Dinner with a Debtor

This week’s meal and last weeks have some similarities. Both stories contain some of the same characters- Pharisee’s, sinners, and Jesus. It even has some of the same themes, but it also takes last week’s ideas and concepts a little further, as we will see.

This week’s meal and last weeks have some similarities. Both stories contain some of the same characters- Pharisee’s, sinners, and Jesus. It even has some of the same themes, but it also takes last week’s ideas and concepts a little further, as we will see.

This week’s meal and last weeks have some similarities. Both stories contain some of the same characters- Pharisee’s, sinners, and Jesus. It even has some of the same themes, but it also takes last week’s ideas and concepts a little further, as we will see.

Jesus finds himself at a house belonging to a man named Simon- a Pharisee. Last week Jesus found himself eating with the sinners and tax collectors while the Pharisees and Scribes cast judgement- but this week is different, this time the Pharisee is the host. I also wonder what the motivation for this dinner is- because I think that Luke uses words intentionally. Last week Matthew- the sinner- held a dinner for Jesus to meet with his friends. This week Luke says that Simon invited Jesus to have dinner with him- I wonder if their hearts were after 2 different things....

So Jesus finds himself reclining at a table and a women who was, as the text says, a “sinner” comes to him. Now, this is some coded language because most of the time when the Bible says that a woman is a sinner what it means is that she is a prostitute. Now, some things never change, and one of the things that has never changed across generation on this Earth is the public opinions of prostitution- so you can imagine how people probably felt about this woman.

Women in these days were known to wear jars of perfume around their necks on strings. These were most likely the most valuable possession of the women that wore them. Perfume was not cheap, and was not to be used haphazardly. So, the woman’s next action is quite astounding.

When people reclined at a table in ancient times it was not in a chair like we do now. No, the table was much lower to the ground, and reclining at it meant leaning forward on your left arm and extending your feet away from the table while leaning on your side. So Jesus’ feet were easily accessible to the woman and she begins to anoint Jesus’ feet with the perfume around her neck.

That weird! We might say- who anoints feet?!? We anoint quite often here at Mt Zion- but not FEET, we anoint people on the head. Well, this store has some of the same images as footwashing- an act of humility. When a person entered your home you provided water for them to clean and wash their feet from the dirty dusty roads in their time- it is the equivalent of offering them a drink or other kind of hospitality in our day. Now, if you were a slave this was part of your duty, you were the one to wash the feet of the people coming into the home. So, this woman washing Jesus’ feet is a sign of humility, a sign of her awareness of her need Jesus. Ok, so let’s think about this for a moment- too many times I think we lean to heavy to what I call the buddy-buddy theology of Jesus. We often talk of Jesus our closest and best-est friend, we encourage people to talk to Jesus like they are talking to their friend, their mom, or their brother…and there is a lot of blessing in this theology. Jesus is certainly my best friend, my closest partner, and the knower of all my heart and there are moments and seasons in my life when I need to approach Jesus as such. However, Jesus is not just my best friend or my buddy buddy- he is the maker of the heavens and the Earth, the sustainer of all things, and God in the flesh. There are times that we need to walk hand in hand with Jesus, and there are times when, like the woman, we need to humble ourselves and anoint his feet!

So, this woman was overcome with emotion when she realized who was sitting at that table. The emotion that she feels overwhelms her and she begins to cry..her tears run down her cheeks and find themselves falling on the feet of Jesus. She is so grateful, so overwhelmed with love, appreciation…might we even say worship? That she cannot fight back her tears.

Simon, good pious, holy Simon the Pharisee starts to wonder- if this man is a prophet, why would he allow THAT woman to be touching him? And I love Jesus’ question to Simon- never forget there is deep power in the questions that Jesus asks, and I think he asks this question on purpose with the particular words for a reason.... “Simon, do you see this woman?” Did he? Did he SEE the woman?

I know I have said this before, but I want to say it again, when God sees you he dose not see your sin- he sees his child. You see, Jesus and Simon were looking at the same woman, but they were seeing 2 completely different things.

Simon sees sin, Jesus sees love…

Simon sees something disgusting, Jesus sees something redeemable

Simon sees something shameful, Jesus sees something beautiful

So, when you see someone who is “sinful” what do you see?

Brandon Heath wrote a song a few years ago that got pretty big on Christian Radio, it was called “Give me Your Eyes” and the chorus went like this:

Give me your eyes for just one second Give me your eyes so I can see, Everything that I keep missing, Give your love for humanity. Give me your arms for the broken-hearted The ones that are far beyond my reach. Give me Your heart for the ones forgotten. Give me Your eyes so I can see.

I want to have eyes like Jesus- I want to see people like he does. I want a different kind of view of people. The other day I was walking along Court Square in Harrisonburg and there was a man standing on the side of the street with a sign asking for money. Now, I will admit to you I normally do not give money to people on the street. I give money to the Salvation Army and the Local Warm shelter- but I do not make it a habit to give cash to people on the side of the road- one of the main reasons is because I do not carry a lot of cash. Normally I am in my car when I see these folks, but on this day I was walking and I looked up and read his sign quickly already making up my mind that I was not going to give this man any money. But as I got closer I looked up from the sign and locked eyes with this man and my heart changed- I wondered what kind of man was in those eyes. A dad? A husband? A broken human being? I did not have much, but I gave him a few dollars.

As I walked away I wondered how often I do this in my life and how often we do this as people- we never look past the sign. Not just the literal signs that people are holding, but the metaphorical ones as well. We all wear signs. Can I tell you that I experienced that a few weeks ago as a pastor? That’s a sign that I wear, right? Most people know me as “Pastor Jon” and I love that! But sometimes people forget that pastors are people too. I was sharing with some folks that I was having some worries about some things that were happening in my life and their response was “Wow, I didn’t think pastors were allowed to worry” and they were 100% serious. Sometimes we do not look past the signs- pastor, liar, divorcee, teenage mom- Jesus always looks past the signs.

Jesus then flips the script on Simon one more time- and creates this parable about a man who was forgiven debts. One debt was huge 500 denari and the other not so big- 50. Jesus asks Simon who is going to love the forgiver more- the one with the bigger debt of course!

Friends, many of us have prayed that we would love like Jesus, anyone here ever prayed that before? But Jesus links love and forgiveness together in this passage, and reminds us that it is impossible to love like Jesus unless we forgive like Jesus too. How about you? Is there someone in your life you need to forgive? I am not talking about little forgiveness- they lied to me or they said something bad about me. I am talking about RADICAL forgiveness. Jesus operates in both.