Volume 47 No. 27
Luke 14:1-24 Txt. Luke 14:12-14
Sermon prepared by Rev. Jim Vander Laan, Grand Rapids Mi.
Proposed Order of Service
Call to worship
Prelude
Leader: Jesus said "I am the resurrection
and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though
he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never
die. Do you believe this?"
People: Yes Lord, we believe that you are the Christ, the Son
of God who was to come into the world. (from John 11: 25-27)
Leader: Grace and peace to you in the name of God, the Father,
the Son and the Holy Spirit.People: Amen.
Psalter Hymnal #246:1-4 "Come Thou Almighty King"
Confession of Faith
Leader: Together with the Church universal let
us confess our Christian faith in the words of the Apostles'
Creed
People: The Apostles Creed in unison
Psalter Hymnal #508:1-5 "Jesus, with Your Church Abide"
The Word of God
Scripture Reading : Luke 14:
1-24 Text Luke 14:12-14
Prayer for the illumination of the Holy Spirit
Sermon: "People with Disabilities Dine with Jesus"
Psalter Hymnal #501, 1, 3, 5, 6 "Oh, for
a Thousand Tongues to Sing"
The Prayers and Gifts of the People
Congregational prayer
The Offering
Departure from Worship
Psalter Hymnal #319:1-4 "Savior, Again to
Your Dear Name We Raise"
Leader: People of God, rejoice in the Lord always. I will say
again: Rejoice! Let your gentleness be evident to all. The Lord
is near. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything,
by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests
to God. And the peace of God, which transcends all understanding,
will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (Phil.
4: 4-7)
Psalter Hymnal #453:1-2 "Let All Things Now Living"
Sermon Outline:
1. The Great banquet
2. The Sabbath Dinner
3. The Kingdom Feast.
Sermon
One of Jesus' best-known parables is the parable
of the great banquet. It is even set to music in the familiar
song "I Cannot Come." But it is also a perplexing
parable. Who is the banquet host? We most naturally suppose
he is God, but when we think further about him, we realize
that he acts in ways that do not fit with God's character.
Let's look at the parable and its context more closely.
This whole section of the chapter is about dining, dining
with Jesus. The parable itself of course is about dining, and
since it's a parable, we know it has something to say about dining
with Jesus. Besides that, Jesus told the parable at a Sabbath
dinner, and that dinner tells us something more about eating
with Jesus. Then finally, one of the guests raises the subject
of the kingdom feast, and Jesus tells us something about that
meal as well. So, these are our three points: The great banquet,
the Sabbath dinner, and the Kingdom feast.
In the society and culture of Jesus' time it would be an almost
unthinkable offense to snub an invitation to a banquet. Hospitality
was everyone’s solemn obligation. The only people not included
under this social system were the moral and social outcasts,
and these included the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind.
Upstanding people assumed that the troubles of these outcasts
proved they were being punished by God for their sins or for
the sins of their forebears. True, according to the law of Moses
such people were to be given alms and food from the Levites'
supplies kept for that purpose, and they might also glean if
they were physically able. But, as in our own time, this "welfare" only
drove home their shame.
The duty to be hospitable included accepting invitations to
dinner as well as inviting others to dinner. Refusing such an
invitation would be an outrageous insult to the host and would
mark the intended guest as a social misfit. The only way you
could get away with your refusal would be if the host was himself
an outcast like one of the traitorous publicans. Some of these
outcasts were rich, but they were regarded as despised by God
because of their sins.
The host of this parable may have been just such an outcast.
He may have deserved being snubbed by his invited guests because
of greedy and shady business dealings. Whatever his faults may
have been, each of his guests treated his invitation in the same
way, implying that he didn’t deserve social acceptance
and that they were right to turn him down. He wanted to be admitted
to polite society, but they rejected him.
The urgency and even panic in the host's voice shows how desperate
he was to be accepted. He cannot bear the disgrace of having
prepared food ready for so many and having no guests to eat it.
An empty house would be worse than a house full of outcasts.
So he sends his servants out to bring in enough people, poor,
lame, blind and crippled though they are, to show the "snooty" citizens
that he doesn't need them. But he still has empty seats, a telltale
sign of his rejection. So he orders his servants to go out and
find innocent and unsuspecting travelers and bring them in, by
force if necessary. This certainly does not sound like God. But
we'll come back to that point. Now we will go to the Sabbath
dinner.
Jesus told the parable of the great banquet during a Sabbath
dinner at a prominent Pharisee's house. Sabbath dinners were
very high religious and social occasions. They were not to be
interrupted by lesser matters that could be handled later. The
man with dropsy was apparently part of a setup to test Jesus,
and the dinner guests were watching him closely to see if he
would put the sick man's interests ahead of their Sabbath dedication
and obedience to God and his commandment.
