Luke 14 1 and 7-14 SermCentral 2

At the Banquet by Jason Hefner

Luke 14:1-14:15

Text: Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16
Luke 14:1-15
Date: September 2, 2001
By: Jason R. Hefner

Hebrews 13 Let mutual love continue. 2 Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it. 3 Remember those who are in prison, as though you were in prison with them; those who are being tortured, as though you yourselves were being tortured. 4 Let marriage be held in honor by all, and let the marriage bed be kept undefiled; for God will judge fornicators and adulterers. 5 Keep your lives free from the love of money, and be content with what you have; for he has said, “I will never leave you or forsake you.” 6 So we can say with confidence,
“The Lord is my helper;
I will not be afraid.
What can anyone do to me?”
7 Remember your leaders, those who spoke the word of God to you; consider the outcome of their way of life, and imitate their faith. 8 Jesus Christ is the same yesterday and today and forever. 15 Through him, then, let us continually offer a sacrifice of praise to God, that is, the fruit of lips that confess his name. 16 Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.

Luke 14 On one occasion when Jesus was going to the house of a leader of the Pharisees to eat a meal on the sabbath, they were watching him closely. 2 Just then, in front of him, there was a man who had dropsy. 3 And Jesus asked the lawyers and Pharisees, “Is it lawful to cure people on the sabbath, or not?” 4 But they were silent. So Jesus took him and healed him, and sent him away. 5 Then he said to them, “If one of you has a child or an ox that has fallen into a well, will you not immediately pull it out on a sabbath day?” 6 And they could not reply to this.
7 When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, he told them a parable. 8 “When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, do not sit down at the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited by your host; 9 and the host who invited both of you may come and say to you, ‘Give this person your place,’ and then in disgrace you would start to take the lowest place. 10 But when you are invited, go and sit down at 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 the table with you. 11 For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”
12 He said also to the one who had invited him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, in case they may invite you in return, and you would be repaid. 13 But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. 14 And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”15 One of the dinner guests, on hearing this, said to him, “Blessed is anyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!”

Sitting down together to eat is one of the basic building blocks of social convention. Whether we want a serious conversation, simply a good time, to talk romance or business, the setting of a meal is appropriate. In fact, sometimes there seems no good way to really bond with someone other than over a meal, or at least a cup of coffee.

This was equally true in ancient cultures. Jesus has been invited by one of the leaders of the Pharisees to share a meal. This is not the first time Jesus has been a guest at someone’s table. In fact, Luke relates to us several stories of Jesus sitting at table – in chapter 5, 7, and 11. In each instance it becomes an occasion for teaching:

- It is not those who are well who need a physician, but those who are sick. I have not come to call the righteous, but the sinners. New wine, requires new wineskins. (ch. 5)
- He who is forgiven little, loves little. (ch. 7)
- Your Pharisees wash the outside of the cup, but neglect the inside. It is not what enters a person’s mouth that makes them unclean, but what comes out. (ch. 11)

The table, in Luke’s gospel, is not a random or accidental setting. They serve as pivot points. It is a deliberate mechanism to prepare us to listen to Jesus as a teacher. However, what we have to notice is that every meal setting is an occasion for conflict. Jesus constantly sets himself in opposition to his host or the other guests by challenging their assumptions about God, true righteousness, and the nature of his ministry. In fact it was at the last meal, in chapter 11, that Luke tells us that the scribes and Pharisees began to be very hostile toward Jesus and began looking for ways to trap him in something he might say.

So let us re-imagine this dinner setting. Perhaps you’ve been to a dinner, where the civility is over-accentuated to compensate for the fact that everyone suspects things might get testy. Everyone is being extra polite. Luke tells us, the Pharisees were watching Jesus closely. All that is needed is for someone to say or do something wrong and this whole dinner is likely to take a dramatic downturn.

Enter a man with dropsy. Was he a guest? Not likely. Dropsy, or what we commonly called edema today, was a swelling condition closely associated in the Jewish mind with leprosy and therefore viewed as making the man ceremonially unclean. He was certainly not invited, in fact the guests would have distanced themselves from him. The man neither speaks nor approaches. But Jesus sees he is suffering. This is the catalyst for the conflict that we have been expecting. Now we have all the ingredients for an explosion: Jesus, Pharisees, Sabbath, healing, table.

