To Go
This summer we are “eating our way through the Gospel of Luke.” (I hope it tastes good!)
Unlike other Gospels, Jesus is almost always on his way to a meal, at a meal, or on his way back from a meal. There are at least fifty references to food. Many of the meals are not mentioned by the other Gospel writers. We are mostly going to read these stories in order, except for today. We are beginning with a story from the middle of the Gospel. It provides a framework for all the other stories.
In Luke 14, Jesus went to share a meal in the home of one of the leaders of the Pharisees on the Sabbath day. They were probably planning on a healthy debate during dinner, but Jesus really dominates the conversation. The meal ends with Jesus telling a parable.
Jesus said: “Someone gave a great dinner and invited many. At the time for the dinner he sent his slave to say to those who had been invited, ‘Come; for everything is ready now.’ But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of land, and I must go out and see it; please accept my regrets.’ Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out; please accept my regrets.’ Another said, ‘I have just been married, and therefore I cannot come.’ So the slave returned and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and said to his slave, ‘Go out at once into the streets and lanes of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’ And the slave said, ‘Sir, what you ordered has been done, and there is still room.’ Then the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the roads and lanes, and compel people to come in, so that my house may be filled. For I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.’”
* * *
Will Willimon once described a trip he took down a country road in South Carolina. He passed a church with a sign board out front.
The sign read: Repent! Now is the day of salvation.
Just down the road, there was another church of a different denomination. Their sign read: Happy Mother’s Day. Virtues are learned at mother’s knee; vices at some other joint.
Willimon thought to himself: What does the world that knows nothing of Christianity except for those signs think of the Christian faith?
Then he passed another church with a sign that said, Do you know what hell is? Come and hear our preacher!
And down the road there was another sign that read: We have room for you at our table. Hospitality practiced. All are welcome.
Finally, he thought, something that sounds like Jesus!
No judgment.
No criteria for entry.
Just hospitality and everyone welcome.
But as he looked more closely at the building as he drove by, he realized that the sign was in front of a building that had once been a church.
It was now labeled Shadydale Restaurant.
It was a restaurant that had the sign out front that should have been in front of all of those churches.
* * *
It is a great question: What does the world that knows nothing of Christianity except for those signs think of the Christian faith?
In Luke 14, Jesus has lunch at the house of religious leaders ,and I try to imagine a sign that could have been placed in the front of this house: Perfection preferred. By invitation only. Important people welcome.
Jesus was at a specific type of meal. When you read Luke 14, you hear a lot of debate and back and forth. Jesus has lot of opinions, especially as a guest at a meal.
The Pharisees and scribes were hosting a symposium. A symposium was when people gathered together for a meal. They would eat, and then recline on couches and drink wine. While debating the important issues of the day.
And, of course on which sofa you sat was significant because the better the seat, the more likely other people took what you had to say seriously
But Jesus seems to have something to say about this whole thing! He stirs up the pot—suggests a different seating chart. He asks, “Why don’t poor people have a voice at this symposium?”
Jesus shows up at this symposium, but he seems to be calling into question the whole format.
This first happens as soon as Jesus gets there. There seems to be an uninvited guest at the entrance. Maybe this man was blocking the door—he had dropsy.
The community around that table didn’t know what to do. Jesus asks, “Does the Law allow healing on the Sabbath or not?”
But no one said anything! Jesus took hold of the sick man, cured him, and then let him go.
The people were willing to gather on the Sabbath and feast, but what they weren’t doing was actually restoring anyone.
Who cares about your great ideas—if it doesn’t make life better for anyone?
Who cares about public shows of faithfulness—if it doesn’t lift the people around you?
What good is a religious community—if it doesn’t provide any sense of restoration?
* * *
As soon as Jesus gets inside he sees something else: Everyone is jockeying for position. People were looking for ways to express how important they were. Again, Jesus finds this to be hogwash. No one is more important than another in the kingdom of God. Jesus Christ is the head of a church where all people have value, meaning and acceptance. Jesus warns the people at dinner: “All who lift themselves up will be brought low, and those who make themselves low will be lifted up.”
* * *
Then Jesus notices who is not at this meal. The poor aren’t there. Jesus said to the person who had invited him, “When you host a lunch or dinner, don’t invite your friends, your brothers and sisters, your relatives, or rich neighbors. If you do, they will invite you in return and that will be your reward. Instead, when you give a banquet, invite the poor, crippled, lame, and blind. And you will be blessed because they can’t repay you. Instead, you will be repaid when the just are resurrected.”
* * *
Jesus is not just eating at this symposium; he is leading a discussion on what a community of faith should look like. When the early church read this portion of Luke, they would have heard Jesus speaking to them. How are we to create community of welcome? How should this community reflect the kingdom of God?
