Building Community with Compassion and Humility

 

Luke 14:1-24

The Parable of the Great Feast

One of the motifs in Luke is ‘feasting or banquet’. Jesus is depicted having pleasure in eating with people from all walks of life, especially the poor, the unclean, the sinners, altogether are the marginalized group of the society. Jesus himself came from the vast majority of poor peasant and artisan society.

Luke actually uses feasting as a framework to illustrate the gospel of the kingdom of God. Today’s text is centered on such feasting context.

From v1, v3, we are told that, on one Sabbath, Jesus went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees. The Pharisees and Scribes were watching Jesus carefully. Judging from the conflicts between them happened in the preceding text (13:31-35), we know that this is a hostile situation with hypocritical hosts, set out to trap Jesus for breaking of the law.

Let’s see what did Jesus do and say:

God’s heart for the needy and the unclean

There in front of Jesus was a man suffering from dropsy (swollen limbs; dropsy is an abnormal accumulation of fluid in bodily tissues and cavities. And it is deemed unclean).

Jesus asked the Pharisees and experts in the law, “is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” But they remained silent. So, taking hold of the man, he healed him and sent him away.

Then he asked, them, “If one of you has a son or an ox that falls into a well on the Sabbath day, will you not immediately pull him out?” and they had nothing to say.

Through this healing act and questioning, Jesus exposed the hypocrisy of the Pharisees and the Scribes who took pride in strict observance of Sabbath and cleanliness law.

So, we see the tension rises between the pride and unbelief of the religious elites and God’s acceptance of the needy and the unclean. Against the backdrop of healing act, Jesus continued teaching people with feasting parable in the feast itself!

God will exalt everyone who humbles himself

Jesus then noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them: "Do not take the place of honor for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the host may come and say to you, give this man your seat, then you would be humiliated and have to take the least important place. But you are to take the lowest place, so that the host will come to you and say, friend, move up higher. Then you are honored (vv.7—10).

Jesus’ word alluded to Proverb 25:6—7, “Do not exalt yourself in the king’s presence, and do not claim a place among great men; It is better for him to say to you, “Come up here,” than for him to humiliate you before a noble man.”

Jesus words reflect the wisdom of everyday life but it also points further to the revelation of the kingdom of God that is: “God will humble everyone who exalts himself, and exalt everyone who humbles himself (v.11)."

Jesus said this to criticize the mentality of the Pharisees and Scribes who are proud of high position, who consider own self holy, who are self-righteous and lovers of self-importance, but the fact is they will be judged by God.

Blessed is the one who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God

V13, Jesus then turned to the host, issued a command: “But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled people, the lame, the blind.”

Jesus said this is to critic prevalent cultural in which the host only invites people of similar or higher status, so as to build a mutual benefit network. On the other hand, the four kinds of people ought to be invited are of the lowest position in the society, being looked down and marginalized; especially the last three are considered sinners who are excluded from salvation.

Inviting these people or accepting them into a person’s own circle, will do no good because they cannot repay anything in kind. Besides, having this kind of people as guests would jeopardy the honor of the host. However, God will reward the host for doing so (v.14), and conversely, the Pharisees who do not accept these people will not be received by God at the resurrection of the righteous.

The above command of Jesus to the host is also applicable to us who are his followers. We are to share our wealth with the poor, taking care of the needy. Not just being the ethical instruction, the inclusion of the marginalized group also demonstrates the heart of the messianic feast in the kingdom of God as the Great Banquet in following text, vv.15—24 reveals.

Jesus through the parables, pointed out that the Pharisees and Scribes who initially were invited to the banquet, due to their pride and self-righteous, they rejected the gospel, thus would not receive the salvation. This scenario was even more apparent in the background 60-70’s AD when the gospel books were written. By then the mainstream Jewish society had utterly rejected the Jesus’ movement.

