The thing I find the most interesting about this Gospel reading for this morning is how it begins. “Now all the tax collectors and the sinners were coming near to listen to Jesus. And the Pharisees and the scribes were grumbling and saying, ‘This fellow welcomes sinners and eats with them.’” When you heard it this morning, you maybe didn’t think too much of it. The point of these couple verses after all is just to set the stage for who Jesus is telling the parables to and to introduce who the “lost” are. But while we read Luke’s gospel as a series of short stories for convenience sake—it wouldn’t make sense for me to read the entire Gospel of Luke on a Sunday morning—it is not a series of short stories, it is a continuous narrative. So let me real quick run through the readings we’ve had the last couple Sundays, to refresh your memories and help you see why I find this intro so interesting.
Chapter fourteen started with Jesus being invited to the home of one of the Pharisees for a meal on the sabbath. Dinner parties in the first century were very transactional affairs. So it’s likely that there were a few reasons Jesus was invited to this gathering. One because as a visiting scholar who by this point in his ministry was traveling with a huge crowd of followers, Jesus probably had created quite a buzz at the synagogue that day, and the Pharisee wanted the prestige of hosting such an honored guest. But second, the Pharisees have already tried several times to catch Jesus working on the sabbath, an action that was seen as against the law of God, and several times Jesus had managed to wiggle out of their accusations by pointing out conflicting laws, so they were likely trying to catch him again. Which, in verse two Jesus healed a man with dropsy and followed up with a challenge to the Pharisees about pulling children out of wells on the sabbath, so the Pharisees were right on, that happened. Jesus followed that up with a parable challenging the social climbing antics of dinner parties, so we’re two for two so far on that.
But there’s another weird aspect of first century dinner parties you may not be aware of, and that is that first century dinner parties, at least among the elite, were public affairs. They were not egalitarian affairs; everyone was invited to join the dinner party. But, everyone was invited to watch the dinner party. First century dinner parties were less like a party you might host in your home and more like the royal wedding or the Oscars. Invitations were based on social standing, but those who were of too low standing to be invited could sit in the audience and watch. And after it was over everyone would gossip about who sat with who and who was wearing what, who enjoyed too much of the host’s wine, who had been snubbed, honored, etc. And just like at a royal wedding, the expectation was the invited guests would not interact with the audience. Unlike today, where the audience was on the far side of camera, the audience would have actually been in the room, but there was still an invisible fourth wall between guest and observer. Those watching were the audience, they weren’t really there.
So last week, we heard how Jesus turned to the “large crowds [who] were traveling with him” and addressed them. And he addressed them with that really hard teaching on the challenges of discipleship where Jesus talked about “whoever does not hate father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters… and even life itself cannot be [Jesus’] disciple” and whoever does not give up all their possessions cannot be [Jesus’] disciple. It was a tough teaching, a real reality check about how hard it is to truly follow Jesus. And this morning we see that that very tough teaching went completely over the Pharisees heads, because they were too busy grumbling that Jesus was talking to the audience in the middle of their dinner party! The choice of the word “grumbling” is an interesting one for Luke to use as well, because it’s the same word the book of Exodus used to describe the Israelites complaints against Moses, after he had helped them escape slavery in Egypt and they were wandering in the wilderness, when they started to lament all the cucumbers they’d had back in Egypt, when they were slaves, and how they wished they could have cucumbers again. So there’s certainly a hint of melodramatics here. Jesus just told you guys, and some other people, about how hard it is going to be to be his disciple, and you’re mad not about what he said, you’re mad that he’s not paying attention to you and you alone. Maybe, Pharisees, Jesus can walk and chew gum at the same time. Maybe he can actually pay attention to both you and the crowds, and maybe, believe it or not, Jesus thinks the crowds too are worthy of being taught.
