Sermon — August 28, 2022
The Rev. Greg Johnston
In every wedding planning process and at every wedding reception, there is a moment that has the power to distil and clarify decades-long relationships into a single decision: the seating chart. For months, the happy couple (or maybe just one of them and an in-law-to-be) have spent hours standing around the kitchen table, moving tiny names around the map as they factor in every variable. We’ll put the college friends over here, they say, and the neighbors over here, and the really strange second cousins somewhere over there. The bridal party goes here at the head table, and our immediate family right next to us, and—wait, wait, wait! We can’t put Uncle Jim next to our old high-school friends. Not after last time.
And then on the other end of the process, there’s the moment when the guests walk into the reception dinner and find their table numbers and sit down, when they finally see exactly what their friends or family think of them. Which table are they at? And, perhaps more importantly, who else is at it? You can tell pretty quick when you’ve ended up at “Random Family Friends Table #4” rather than in the place of prominence you think you deserve.
(This is one good reason to do what we did, and follow Alice’s family tradition of a stand-up reception, with a few tables scattered around for the grandparents.)
In Jesus’ time and place, wedding banquets worked a little differently, but there was just as much room for drama. From his words in the Gospel today you may be able to imagine the scene. At a typical classy event in the ancient Mediterranean world, the guests wouldn’t have been seated at separate tables, but reclining on their sides couches in a large U shape. The host would be seated at one end of the U, with places of honor on either side. If you were way down at the other end, not only would it be hard to participate in conversation, but you’d be facing away from the host and guests of honor.
One can imagine that in such an honor-focused society, the seating at many events was assigned. But Jesus describes a banquet with no assigned seating. You can imagine that when you entered the room, you had to think: am I the most important guest at this banquet? Am I the third-most important? The tenth? If you guessed too high, you’d embarrass yourself. Because if you walked in and took a great seat, and then someone else came in who was the real guest of honor, you’d be bumped to the first empty seat, which would most likely be the worst seat in the house.
So, Jesus gives some very practical advice: Go in and sit in the worst place instead, so that when the host walks into the room, he says to you, “Oh come on, scooch in a little closer,” and rather than being embarrassed, you look important and cool. (Luke 14:7-11)
It’s a neat trick. I’m not sure I’d call it a “parable.” (But we’ll get back to that.)
Then Jesus offers up a second piece of strategic dining advice, and this one is counter-intuitive but straightforward enough. When you throw a dinner party, he says, don’t invite your friends or siblings or relatives or your rich neighbors, because then they’re going to invite you over for dinner, and they won’t owe you anything anymore. (Luke 14:12) Instead, invite the people who can’t repay you, the ones who are poor, or who are living with various physical impairments. (14:13) And because they can’t repay you in this life, you’ve successfully tricked God, who’ll be forced to repay you in the next.
I don’t want to speak for anyone else, but to me this just feels a little… icky. The Gospel today reads like one of those click-bait ads at the bottom of a webpage: “Pastors hate these two easy ways to get into heaven.” Shouldn’t our motives be a little purer than this? Does Jesus really need to give us advice on how to fake humility so we look good in front of everyone else? Shouldn’t we extend our hospitality to the people who need it most because it’s the right thing to do—or maybe because we might be entertaining angels, as Hebrews says! (Heb. 13:2)—but not just to store up points in St. Peter’s account book? Can’t we be trusted to be good for goodness’ sake, and not out of self-interest?
Well, just to pause there for a second: What Jesus describes would be as remarkable in our culture as it was in his. When those of us who have more money host a dinner or a lunch, we really do tend to invite our friends or relatives, or neighbors who are more or less like us. We don’t really invite the people who can’t afford to pay us back. When those of us who don’t have much money are invited over for a meal, it’s not typically an invitation from the super-rich. In our society, we institutionalize a certain amount of generosity through non-profits and charities and a social safety net, but there’s very little real face-to-face encounter across our various divides; and in fact, outside a select few neighborhoods, most of our world is structured so that people who are poor and people who are rich don’t even see each other, don’t even live in the same place, let alone share a meal together.
And so if this sermon inspires you to “let mutual love continue,” to “show hospitality to strangers,” (Heb. 13:1-2) to host a radically diverse banquet and to choose the least prominent seat, then… Jesus would be pleased! We should probably do more of that! Maybe not for the self-serving reasons Jesus gives in his advice, which is so focused on our own honor and our own salvation. Maybe because it would be a beautiful enactment of so much of what Jesus teaches about the kingdom of God.
And in fact, I think there’s a little more going on here. It’s not so much that some of us, who are rich in possessions, should give banquets and invite others of us, who are poor, out of the goodness and generosity of our hearts. It’s that Jesus himself, rich in spiritual abundance beyond our wildest imaginings, is inviting all of us, who are poor, and hungry, and blind, to his wedding banquet. Luke calls this a “parable.” (Luke 14:7) Mere practical advice on how not to look like a fool isn’t a parable. A parable is about how God relates to us.
And in Christ, in Jesus’ very own life, God chose the humblest place. Jesus gave up the riches of heaven to become a simple, fragile human being. And he went beyond the lowest seat at the banquet into the most shameful places in the world, onto the cross, into the tomb. And when God said, “Friend, move up higher,” (Luke 14:10) he did, and brought us with him on his way. We are the poor, all of us, whom he invited us to feast on the riches of his grace, and we have feasted, and we cannot repay him. But we can turn around and invite other people to celebrate with us and to feast at his table.
So, yes, choose the humble place, not so that you will be exalted but because the One who humbled himself for you has chosen to exalt you. Yes, share a meal with those children of God with whom you might not otherwise come face to face, because the One whom we do not yet see face to face is even now inviting you to share in the holy meal of his Body and Blood. “Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have,” as Hebrews writes, “for such sacrifices are pleasing to God.” (Heb. 13:16) Do not neglect to do good and to share what you have, for God has shared God’s whole being with you, and he has said, “I will never leave you or forsake you.” (Heb. 13:5)
Even if you find yourself sitting at Table 17.