Table Lessons

Proper 17, Year C Luke 14:7-14

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

I tease. What is it about eating that brings us closer in relationships? I don't know about you, but I remember going on a first date and you always are asking somebody out to dinner on a first date to get to know one another. And even if you develop a relationship with somebody or even in marriage, you celebrate your anniversaries and special days with meals. You gather with your family around and centered on What is it about meals that teaches us something about relationships? That's what I'm trying to get at here. And here we're given in our gospel lesson a meal situation, a scene where Jesus is observing what is going on in the room, and yet Jesus continues to not only teach us on how we need to have our manners appropriate at a meal, but also about how we ought to be living our lives and posturing ourselves, positioning ourselves in life and even in the kingdom. And what's interesting is that as Jesus has been invited, this is a house of the Pharisees. We learn this in verse 1 of chapter 14. So he's invited by even those who are hostile towards him. And he goes and he begins to observe the whole entire room. And what he notices is that the one who is the host, who has invited everybody, he sees all the other guests begin to deliberate. That's what the word means. Deliberate and position themselves closest to the host.

UNKNOWN: 1:30

And he says,

SPEAKER_00: 1:30

because it's the closest position to the host that symbolizes the relationship, that you have a better relationship than anybody else that has been invited. You can begin to think about the Last Supper, and we're told that John the Beloved is reclining at table with Jesus, and he's leaning his head on Jesus's bosom. Now you can say whatever you want, but we all would know in that room, there seems to be one that's more affectionate than all the rest of the disciples. He gets to put his head on the chest of his Lord and Savior. It is the one closest to the host that has the prized and most valuable position. And so Jesus is observing this, and they're all fighting and delivering over each other about which couch, they didn't have seats, they had couches they reclined at, closest to the host. And Jesus takes this opportunity at this meal to expose and to rightly teach how it is the kingdom of God positions every member. And what God the Father, the one who is hosting a banquet, how he positions people at his table. And you might even think about how what is happening in this room happens among the disciples. You think about the sons of Zebedee, right? They're the famous ones, the sons of thunder themselves, are the famous ones who approach. After Jesus is just made known that he is the Christ, the Messiah, by the confession of Peter, and that he's going to die for the sins of the world, the immediate thing that's on the sons of Zebedee's mind is, Jesus, can we request something of you? And he says, yes, what is it that you ask? He says, you don't know what you're asking. can you drink the cup that I'm about to drink? Speaking of his own death. And they confidently say, we can drink the cup that you drink. And Jesus says something very interesting. He says, you will drink the cup that I will drink, for they will find their lives defeated in death, but then raised up in the Lord. But he says, the Father is the only one who dictates who will sit to the left and to the right. Those positions have been reserved for the preference of my father. So we're beginning to develop what it means to be positioned, right? And so Jesus looks around and he begins to teach this parable, Luke tells us. Luke says, in the kingdom of God, this is how it functions. This is the rule of law in the kingdom. This is my father's preference. My father's preference in his kingdom is that he always pays more closer attention to those who are last than those who are first. Right? Jesus has been teaching this in his ministry. The last shall be first, the first shall be last. And oftentimes we might just throw that away as a nice little catchphrase, but Jesus is serious. He goes, this is the program of the kingdom. This is the way of the kingdom. This is how my father and I operate. And you can even begin to understand this because that's what, look at Jesus' ministry. In the Gospels, three years of his ministry is constantly overlooking the Pharisees and the Sadducees because they think themselves to be primary and the closest to God, but yet Jesus is always calling out the crowd, the one who is furthest back or the one who is lowly positioned, the one who is most humble, the one who can't even do anything for themselves because they're crippled and lame. They're blind. They can't see. Jesus is always He's always paying attention in his ministry to those people primarily. Matter of fact, this incites hatred for Jesus because he doesn't pay attention to the massive spiritual athletes that are present before him who are in proximity to him. He always goes to the person who's never picked. And he looks at them and he moves them up to him. He always calls out to them and they bring him or them to him. Jesus. This is the way of the kingdom. This is the way of God. This is what God does and Jesus