As for us who accepted Christ as Lord and Savior, are the disciples of Christ, who ought to go out to invite the lowly, the marginalized, the humbled sinners into the feast. These people will be exalted by God, being able to eat in the feast which means receiving the salvation.

The feasting parable reveals to us God is so generous and compassionate. Human society perpetuates structures of injustice and exclusion, but God intervenes on the side of the oppressed and the weak. The disruptive effect of God’s intervention is presented as a reversal of the structures of society: those with power, status, riches and self-righteous are put down and those without them are exalted into his kingdom unconditionally.

This implies that we are saved and exalted solely by the grace of God, not by own merits. So, for this reason, we ought to be humble and love our neighbors, accepting everyone even they are of lower status, people that we don’t like and find discomfort to associate with. In so doing, we are building a unique and new community, the Jesus’community! This community is fed by the grace of God alone.

Hebrew 10:19-25 say, “And so, dear brothers and sisters, we can boldly enter heaven’s Most Holy Place because of the blood of Jesus. Be his death, Jesus opened a new and life-giving way through the curtain into the Most Holy Place. And since we have a great High Priest who rules over God’s house, let us go right in to the presence of God with sincere hearts fully trust him. For our guilty consciences have been sprinkled with Christ’s blood to make us clean, and our bodies have been washed with pure water. Let us hold tightly without wavering to the hope we affirm, for God can be trusted to keep his promise. Let us think of ways to motivate one another to acts of love and good works. And let not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.”

Paul in Ephesians 2:13—18 says, “But now you have been united with Christ Jesus. Once you were far away from God, but now you have been brought near to him through the blood of Christ. For Christ himself has brought peace to us. He united Jews and Gentiles into one people when, in his own body on the cross, he broke down the wall of hostility that separated us. He did this by ending the system of law with its commandments and regulations. He made peace between Jews and Gentiles by creating in himself a new people from the two groups. Together as one body, Christ reconciled both groups to God by means of his death on the cross, and our hostility toward each other was put to death. He brought this Good News of peace to you Gentiles who were far away from him, and peace to the Jews who were near. Now all of us can come to the Father through the same Holy Spirit because of what Christ has done for us.”

Conclusion

Now we are in Christ as one new person. We have been reconciled to God and we ought in turn to share peace with everyone through mutual acceptance. Ethnicity and all other differences must not be the barriers anymore to divide us.

Today many of our urbanized churches have grouped ourselves on certain common ground, for example: a unique community, race, spoken language and income bracket. Church going has become a life style of the middle class, so much so when a person from the grass root, not the middle affluent class, walks into the church, we do not know how to have fellowship with him. We feel uncomfortable to have him around so we tend to ignore him. The irony is that Jesus Christ spent most of his time, walking through the vicinity of Galilee Sea, ministering to the grass roots people.

This is the challenge to us, as the redeemed people of God, in living out the gospel of the kingdom of God, which requires the acceptance of people who are of the same circle, and also people who are beyond our own circle to partake in the Lord’s feast together. We need to constantly examine ourselves, are we here building a wall of segregation or constantly gathering as one at the Lord’s Table.

Let us think over this, “What is the identity marker as God’s people?”

Not the profession, education level, income bracket, language spoken, skin color or academic credentials, nor religious taboos. Our identity marker is “people from diverse background, gather together as one people, feasting in the kingdom of God”!

Our identity marker is also “people from diverse background, gather together as one people—the Jesus’community, to motivate one another to acts of love and good works. And let not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another.”

We are all called from diverse background but one thing in common is that, we are here because of the grace of God. No one has anything to boast of and justify oneself. Let us do as Jesus did and commanded, that is, walk into the community around us to share our lives with people, extend our care, concern and acceptance to those whom the Lord also accepts.

Our Lord is indeed full of grace for everyone who humbles himself, who is willing to accept and love his neighbor. He will exalt us and provide for all our needs as we gather as one in his table. By this we can truly declare: “Blessed is the man who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God” (v15).