It is hard to say exactly what disability this man had. It
may have been painful since Luke says he was "suffering" from
it, but it is not important for us to know that. We do need to
know what Jesus is teaching those who were listening. After healing
him Jesus asks "If one of you has a son or an ox that falls
into a well on the Sabbath day, will he not immediately pull
him out?" Of course their answer would be "yes",
not only regarding a son but even regarding an ox. That is to
say, they themselves believed that God would not condemn a person
as a Sabbath breaker if he rescues an animal from drowning on
the Sabbath even though it involves hard work. Jesus' point in
asking this question is to teach them, and us, that it is not
necessary to know how long a person has had a disabling condition
nor how long it could still be tolerated. What is necessary for
them, and for us, to know is that the need of the disabled man
for help is as demanding and urgent as that of the drowning ox
or even the drowning son, and that God expects them, and us,
to help such a person in need.
Luke tells us that the dinner guests watched Jesus carefully,
but also that Jesus watched them carefully. He noticed how each
guest chose the best open seat. Rather than commenting on their
selfishness in doing that, he gives what must have sounded like
good practical advice but what was in fact a parable about the
kingdom of God. He advised them, "when someone invites you
to a wedding feast, do not take the places of honor, for a person
more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the
host who invited both of you will come and say to you, "Give
this man your seat." Then, humiliated, you will have to
take the least important place. But when you are invited, take
the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to
you, "Friend, move up to a better place." Then you
will be honored in the presence of all your fellow guests."
Why does Luke call it a parable? Because Jesus isn't giving
social advice but a stern and compassionate warning. When he
speaks of a wedding feast they must have caught his point because
that was a well-known figure of speech for the final coming and
judgment of the Messiah. He is appealing to them to humble themselves
in their own eyes before they attempt to join their divine host
at the feast lest he will have to humiliate them. If they do
not, the same self-centered indifference that they showed to
the disabled man and that they showed in their choice of seats
will blind them to their arrogant pride. And God will not admit
the proud to his wedding dinner. Jesus sums up with these familiar
words, "For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled,
and he who humbles himself will be exalted."
Now he speaks directly to the dinner host. He says, "When
you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends,
your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do,
they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when
you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame,
the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay
you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous."
Imagine how this must have sounded to the Sabbath dinner host.
In front of all his guests he is told that he shouldn't have
invited the people he did. For that matter, imagine what would
happen to you and your place in society if you stopped inviting
your friends and acquaintances to come over, and instead searched
out the marginal people Jesus stipulated. You would probably
end up on the social margins right along with your new set of
guests. It certainly would have meant the end of the tightly
knit social fabric of life in that biblical time if the dinner
guests and their friends had done it. Jesus' words probably confirmed
the opinion of the dinner host and his guests that Jesus was
at best a fool if not much worse.
But what about us. We are here in church because we at the
very least want to honor Jesus. And most of us would go beyond
that to say that we trust in Jesus and intend to follow his instructions.
Well, what do you think about Jesus' instructions here? Is he
exaggerating again? He does that some times for emphasis, talking
for example about hating our spouses and children for the sake
of the kingdom. Or does he mean these words quite literally?
Does he really want us to change our whole pattern of social
interaction? This brings us to our third point, the kingdom feast.
The Pharisees believed in the resurrection of the righteous,
and they talked about it as a kingdom feast. So when Jesus' talked
about the resurrection of the righteous, one of the guests was
moved to say, "Blessed is the man who will eat at the feast
in the kingdom of God." Well, just who will eat at that
feast? That depends on the host and on his choice of which people
he will invite. We have already talked about the host in the
parable of the great banquet, and about the host at the Sabbath
dinner. Now what about the host at the kingdom feast.
Of course, it is Jesus himself. His fellow guests at the Sabbath
dinner probably didn't believe that, but we do. We confess that
Jesus is the Christ, the Messiah who will judge the living and
the dead. He will restore all things, and he will rule forever
as David's Son. He will bring home his bride, his people, his
church. That is why his return is pictured as the wedding feast
of the kingdom. Now, what kind of people will he invite?
There can hardly be any doubt about who some of his guests
will be from what he says in these verses. Jesus is not a hypocrite,
he will not give instructions to others that he himself will
not keep. When he commands his followers, he commands them to
do as he does, to follow him. This means that he will invite
people like those he told his host at the Sabbath dinner to invite;
the poor, crippled, lame, blind, and the people who have compassion
and share their resources and possessions with them.
You may be thinking, "Jesus said the people who invite
those outcasts will receive their reward, so they must be his
guests. But he didn't say anything about the poor, the crippled,
the lame, and the blind being there too." Really now, do
you think Jesus will reward disciples for inviting such people
but not invite them himself? His ministry from beginning to end
was one of compassion to this kind of people.
In chapter four Luke describes Jesus at the beginning of his
ministry as quoting Isaiah's words, "The Spirit of the Lord
is on me; therefore he has anointed me to preach good news to
the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind, to release the prisoners,
to proclaim the year of the Lord's favor." Then he said, "Today
this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing."
In chapter seven we hear John the Baptist in prison sending
his servants to ask if Jesus is really the Christ. He had heard
how much time Jesus was giving to sick and disabled people instead
of preaching to the crowds, and he was perplexed. Remember, the
general attitude toward poor and disabled people was that God
was punishing them for their sins. So healing them must have
seemed like someone in our own times emptying out the prisons.