Jesus makes is the clear in this story: The church is the church when it claims the restorative power of God. Jesus intends for the religious community to provide restoration for people. We must respond to the real needs of people in the world.
The church is at its best when people are not jockeying for power. The church is at its best when we recognize the first shall be last, and the last shall be first.
Finally, the Church exemplifies God’s love of all people, especially those are marginalized or easily ignored.
At the end of the symposium, Jesus makes his three points, and then tells a great story. That story is our scripture reading today. It is the Parable of the Wedding Banquet. It is such a powerful story about the reversal and welcome extended to all people through God’s mission to the world.
Who do you think Jesus resonates with in that story? The master, the slave, the invitees, or the poor and crippled, blind and lame?
When Jesus tells the story, I imagine he kind of identifies with the slave. The slave is told to go invite people to a wedding banquet, and everyone turns him down because they are too busy. Then the slave is sent to gather up all who can’t repay his master. He invites the poor, crippled, and blind. He fills the banquet with all sorts of peoples.
That’s what Jesus does. God sent patriarchs and matriarchs, prophets, and kings, and we ignored them—or killed them. So finally Jesus Christ comes to gather up the people himself and to bring them to God.
* * *
Do you want God is planning? God is planning a wedding between heaven and earth. God is planning a marriage between God and humanity. Peace and righteousness kiss.
And you need to be at this party. You can’t miss it. It will be the best feast you ever had. It is a rich feast of choice wines and select foods rich in flavor. And death will be swallowed up forever. Tears will be wiped away.
It is the feast Linda read about from Isaiah. That’s the wedding feast Jesus is describing, and God is forlorn at the people who don’t want to be there. God sends Jesus to bring us that feast.
Jesus is bringing that feast you to us. If you don’t think you are worthy of being there, Jesus is going to bring you. If you don’t think you can there because you feel disgraced, Jesus is coming to you.
And this why I want to begin this series with this parable:
Every meal in Luke is a serving of this messianic feast.
* * *
Last weekend, I went to a design and innovation lab with a number of folks from this congregation—I guess it was symposium of sorts. It was hosted at Princeton Theological Seminary, and it was part of $15,000 grant that we received. We were supposed to bring two innovative ideas to expand our ministry with young people in our church. I know our team is excited to share some of their work with you at a future date. They have worked diligently.
One of the people we meet there was named Jess; she was our innovation coach. She is the pastor at Kingston United Methodist Church. Her church is located a little less than ten minutes from Princeton, New Jersey. They had always thought that their ministry thrived because of their work with young adults. But here is the problem: Kingston United Methodist Church is landlocked; it is on a dainty one-way lane across from a cemetery, which means that it is not exactly on the way to anywhere…well…except…the cemetery.
And here is another problem they learned. Undergraduates at the nearby university aren’t allowed to have cars for their first two years of school. And the university can be quite an insular place. How would they expect to minister with these folks who can’t find, or even drive, to their place.
Well, they figured out they needed to go to them, and to do that they needed a Trojan horse. They needed to find a way to break the barriers that prevent people participating in their ministry. They bought a food truck. They learned how to cook in a food truck. Jess had to learn how to drive a stick-shift, and then, subsequently, how to replace two clutches.
And then they would drive the food truck wherever people were gathered. Someone would invite them on to campus. And they would show up and hand out food from the food truck. People from the church would just show up and talk to the patrons of the truck.
They realized that the feast at the middle of their community wasn’t just for them. Rather, their work was to go out into the world and share God’s feast. The Feed Truck, as they call themselves, serves locally sourced, handcrafted breakfast and late night fare – but that’s not all. They’re also in the business of serving up radical hospitality and a taste of hope to the good folks of Central New Jersey. They are especially interested in giving young people an unexpected, positive encounter with the Church.
* * *
At a Pharisee’s house on that Sabbath day, Jesus us trying to show a new way forward for his community of faith. Jesus wants his community to be restorative, egalitarian, and inclusive. That ought to speak just as much to us today as it did in the first century.
Wouldn’t be something to put on a church sign?
Restorative, egalitarian, and inclusive.
Jesus demonstrates that throughout his life and ministry. And as the church today is looking for a new way forward, it might just trying what Jesus modeled. As I’ve said before, the future of the church is not a “sanctuary-centered, membership-based, religious life-and-service provider.”
Jesus was sent by God to gather up. Jesus was sent to share the feast with us. We may be sent to do the same. When we come to this table to be sustained for the work of ministry, we are sent into the world as agents of God’s grace and compassion.
Perhaps, we should take the table with us.