demonstrates. And that's what he's teaching here at this feast. If you really want to know how to have a close relationship with God, if you really want to draw near to God, you have to be humble. You have to be in the places where his eyes look to. He looks to the lowly. He looks to the people that aren't filled with glory because he doesn't share glory with another. So he looks for people that want to delight in his glory and have no glory of their own. They have no honor of their own because he wants to be the lifter up of heads. When you read this in the Old Testament, the lifter up of heads, it's a constant refrain throughout the scriptures. And what it means is that when you approach a king, you're never to Look him in the face. You approach him humbly and cast down in the great honor and privilege that might be bestowed upon you is if the king comes and lifts your head up to look at him. That's how you know that you can look and come closer to the king, that he finds value in you. But isn't this a reality for us? Isn't this a challenge for us? You think about how that requires the last shall be first and the first shall be last, that if God's attention is on those that are in the back, those who are the furthest away, those who cannot do anything for themselves or demonstrate that they've done anything for God, that requires quite a bit of faith, quite a bit of reliance that God actually looks to those places. And yet we are a people who desire primary position. You think about even if you are employed and how you desperately, the guy who writes the checks and can offer you a raise, how you would do anything and go out of your way to appease them so that when it comes time for the raise, they might not overlook you because you fear to be overlooked. You think about the guy who's not as athletic in kickball or basketball like everybody else has been, and you get overlooked and not even chosen to be on a team. Nobody likes to be that last person where the team is trying to let the other team take them. I'm speaking from personal experience. Nobody likes to be in last place because the world's program teaches us that being first is glorious and right and good. But in God's kingdom, he is first. And we who acknowledge that he is first and submit ourselves to being last and bow ourselves down to him in worship, let God who is first lift up our heads. You might think about how even in a room when you want to be noticed by somebody, you do everything you can just to kind of put your name out there or your voice out there. You start speaking over people because you're being overlooked. We all have this fear of being overlooked. We desire to be valued. And that's the word that Jesus uses in this parable. He cautions people to not position or deliberate about the closest position to the host because there might be somebody more distinguished, and that word distinguished means valuable, more worthy than you. Instead, the host needs to be picking the people that are in the back, the last, as being the most valuable. The host gets to determine people's value and worth and then order them accordingly. But what happens when we have this fear of being overlooked? When we constantly are, I'm in last place all the time. I say, and the scriptures say, and Jesus seems to be saying and teaching, embrace it. Whatever position you are in, because content with your position. Humble yourself. Because here is the reoccurring promise in the scriptures that if you are humble, God will exalt you. But if you're exalted, you will be humbled. There's no other way that operates. There's no other, maybe he'll make an exception. I could present to him these great things. No. You will be humbled if you come and approach boldly the throne of God out So he's saying, if you have a fear of being overlooked, trust in this. Believe in God who doesn't overlook those who are last. It is a God who sees. You are to live your life out in the kingdom as trusting in the Lord to see your works even though you get no praise, no glory, and no position. But humble yourself and allow a trust in God to exalt you to the places of prominence. You might think about, and the greatest example of this that I found, I think, is going back all the way to Genesis chapter 16. You remember the story of Abraham, Sarah and Hagar, and all that tension that is occurring. Hagar flees because Sarah starts mistreating Hagar. So Hagar takes Ishmael, and Ishmael's name means the God who hears. So she takes him out, and they come into this well, and the Lord finds Hagar. And he says to her, what are you doing? She says, I'm fleeing because I haven't been given a position in the house, and yet here I bear a son for Abraham. And he says, the Lord says, humble yourself. Go back and serve. And I will make your descendants great. That's the promise he offers to Hagar. That's the promise he says that through your son, though he will be a wild donkey of a man, there will be a lot of descendants from him. And it is his line that represents the Gentiles of the world. And guess who gets included in the promises in his in the salvation of Jesus Christ, not just Jews, but also Gentiles. And she names this well, the God who sees, for he saw me and yet I live. That's the God that we can trust in and find faith, that