And then we get to the parables themselves. Two stories of people losing a small part of what they have, seeking after that thing until they find it again, and then once it is found, rejoicing in its return. Key to understanding the radical nature of these two parables is to know that for either one lost sheep out of a hundred or one lost coin out of ten, the prudent response, the practical response, would be to cut your losses and move on. The time and energy expended in seeking out the lost thing is not worth the value of the lost thing in the first place. And yet, Jesus told these two parables of people who do just that. So is Jesus insinuating that even seemingly worthless things deserve being sought? Yes, that’s certainly part of what’s going on here. And that’s a huge good news piece. God seeks out and finds every sheep, even one sheep lost is a missing sheep too many for God. If you feel lost, if you’ve ever felt lost, that God is not going to discount you is some pretty stinking good news. I could say Amen right here and call it good, and that would be a solid sermon. But a question was raised in Bible study today that made me think that there may be even more going on here than just that. So verses seven and ten are the verses that loop the Pharisees into the parables, that there is more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need of repentance. And the question that was asked was this, “what is the definition of a sinner in these verses, and what is the definition of the righteous?” And because I’m a good gospel scholar and I know that different words have different emphases in different Gospels, I responded, well, in Luke’s Gospel, Jesus spent most of his time with those who were called sinners by the Pharisees. So sinners were those who had failed to live up to the Pharisees interpretation of the law. And by contrast the righteous were those who kept the law as Pharisees understood it, i.e. the Pharisees. But the theological definition of sin, hamartia in the Greek, is separation. Sin is that which separates us from God, a sinner is someone who is separated from God. Righteousness, on the other hand is to be in right relationship with God, a righteous person is someone who is in relationship with God. So could we say then that in the moment of being found, the righteous sheep is the one sheep who was found by the shepherd, while the “sinner” sheep, and sinner in quotation marks here because I mean sin as a theological concept, sin as separation rather than sin as a separating action, the “sinner” sheep are the ninety-nine sheep who are not with the shepherd. Boooom, mind blown. Now, let me caution, please hold the sinner sheep thing super lightly because this is a sermon and I don’t have time to unpack that fully. Attention studies say I get about twelve minutes, and I’ve already used like ten of them. My point is the Pharisees working definitions of sinners and righteous were wrong because they were based on what they themselves could do. Or, more realistically, thought they could do. But the parables are about sheep and coins. Neither of which could be held responsible for getting lost, and neither of which could participate in their being found. The sheep and the coin were not found because they repented, they were found because the shepherd and the woman found them. So, therefore, our righteousness, our ability to be in right relationship with God is not about us finding God, it is about a God who found us.
That, dear people of God is the real good news in these parables. You have been found by God. You, individual you, not in this instance you as the collective but you have been sought out and found by God. God values you so much that God stopped at nothing to find you, God left everything to make sure that you were found. Notice the tenses I used there, God values you, present tense, so God left everything and found you, past tense. I used the past tense there because the finding of you has already happened, you were found in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. You, you alone, you as an individual, you who as the Psalmist said, God knew before you were born, you who God knit together in your mothers’ womb, you are not lost, have been found.
You, precious, beloved, named and claimed child of God, and every other precious, beloved, named and claimed child of God who ever was and who ever will be. Because see God is infinite and we are not. Which means God has that same all-encompassing, all-consuming, completely intentionally focused love for each and every one of us. God’s complete and total attention and love for one of us is in no way diminished by God having complete and total attention for someone else. God too, can walk and chew gum at the same time, God can love more than one of us, in fact, God does love all of us. God’s focus for each one of us is the same intensely individual focus as the shepherd leaving behind the ninety-nine to search for the one. Which means, and here’s the piece the Pharisees failed to grasp, God was seeking each of them out with the same intensity God was seeking out those whom they called sinners. The Pharisees just didn’t get to realize they were being sought, because they hadn’t yet realized they were lost. Which is in itself good news. Because God is infinite and we are not, because God does not have to pick and choose whom God is seeking, that means that God is on a hunt for you even, and maybe even especially, if you do not think you are lost. So if you’re pretty sure you’re not lost, hold on to this promise for the days you feel lost, so when that day comes, you can remember that God has always been seeking you.
There’s the good news, and here’s the challenge. Since God is seeking out the lost, if we have been found and we want to stay where God is, God’s with the lost, so that’s where we too need to be. The challenge is we, like Jesus, need to be out with those whom others may call sinners, because it is among them that Jesus so often was, and it is among them where Jesus still dwells. You are found, dear friends in Christ, you are found, so go find Christ in others. Amen.