Jesus has the opportunity to heal someone on the Sabbath. He has healed on the Sabbath before, but always at the cost of extreme confrontation with the Pharisees. It is not that the Pharisees were coldhearted or cruel. They were simply protective of the holiness of the Sabbath. If a person had a chronic illness – like dropsy – he or she could be healed on a Tuesday. Any other day would be preferable, simply to stay clear of possibly invading the Sabbath. But Jesus isn’t interested in qualifications. Jesus poses the question point blank to his host and fellow guests: Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?

They make no reply. At their silence Jesus takes hold of the man, heals him, and sends him away. Jesus poses his question again, this time obviously baiting the lawyers with his quotation of the law. When a room full of lawyers and teachers is quiet you know something is wrong. The tension of the moment is the key to understanding the importance what Jesus is about to begin teaching.

Luke has set the stage for us to understand that the teaching that Jesus is about to offer is more than just customary wisdom. It is not polite dinner conversation. We are being asked by Luke to hear a greater and deeper truth than simply how to manipulate social circumstances.

The danger is to suppose that Jesus’ words are merely commonsensical etiquette of the day. The book of Proverbs (25:6) certainly comes to mind Do not put yourself forward in the king’s presence or stand in the place of the great; for it is better to be told, “come up here” than to be put lower in the presence of the prince. But Jesus is not simply re-iterating Proverbs. Jesus is saying something altogether more challenging.

Throughout Luke’s gospel we are surprised by the divine reversal of values that Jesus embodies and teaches. He takes the values of this world and stands them on their head. The poor are blessed, the first will be last, and here, everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted. It is not the appropriate way to get exalted that Jesus is addressing, but the frame of mind that seeks exaltation in any fashion. Jesus is making a parody of “good advice” , he is using worldly wisdom as a foil to demonstrate that the kingdom of God operates in wholly other fashion.

Human wisdom seeks to appear humble “in the eyes of others” as a way to guarantee honor. But God will ultimately expose every intention of the heart and God will assign true honor to those who deserve it: those who are willing to set honor and possessions aside all together.

Jesus gives a command in v. 12. He issues an imperative to his host, Stop! Stop inviting your friends and relatives and the wealthy or anyone who can repay you in any way. Stop using whatever power you have, whether it is economic or social, to gain more benefit for yourself. Stop measuring every expenditure so that it comes back to you someday. Stop evaluating interactions with other people based on maintaining or improving your own comfort zone. Instead use what you have and who you are to bless others- especially those who cannot return the favor: like the blind, the lame and crippled, the poor. Then you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous. It should be clear by now, that Jesus does not fit in well with our expected social patterns.

This world is a banquet – it is a feast of opportunities to exalt ourselves and gratify our lusts for possessions and power. This we are tempted to do as much to please ourselves as to be admired by others. If that is what we want, if that is what we think is important, then that will be what we get.

Jesus tells us there must be a reversal in our lives. That is what conversion to Christ is. The values of the kingdom of God must, in our lives, trump the values with which this world seeks to delight and ensnare us.

Every day we are offered the opportunity to humble ourselves – and not just privately – but for another person. Certainly there are blind and lame and poor in our society. But lets start closer to home, in our everyday world. At work, would you be willing to fill up a subordinates coffee? Or clean up after a meeting so that someone else doesn’t have to? What about letting an inconsiderate person go ahead and have the spot in line they cut – especially during lunch hour or just before the movie starts? We all have interactions with people when their attitude makes them difficult - instead of reacting to them or reproving them, could you simply take it in, as if you were in the wrong?

We could be taken advantage of or disrespected! Yes. In fact, that is likely to happen. This is the example Christ has given us with his own life. Paul tells us in Philippians that although Christ was one with God, he humbled himself and took the form of a servant – even submitting himself to death on the cross. Yes, on a cross, as if he were wrong. Every day Jesus humbled himself and emptied himself out of love for us and to provide for our need: We who mistakenly seat ourselves in a places of honor. This is what divine love looks like. It denies itself for another person.

Let anyone who would follow me, says Jesus, take up their cross daily and come. It is our pride that must be checked, it must be set aside and it must be set aside for another person with no guarantee that they will treat us in like manner. Until we begin to desire more the kingdom of God than the kingdom of this world, we will be fearful of the cross and what it demands of us. If we resent and fear the cross it will be a burden to us, sapping the joy out of life. However, if we will embrace it, it will itself become our only comfort in this world and our salvation in the life to come.

Jesus would not ask you to do this if there were a better or easier way to know him and he wouldn’t ask you to do this if he hadn’t done it himself. Blessed indeed are all those who will east bread in the kingdom of heaven!