when we humble ourselves, when we position ourselves in last place, where we don't seek in our own strength to positions of honor and to be in those prime positions, allowing God to do what he sees fit and what is right. That's the God we serve. And that's why we don't need to fear being overlooked because God doesn't overlook anything. These promises are all over the scriptures. Hebrews 4.13 says this, and there is no creature hidden from his sight, but all things are opened and laid bare to the eyes of him with whom we have to do. Or even Proverbs 15.3, the eyes of the Lord are in every place watching the evil and the good. Or Jeremiah 23, 24. Can a man hide himself in hiding places so that I do not see him, declares the Lord? Do I not feel the heavens and the earth, declares the Lord? That's a God who sees you. but he just doesn't see you. He has preference for the hiding places where people will humble themselves, the last places. He does the exact opposite of the world wants to do. The world and their pride have rebelled against him. And so he is looking for people without pride, a people that can't do anything for themselves because he will do everything that they need. And those are the people that the kingdom is open to. Those are the citizens that fill this kingdom that Jesus is ushering in and bringing in. It's not wrong to desire position. It's almost in our DNA. But how we go about it is what Jesus is teaching. If you want to be, if you want to capture the eyes of God, position yourself last, and he will exalt you to first. But then Jesus not only teaches us about the taber manners that you ought to conduct yourself with at a feast and in life, but he also talks to those who have been exalted. He also talks to those and teaches a parable about those who get to host, who have been in the position of hosting. It makes logical sense that if you position yourself humbly in the last place and that God's eye is on you then and he exalts you and moves you up, now you get to be close to the host, if not get to host yourself. So how then ought you to behave? What is the right way to host? What is the right way to live into this position that the Lord has exalted you into? It begins talking about this in verse 13. He says, if you're going to do this, a host doesn't invite people seeking to be repaid by these people. He doesn't invite people in order that they continue what he wants. And this is what happens during Jesus's time is the host would have a dinner party and he would invite other people, other prominent people who can return the favor that when it came for them to have a party, he would be invited himself. Jesus says, don't be like that. That's not the way the kingdom works. It's not what my father has in mind. But if you have been exalted by the hand of my father, this is how you ought to live into your being a host. And that is You do what the Father does. You look to those who couldn't host a party and you invite them to come in and experience the blessings of God because they never will without you. That's what we're being told. We are being told that if you are a host, then you need to go to those and continue this program of the kingdom, which is to look to those who are last and honor them because that's who the Father honors. So we get this snapshot of not only how we ought to conduct our relationships at dinners, but that dinners form our understanding about relationships and how we ought to be building relationships. Is that we consider ourselves last and humble ourselves and allow God and trust in God to position us where we need to be sat at his table. But that if he does position us closer to him and in position to host, that we use that opportunity and that position in order to look to where he looks, to the crippled, the lame, and the blind. That's our job. That's our responsibility in the kingdom. And the church is the kingdom. The church is the city on the hill. And this is how we operate. Oftentimes, we think that the people who sit in the front row are the ones who are the most spiritual. But now we look to the back row. And those are the people that are longing, probably longing the most for Jesus. Does Jesus do this? If this is true, if this is the way that the kingdom operates, do we see even Jesus being last? Do we see Jesus even being humbled? Is this the kind of position that Jesus takes? I mean, is Jesus the son of God? Surely he won't have to come in last. Surely he is the first. But Jesus does model this. He not only teaches it to us, but he models it and says, let me just show you how this looks. Keep in mind, this is the son of the living God. This is God himself in the flesh. What does Jesus do with his own life? We read Philippians 2, 5 through 11, which says this. Have this attitude in yourself, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, although he existed in the form of God, did not regard equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking a form of a bondservant and being made in the likeness of men, being found in the appearance of man. He humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on The Father bestows upon Jesus the highest name, the highest position of glory. Why? Because Jesus, His Son, humbled Himself took a form of a bondservant and