I was traveling over the "Work" Day weekend, so I found an excellent sermon by Dr. Norman Nagel. Subsequently, I found this sermon online, which is very similar. Thus not sure to whom I should attribute.
Pentecost 14 - August 29, 2010
Feasting with Jesus
A sermon based on Luke 14:1-14
By Rev. Dr. Art Eichhorn, Ed. D.
By Rev. Dr. Art Eichhorn, Ed. D.
Our Gospel lesson for today is disappointing. After all, "Don't make a jerk out of yourself in public" is a piece of wisdom we hardly need to hear from the lips of Jesus. We have Emily Post for that. This piece of wisdom has been around for a long time, as King Solomon wrote in the book of Proverbs: "Do not put yourself forward in the king's presence or stand in the place of the great." You would expect that Jesus could do better than that. Well, actually, He does do better than that. You just have to keep looking deeper into the text until you find more. And there is some strong Gospel at the beginning of the lesson:
"One Sabbath when (Jesus) went to dine at the house of a ruler who belonged to the Pharisees, they were watching Him. And behold, there was a man before Him who had dropsy. And Jesus spoke to the lawyers and Pharisees, saying, 'Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?' But they were silent. Then He took him and healed him, and let him go. And He said to them, "Which of you, having a donkey or an ox that has fallen into a well, will not immediately pull him out on a Sabbath day?' And they could not reply to this." (Luke 14:1-6)
Now we see the real Jesus. He accepts an invitation from a man who is certainly no friend of His. The text tells us, "They were watching Him." Jesus, knowing this, acts the same way He always acts. There is a man in need, so Jesus helps him. Do the others think that Jesus did the right thing? They are silent because it is Saturday, the Sabbath. The Pharisees had taken a day of rejoicing in God's good gifts and made it into a performance. They had set numerous requirements that served to show how good of a job they were doing in keeping the Law. They wanted to compare themselves with others and find themselves superior.
There is no point in being superior if you are not going to get recognized for it. Jesus tells what He thinks about showing off one's superiority. Jesus is not very democratic. Here in America, you can sit anywhere. Your seat doesn't show how much you are respected in comparison to someone else. In our text, however, the place where you sit gives your place in the order of honor. There were three couches in a group each holding three people. The center couch is the place to be to be recognized.
Jesus saw what was going on, and He talked about it. It seems at first glance that he is talking on the level of prudent etiquette, and no one is likely to disagree with Him. It's risky to put yourself too far forward because you might get shoved back. It's better to start low, and you will have a better chance of being advanced. But Jesus is up to something more than what lies at the surface. He leads his hearers to the point where humility becomes the instrument of self-advancement.
Jesus has a disconcerting way of peeling off our pious pretenses and disclosing their phoniness. Humility is a game you cannot win. Truly humble people never mention humility as a virtue found in themselves. They are otherwise engaged. Those who draw attention to it in themselves or how hard they are striving to be humble are almost certainly phonies, the opposite of humble.
Some will say that today's text is a lesson on humility given by Jesus. That is to get only the husk, not the kernel. We have been warned against this by being told that Jesus was telling a parable. A parable tells an earthly story alongside the intended heavenly message, the kernel. The parable does its job in bringing that message, that kernel.
The parable is about a marriage feast, which is a traditional way of telling of the Lord's love for His bride, His people. The feast is a celebration of that love, and the bringing of the feast is the Messiah's work. Here Jesus is telling about it - that it is bestowed not according to our calculations of first or last, or high or low, but only of His bounty. Those who are surprised by God's bounty are the truly humble who are not prompted by calculation of their own advancement or reward.
There are all sorts of rewards, all sorts of good things given, but if you target yourself at them as at humility, you will end up with the opposite. The rewards business is God's business, and Jesus runs that business. He runs it the opposite of our calculation. "Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." (Luke 14:11)
Be on your guard against the Tempter should anyone ever tell you how humble you are getting to be. Give him only a mocking laugh. The one thing that the devil just can't stand is to be laughed at, as Martin Luther observes. If you become absorbed in taking your humility seriously, it is Satan who would have you become more earnest, sweating to show how well you can do it. Then you will be a pain not only to yourself but also to those who have to live with you and also to God who wants us to be a joy for one another and for Him.
God dishes out his gifts far beyond our calculations of reward. Faith lives in giving God's gifts as gifts to others, without calculation of return, without us trying to be better than others. "But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you." (Luke 14:13-14) Jesus doesn't blame His host for having friends to dinner. Some of our happiest times are feasting with our friends. But on this Sabbath, contrary to the appearances on the surface, it was not a gathering of friends. They were jealous of where others sat. Jesus was not invited as a friend, but to give them an opportunity to size Him up.
Even before Jesus exposes the deceitfulness and hypocrisy of the group, they demonstrated it by how the man with dropsy was welcomed. The traditional show of piety was to have the door open for the stranger and the poor, which was fine, so long as some stranger in need didn't take this seriously and actually come in. If one did, the host could stare him down. That would make the person feel uncomfortable enough to go away. He surely would not try such a presumptuous thing again. Giving him some food at the bottom place or in the corner could also hasten his departure.
But with Jesus, this is not the case. A summary of the Gospel is that Jesus is the friend of sinners and eats with them. Jesus feasts with Zacchaeus and his crowd, with Matthew and his bunch. The happiness of being at table with Jesus gives us a foretaste of the feast to which we are all invited. Jesus really means it when He leaves His door open. You may doubt your worthiness, but you cannot doubt Jesus and His invitation. And Jesus expects no return, no reciprocation of His love. His love simply helps others. His love sent Him to the cross for our salvation.
At the feast, top-seat people such as Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets will be moving over for those who come from all over the place, as we were told in last Sunday's Gospel lesson. "And they shall come from the east, and from the west, and from the north, and from the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God. And behold, there are last which shall be first, and there are first which shall be last." (Luke 13:29-30) We hear this echoing in Jesus' summarizing words in today's text:
"For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." (Luke 14:11)
God grant His Spirit to work the truth of these words in us to repentance and faith, toward lives freed from sin for feasting with Him, of enjoying one another without calculation of what use or advantage we may get out of them. Such love forgets about trying to be humble, about showing off for others. Our place and who we are and what we are worth does not depend on any of that, but it is given to us by our Lord, who is Jesus, the Good News of forgiveness and salvation. He is our Savior today and at the resurrection.
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