Healthy and able-bodied people were probably not at all pleased
about these healings.
Jesus sent this reply back to John, "Go back and report
to John what you have seen and heard: The blind receive sight,
the lame walk, those who have leprosy are cured, the deaf hear,
the dead are raised, and the good news is preached to the poor.
Blessed is the man who does not fall away on account of me." How
strange it is that even a good and godly man like John should
need this warning that the Christ is determined to show great
compassion to marginal and outcast people.
It is true that some Bible passages describe God's sinful
people as being like those who have disabilities. A blind person
represented the spiritual blindness of people who do not know
where they are going. A deaf person pictured the hard hearts
of people who would not listen to their God. A lame person portrayed
the debilitating affects of sin. This is why members of the priestly
clan might not be priests if they had defects, disabilities or
diseases.
But, God did not regard the disabled priests as outcasts.
Just the opposite, they were representatives of the rest of the
people, the picture of why ceremonially perfect sacrifices and
priests were needed to cleanse them from their sins. So God's
excluding people from the priesthood did not mean that the healthy
and able-bodied had a right to treat the diseased and disabled
with contempt. If they did they were rejecting themselves, for
they also were disabled. In short, there was no excuse for Jesus'
hearers to be contemptuous of people with diseases or disabilities
as outcasts or sinners. Neither their scriptures nor Jesus himself
gave them reasons for such an attitude.
We today also have no reason to be proud of ourselves in this
matter. The way the church typically restricts the celebration
of the Lord's Supper gives us an example of this same attitude
towards people with disabilities. In I Corinthians 11 Paul rebukes
some believers for going ahead with the Lord's Supper and ignoring
the poor members who had too little to eat. He tells them that
they are not discerning the body of Christ when they act this
way. By this he does not mean the sacramental body in the elements
but the church body of believers. He makes this clear in the
next chapter with his powerful description of the church as a
body. The self-examination he commands these careless members
to conduct, is to bring them to realize that their neglect of
the marginal church members is a deadly sin against the Church,
the body of Christ, and therefore against the Lord himself.
But what we ourselves too often do with this call to self-examination
is to turn it into an intellectual inquiry as to how much the
professing Christian knows about the catechism or about the church
and its rules. These things are valuable to know, and people
should know them if they have the capacity. But we should not
use this examination to exclude members with developmental disabilities
from communion. Perhaps they can not give intellectually complete
answers to the council's questions, or perhaps they cannot speak
clearly enough to be understood, but their faith in Christ as
their Savior is unmistakable from their demeanor and from their
body language. If we exclude them from the Lord's Supper because
they cannot put their faith into words, we are denying them the
very sacrament which our Lord instituted to convey himself to
believers without words through the touch, the taste, the smell
and the color of the elements. That is, we are doing the same
thing the church in Corinth was doing. We are ignoring and excluding
poor and disabled people from participating as equals with ourselves
in the Lord's supper
We are talking about the kingdom feast, and the Lord's Supper
is a rehearsal for that feast. That's why the Lord said during
the last supper that he wouldn't drink wine again till he drinks
it new in the kingdom. That's why he said we should celebrate
it till he comes again. Well, that's also why we must get it
right, now, during the rehearsal. If we exclude people with disabilities
who belong with us, we will be in danger of getting ourselves
excluded when the real feast begins.
Now, let's go back to the parable of the great banquet. Does
it describe God in some way? It is true that God chose the Jewish
nation first to carry out his strategy to save the world, and
the people first invited in this parable might stand for this
nation. But we must immediately say that unlike the people in
the parable the Jews according to Romans 9 through 11 will in
the end not refuse his invitation. We must also say that God
does not regard the poor, the blind, the crippled and the lame
as his second choice guests as they are in the parable. Jesus
makes it clear in his words to the Sabbath host that his preference
is just the opposite. Even if we take the disabled guests to
represent the gentiles, God's strategy from the beginning was
to bless all the nations of the earth through the seed of Abraham
and not to rank his guests as to his preference. We must say
then that, like the judge in the parable of the persistent widow
in chapter 18 or like the master in the parable of the shrewd
manager in chapter sixteen, the host in this parable is a contrast
to Christ rather than a picture of him.
Besides that, taking the host in the parable to be God turns
the poor, blind, crippled and lame into figurative representations
of gentile converts instead of actual disabled and poor people.
The man with dropsy was a real man, and Jesus means real people
with disabilities when he tells his host to invite "the
poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind." So too the poor
and disabled people in the parable represent real people with
real disabilities who are really poor.
Jesus had compassion for real disabled people. In fact, he
gives them special attention and promises them the sure hope
of the resurrection and the transformation of their bodies. We
too should follow his example. No matter how we understand the
parable of the great banquet, Jesus' words are crystal clear,
and they are for us, when he says, "But when you give a
banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind,
and you will be blessed. Although they can not repay you, you
will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous." May
the Lord give us the grace of his Holy Spirit so that we may
share ourselves and everything we have with those in need. Then
we will be ready for dining with Jesus when the time comes.
Amen.
