Sermon Tone Analysis

December 13, 2015

*Read Lu 14:7-11 *– A faithful parishioner asked his pastor, “Doesn’t it make you nervous preaching on sin with all those experts sitting out there in the congregation?”

The answer should be, “No, because I know the worst sinner is standing in the pulpit.”

If you knew what I know about me, and I what you know about you, we’d know!

It’s critical we see ourselves as God sees us.

That drives a humility that is key to heaven and holy living.

Isaiah

James 4:6: “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.”

It is important to be humble – not the “Aw shucks, it was nothing” kind – but a humility that sees God for who He really is and me for who I really am.

Isaiah was a brilliant, court-educated, spiritually responsive man.

But when he saw God “high and lifted up”, his response was amazing: “Woe is me!

For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips” (Isa 6:5).

That’s humility.

And God doesn’t say, “You’re not so bad, Isaiah.

In fact, you’re the best one around.”

Rather God accepted that confession and sent an angel with a burning coal to touch his lips saying “your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for” (Isa 6:6).

We know ourselves when we see ourselves as God does.

Setting

That’s what Jesus is trying to show the Pharisees here.

Remember the setting.

Jesus goes to Sabbath lunch by a leading Pharisee.

But it’s a setup.

A sick man has been invited in hopes Jesus will heal him so they can accuse Jesus of violating the Sabbath.

Jesus thwarts that effort by showing their hypocrisy.

They give themselves waivers to help their own animals on the Sabbath, but object to healing a terribly afflicted man.

They are left with no response.

Parable

But Jesus isn’t done.

V. 7, “ Now he told a parable to those who were invited.”

If they have no further response, He does.

So he tells a parable.

Now many teach that Jesus is instructing against being too forward, a sort of commentary on Prov 27:2, “Let another praise you, and not your own mouth.”

But while that is true, that is not the main point of Jesus’ teaching.

This is a “parable” -- a physical illustration of a deeper spiritual truth.

V 11 is key: “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Jesus hammers that principle home relentlessly in Luke’s gospel.

It warns against the natural self-justification that plagues all of us.

The Pharisees, who considered themselves better than others, desperately needed to understand this, just as we do.

We are all Pharisees at heart.

Born that way.

And Jesus is teaching for entrance to God’s kingdom, something has to change.

So – the simple parable and the spiritual point.

*I.

The Simple Parable*

V. 7 tells us what drove this parable.

Jesus had seen something when He first arrived.

“7 Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed how they chose the places of honor.”

Jesus’ audience for is “those who were invited” to the party – His comments sparked by the scramble for seating He’d seen earlier.

In that He saw human nature in need of transformation!

*A.

Human Tendency*

In those days at a formal occasion, people didn’t sit at table as we do.

They reclined on couches around a table.

Normally each table would have four such couches, one on each side.

One’s rank was reflected by where he was seated.

Top honor was accorded the host who reclined in the middle seat of the host couch.

The most honored guest reclined to his right and the next to his left – all at the “head” couch, so to speak.

The couch to the left included positions 4-6, to the right, 7-9; and the couch at the foot included positions 10-12.

Other tables in decreasing order of honor were included depending on the size of the gathering.

Seating order determined one’s position in the pecking order.

Now, human nature takes over.

V. 7, “They chose the places of honor.”

They had no place cards, you see.

The host had a seating order in his head, but without place cards, early arrivers sat as high as they dared, assuming possession is 9/10’s of the law and hoped they’d get to stay.

A guy might know he could never be #2 in this crowd, but nothing stopped him from trying for number 4. So he subtly slid in just ahead of someone else heading for that spot.

Everyone was seeking to be near the host, or to be near someone else who could benefit them in some way.

It was the first century version of ladder climbing as everyone hoped, over time, to gain better and better positions.

Humility in this setting would have been considered a sign of weakness.

This was the kind of infighting Jesus had observed that suggested His parable.

So Jesus addresses this natural inclination to self-promotion.

Vv. 8-9: “When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast (Jesus uses “wedding feast” for His example instead of dinner party – introducing the subject with sensitivity and a hope that they will hear), do not sit down in a place of honor, lest someone more distinguished than you be invited by him, 9 and he who invited you both will come and say to you, ‘Give your place to this person,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place.”

We all exaggerate our own importance.

Adlai Stevenson ran for president against Ike in 1952.

He was considered an intellectual.

To check it out, on a taxi ride to an airport, he said to the cabbie, “People say I talk over the head of the average man.

What do you think?”

The cabbie replied, “Well, Governor, I understand you all right, -- but I’m not sure about the average man.”

No one wants to be average, right?

We naturally exaggerate our importance, seeking honor!

And we get very clever about it.

Remember Senator Sam Irvin who chaired the Watergate committee.

He looked every bit the good-ole-boy country lawyer.

But Howard Baker, the ranking Republican member later wrote, “When Sam reaches the point where he refers to himself as ‘just a poor old country lawyer from North Carolina,’ I am motivated to do two things.

First, out of reflex action, I put my hand on my wallet; then, I gently remind him that while he may consider himself to be just a poor old country lawyer, he is also an honor graduate of Harvard Law School.

That’s when Chairman Sam raises his magnificent eyebrows, cocks his head, beams his benign smile and whispers, “Yes, Howard, but nobody can tell it.”

There’s pride in disguise.

Another way of seeking honored places at the table.

But Jesus knew the more we self-promote, the more vulnerable we are.

He had a better way.

*B.

Humbling Transformation*

10 But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’

Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you.”

Try a little humility.

The Greek philosophers and ancient people in general would never have given this advice.

Humility is a stricly Christian concept.

Jesus is saying, “You should try it; you might be surprised.”

Actually, it’s interesting Jesus’ had to give this advice to supposed Law experts.

The advice comes straight out the OT they claim to revere: Prov 25:6-7 “Do not put yourself forward in the king’s presence or stand in the place of the great, 7 for it is better to be told, “Come up here,” than to be put lower in the presence of a noble.”

Note, Jesus does not say, “Go and sit in a lower place.”