of righteousness. And lastly, whoever gives one of these little ones even a cup of cold water… We may gather from this 42nd verse that many things will be rewarded — things done unknowingly, or thought too small to be worth noticing.
A cup of water counts because the Lord never separates Himself from His people. His name rests on them.
Our blessed Lord fully identifies Himself with His people. His name is put upon them. It is also entrusted to them to carry, so that they maintain His honour before men. So to receive a Christian in the name of Christ is to receive Christ Himself. And to receive Christ is to receive Him who sent Him… Whatever is done for His own is kindness shown to His name.
The cup of water is not the point in itself. It is evidence of something already at work inside.
It would be the evidence that the Spirit was at work in his soul — his heart drawn out in mercy toward those who are of God in this world, and in sympathy with them. He should in no way lose his reward. It is the outward conduct springing from the inward principle.
Nothing here promises repayment now. The Lord settles the account later, at His judgment seat.
Reward is never an adequate motive for the saint. But it is set before faith as an encouragement to be true to the Lord. On the other hand, the unfaithful will lose it. The kingdom is the sphere where the Lord will take account of both, when everything is brought to light at His judgment seat… Even a cup of cold water given to one of the Lord's little ones in the name of a disciple will not be forgotten in that day. What a Lord we have to serve! Who but He would think of recognising anything of such little account?
Because the Lord promises a reward, it is easy to start calculating. But the two motives are not the same, and they do not end the same way.
Love rewards, but working for reward and working for love are entirely distinct. The labourer in the vineyard who worked for his penny gained his penny, but he did not obtain the smile of his master. It is the Christian's happy privilege to work for love. It will be the joy of the Master to remember every service.
- Name. The cup goes to the man as a disciple, because he belongs to Christ.
- Link. Christ has tied His own name to His people, so kindness shown to them is kindness shown to Him.
- Grace. The scale runs down from Christ to the smallest "little one," and the reward keeps pace. It rests on grace, not on the size of the service.
- Evidence. The outward cup of water shows an inward work; the Spirit moves the heart before the hand moves.
- Day. The reward waits for the judgment seat, where even forgotten acts come to light. Love, not the reward, makes service a joy now.