was willing to put himself under the needs of other people, even to the point of death. That's what Jesus does. And the father is true to his word. The last shall become first. And my son is the first born among the dead because he is the one who died for the sins of the world. He was faithful and obedient and he humbled himself. He did everything I And that's why he sits at my right hand. You think that Jesus, and Paul says it this way, that what does it mean that he ascended other than the fact that he descended from the throne? He descended, put himself last and furthest away from the throne. And then what does the father do? Raises him up from the dead and then positions him at the right hand. You think about even Maundy Thursday when we celebrate this during Holy Week. We think about this. And what did we do this last Maundy Thursday but we washed each other's feet because we read about Jesus washing the disciples' feet. Jesus positions himself as a servant and he girds up his loins with his robe. He ties it up. He gets down on his hands and knees and he serves his students, his disciples. And Peter's like, no, no, no, no, no, don't do this. And Jesus says, if I don't do this, you have no part with me. And Peter's like, then wash my whole body. He's like, Peter, you only need your feet washed, big guy. But Jesus demonstrates and shows us that even the Son of God humbles himself and serves. And the Father demonstrates and verifies that he will exalt those who humble themselves and begins with Jesus. We see it in Jesus. So what might this mean for our lives? We being the church, us being the citizens of the kingdom, us living in the city of God. This informs us how we ought to be conducting our lives and our relationships with one another. And we begin here. That Philippians chapter two begins with this. Have this mind in your mind that was also in Christ Jesus. Have this mentality that Jesus demonstrates in yourselves that he emptied himself. He became a servant and he served others and was lifted up by the Father, highly and exalted. Have that mentality in every respect in your life. For that is the program. That is how the kingdom and the people of the kingdom operate. They follow after the king and they do what the king does. This also teaches us that in the scriptures it does say that if God is for you, then who can be against you. But the opposite is true. If God isn't for you, then you better be watching for how he'll humble you. For God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble. Do you feel distant from God? Do you feel like you're in last place, that God's eyes aren't on you? According to the scriptures, trust and believe this. That if you humble yourself and position yourself in that place, God's eyes are always there. He's always looking for those who humble themselves, who aren't trying to reach up in their own strength or position and deliberate with others on how they might position themselves better. They live into the position they have and they trust in the Lord to see them and they trust in the Lord for their exaltation Are you in a position of hosting? Has God seen you and moved you up? Then how are you to conduct this new position? We learn this, that too much that has been given, much will be required. If you are a person who has received an abundance of blessing by the grace of God the Father, and he has moved you forward, use your forward position to look back on those who are humbled. Look to those that God is also looking at. And be his agent for blessing. As you have received grace, extend grace as a host. As you have received blessing, extend blessing as a host. Don't choose those that are easy and delightful. to position closer to you. Go after those who are strangers, aliens, foreigners, who can't do anything for themselves, who never experienced a meal before. Invite them into the kingdom. Invite them to come and truly sit and eat with God. If you've been forgiven much, you will forgive much. Be content with your seat. A lot of times because of our desire to be first, because of our desire to be close to those that matter the most, if you find yourself not, be content. Wait on the Lord. I've been waiting for a long time. Then pray to the Holy Spirit because the fruit of the Holy Spirit gives you patience. And there are psalms after psalms always saying, I will wait on the Lord as if he's trying to convince himself. I'm struggling with waiting on you, Lord, but I've been in a position of humility for a long time. But I'll trust in you. I won't do it in my own strength. I will wait on the Lord to move me when the time is right. A church that does not take in those humbled by sin or humiliated by its effects to dine at their table is no church at all. The true bride of Christ will not refuse to take in those her husband has invited. This is what we need to do in our ministry when we're sent out into the world is to look in the low places, the dim places, to the humble people, and we are to invite them in. And we are to see how the Father will position them and exalt them. This is the lesson for this morning for us. How it is that we need to be governing our lives under the rule and reign of Jesus. How does He operate? How does He rule? Well, He shows us here in this lesson. Let's pray.