Whoever will not receive you will be met with a fate worse than that which befell Sodom and Gomorrah. Hospitality was a prized virtue among the Hebrew people. Not only was it a noble display of character (Abraham and Lot were smiled upon favorably by the Lord because of their hospitality to strangers [cf. Genesis 18:1ff, 19:1ff], it was also a requirement of the law. God commands the Israelites to practice hospitality as a means of thanking God for liberating them from the hands of their Egyptian masters (cf. Exodus 22:20; Leviticus 19:34; Deuteronomy 24:17-18).
In our Gospel reading today, Jesus sends the twelve men he had appointed as apostles on mission. And in order for them to reach out to as many people as possible, they were to travel light. They were not to be encumbered by unnecessary distractions such as thinking about where their next meal was going to come from or where they were going to shelter for the night. As was their custom, it was expected that they would be shown hospitality by the people to whom they were going to preach. Moreover, part of the ‘Good News” they were sent to proclaim was forming one family of God out of the many tribes and races. As members of a single family of God, they were to expect hospitable treatment from their hosts.
But even as Jesus sent the twelve with the hope that they would be received and treated hospitably by their hosts, he was also aware that the apostles could be met with rejection because of their message. The values of the kingdom that Jesus wanted the people to embody and live (love, kindness, forgiveness, sharing) posed a threat to those who were benefitting from unjust practices. If the apostles happened to be rejected, they were to move on but only after leaving a clear message to those who rejected them: unless they changed their ways, they were headed for the fate that befell Sodom and Gomorrah.
We all know of what happened to the two cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. We also know that their annihilation was hastened by the treatment they accorded Lot’s visitors (angels of God). By demanding that Lot allow them to commit unnatural acts with the visitors, they transgressed against the law of hospitality. A visitor is among the vulnerable members of the society who were close to God’s heart. A mistreatment of a visitor was thus a direct insult to God and was therefore not tolerated. However, the punishment for those who would reject the apostles would be worse since not only would they be failing to reciprocate God’s hospitable treatment toward them, but they would also be rejecting the word of God.