Good Morning Friends,
A lot has changed in the way the people of God worship since Moses brought the Ten Commandments down from the mountain and Jesus died on the cross to save us. The change has been even more stark in the last few years with the ripple effect of the pandemic and the physical distancing that was standard behavior for many. Some have gotten out of the habit of worshipping. Today’s Gospel scripture gives us some perspective on the topic of gathering for worship with a Kingdom mindset instead of a Worldly one. The setting of the scripture is a dinner. It was customary to invite the visiting preacher, in this case, Jesus, and other guests to dinner after the synagogue service. However, the details given indicate that this occasion was staged. That the people there were observing him carefully, indicates that he was a curiosity piece, to say the least. That there were scholars there, indicates that they were more interested in evaluating Jesus than eating dinner. Finally, if you read the whole story, you discover that a man suffering from dropsy just happened to be there, so that the scholars and people could evaluate Jesus if he healed him on the Sabbath. All this seems more than coincidence. The scene is a typical setup by the Pharisees to build, or at least add to, their case against Jesus. But Jesus went anyway. The Pharisees had their purpose and Jesus had his. Interestingly Jesus used the occasion to teach, using accepted practices surrounding formal dinners, in a parable as examples of how not to behave. Jesus, at dinner in the house of a leading Pharisee, counsels both the host and his guests about humility, honor and generosity that might well be guidance on who we are inviting to worship. So, What Are We To Learn About Humility, Honor And Generosity In Welcoming People To Worship?
Scripture: Those conflicts and disputes among you, where do they come from? Do they not come from your cravings that are at war within you? You want something and do not have it; so you commit murder. And you covet something and cannot obtain it; so you engage in disputes and conflicts. You do not have, because you do not ask. You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, in order to spend what you get on your pleasures. Adulterers! Do you not know that friendship with the world is enmity with God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. Or do you suppose that it is for nothing that the scripture says, “God yearns jealously for the spirit that he has made to dwell in us”? But he gives all the more grace; therefore it says, “God opposes the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Submit yourselves therefore to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you sinners, and purify your hearts, you double-minded. Lament and mourn and weep. Let your laughter be turned into mourning and your joy into dejection. Humble yourselves before the Lord, and he will exalt you. Do not speak evil against one another, brothers and sisters. Whoever speaks evil against another or judges another, speaks evil against the law and judges the law; but if you judge the law, you are not a doer of the law but a judge. There is one lawgiver and judge who is able to save and to destroy. So who, then, are you to judge your neighbor?
James 4:1-12 (NRSV)
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. When he noticed how the guests chose the places of honor, he told them a parable. “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; 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. 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. For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” 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. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”
Luke 14:1, 7-14 (NRSV)
You have not come to something that can be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest, and the sound of a trumpet, and a voice whose words made the hearers beg that not another word be spoken to them. But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to innumerable angels in festal gathering, and to the assembly of the firstborn who are enrolled in heaven, and to God the judge of all, and to the spirits of the righteous made perfect, and to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.
Hebrews 12:18-19, 22-24a (NRSV)
Message: After synagogue one of the leading Pharisees invited Jesus back to his house for a meal. It is not unlike the modern-day practice of inviting a guest preacher out to lunch. However, there are hopefully some notable differences in the motivations behind the actions. Jesus accepted, knowing full well that the Pharisees’ intentions were to trap him in some heresy or, at least, to entertain his friends with this rather unconventional religious teacher. As it turned out it was Jesus who was entertained by, if also disapproving of, the antics of these self-styled important, and supposedly serious people. They were jockeying for position and scrambling for the seats of honor. Who among us has not had a quiet laugh as we observed people at banquets or weddings or even funerals either trying to sit next to people, considering their social equals or complaining that they were put down too low on the seating order of importance? First, it is funny. Then it is sort of sad that such folks are so insecure within themselves that a chair’s place or a place in line is so important to their self-worth. We laugh, of course, until we realize that we are just as insecure, only we have enough sense to try to hide it. However, Jesus is not recommending that we pretend to be humble, all the while remaining proud undercover. He is recommending, requiring really, that we be truly humble. That means that we see everyone’s self-worth in the light of God’s estimation. It matters not to God what our social or economic status might be. All his children are worthwhile to him and that is so because of him, not because of us. We cannot earn our worth before God. It is given. We can reject it, neglect it, tarnish it, try to trash it, but we cannot really lose it. God’s love for us is still there. The Pharisees overestimated their worth, even though God still loved them. The problem was that they considered worth as being something to do with themselves and their self-righteousness. They also, thereby, underestimated the worth of the poor, the disabled, the outcast and even the sinner. They would never think of having such folks for dinner or associate with them in any way whatsoever. After all, they were not their kind of people. The irony was that this Pharisee had invited Jesus for dinner, who, at this point in his life, had no home to invite him back! Jesus was, in effect, saying, to invite more homeless folks like me into your home and into your generosity. Our passage from James gives further guidance on the subject of humility and its benefits. And though it might look divisive at first really gives us guidance on being more inclusive and not divisive at all. Friends we get caught up in thinking about who is first and last when we too often miss the point of life. We feed the poor people on Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays and too often forget about their hunger for spiritual food the rest of the year.
And So, the hypocrisy of others serves a good purpose if it points out the same hypocrisy in ourselves. Jesus did not merely condemn the hypocrisy of the Pharisees. He used their examples to help others, including us, to see the same attitudes, tendencies and actions in our own lives and do something about it. No doubt, Jesus also wanted to give the Pharisees as many chances to reform their lives as he gives the rest of us. Jesus dealt with hypocrisy by calling it by its right name and, at the same time, not rejecting the hypocrite. Our place in the world is not determined by where we sit or what our title is, but where we stand before God and what he calls us, namely, his children. People who overestimate their own worth underestimate the worth of all others. The problem is that we can fake humility. We can pretend to have a lower opinion of ourselves that we really have in our hearts and tell others how humble we are. It would be hard for others to tell the truth. But it is really the way we treat others that shows whether or not we are truly humble. Humility is simply having the same opinion of ourselves as God has of us. God may have a rank, and order of preference but this is not ours to decide. What we do know is that Jesus has told us that true greatness consists in service to others. However, if we serve the poor but still look down on them as less worthy, less important, less human than ourselves, we are not truly humble.
Pray we humble ourselves. Pray we submit ourselves to God and God’s rule. Pray we realize that we are not alone in fighting the battle with desires and temptations that can lure us away from our relationship with God. Pray we experience heavenly bliss in our relationship with God. Pray we not seek to be the center of attention but point in our behavior to the Spirit of lifting up those Jesus would honor. Pray we not get so caught up in greed, selfishness, ambition, and pleasure that we fail to have a spiritual life that honors God and expands the invitation to the table in God’s Kingdom. Pray that our heavenly Father empower us to see everyone’s worth in the light of the reality that Jesus died for each of us.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 