The extraordinary can look so ordinary
Wednesday, September 18, 2019
Sunday, September 8, 2019
God's Work. Our Hands. - A Sermon on Luke 14:25-33
Well now, the last time we were together Pastor Jennifer preached about the time a lawyer summed up the law as “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and love your neighbor as yourself.” And when the lawyer tested Jesus with the follow-up question, “and who is my neighbor?” Jesus followed up with a parable about how a man was beaten and left for dead, and the only person who would stop to help him was an outsider Samaritan. I have to admit, on first read I’m feeling a bit like I drew the short straw this year in our joint worship experiences, that Pastor Jennifer got the Parable of the Good Samaritan, and I got “Whoever comes to me and does not hate [their family]… cannot be my disciple.” How did we get from “Love God and love your neighbor” to “hate [your] father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters, yes, and even life itself”? Who is this Jesus?
Not going to lie, I was stumped at first with where this sermon was going to go. How I was going to bring together this apparent command from Jesus to turn on our families and God’s Work. Our Hands. Sunday, a day dedicated to going out and showing God’s love for the world through service? But then I started thinking more about the Samaritan, and the risk he took in caring for the man on the side of the road. What repercussions might he have faced from this act of service?
I want to run through this Good Samaritan story again really quick, but first, I want you to picture in your mind the most villainous group you can imagine. And I mean group specifically, don’t think of an individual person here. This is probable the one and only time I’m going to invite you to lean into stereotypes, think of the group of people who you would completely stereotypically think of as the worst sort of people, who have the worst ideas, who are the most off-based, the most selfish, the most self-centered, the most cruel. Got that group in your mind? OK, good. Let’s go on.
If you’re following along, this is from Luke chapter ten, verses thirty to thirty-seven. “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho when he fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead.” Jesus was telling this parable to a group of Judeans and Jewish religious leaders, so here’s what we should assume about the man, he was meant to be someone we can relate to, he was meant to be one of us. He was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho, maybe he was coming back from worshipping at the temple, or trading in the city, or visiting relatives, or whatever. What matters is he’s our sort of person, he’s part of our family, he would be the sort of person that we would feel an obligation to care for. So when the priest and the Levite, two people in well-respected positions of leadership passed him by, they were neglecting one of their own, leaving a brother or sister in the ditch. What if it was someone in your family? Can you imagine being so callous as to walk on by? Picture that scene in your mind.
And now, add to the scene of your loved one in need, a member of the villainous group I had you think about earlier. Imagine they are the one who stop to help your injured loved one. They are the one moved with pity, who bandage their wounds, bring them to safety, and offer to pay whatever the cost for the care that they need. That villainous stereotype, that is how the Judean community viewed the Samaritans. So if that scene was jarring to you, that is how Jesus’ audience would have heard it as well.
And now, I want you to flip the script one more time. This is the cool thing about parables, they invite us to read them from a variety of different perspectives. Flip the script and imagine the person in the ditch is a member of that villainous community. They are not your family member, quite the opposite, they are someone who wishes your family harm. And you, a follower of Jesus Christ, do the thing that Jesus was commanding here. You step in and play the roll of the Good Samaritan. You pick this person up off the ground, you bandage their wounds, you care for them, you bring them to safety, you pay for their bills. Of course, on the surface, we all know that is the right thing to do, “love your neighbor” is second only to “Jesus” as the best possible answer to every Sunday school question. But think for a second if you actually had the opportunity to do that. Would you get pushback from some in your family, in your community, for helping out someone like that? Someone who wants to do harm to you? I invite you, again, for the first and probably only time, to lean into the stereotypes in your mind and really ask the question, if you did something as radical as the Samaritan did and helped someone whom was understood to be truly and really other, would you get pushback for that decision? I’d be willing to guess you would. When that Samaritan went back to his family and said, “I helped a Jew today,” I bet he took some heat from it. Just like you’ve maybe been forced to have uncomfortable conversations with some of your family members about your faith. Conversations you’d maybe rather not have had.
But then I need to ask, was it worth it in the end? To help the person in need, to follow the way of Christ, even though you had to have that awkward conversation, even though it caused some conflict, even though the people you love, the people who are your family, couldn’t understand the choices you made? I don’t know all of you super well, but I would guess, knowing the cultures of both St. Peter and Trinity, I would guess that you would say that it was. That it was worth it to follow Jesus, worth it to love the outsider, worth it to take that risk for the Gospel, even though it made people uncomfortable.
Following Jesus, being a disciple, being part of the kingdom of God, has a cost associated with it. It’s not all puppies and rainbows and everybody loves you. Sure some people, many people, maybe most people, thought what we did yesterday, going out and being God’s hands and feet in the world, was great. But some probably questioned if we were wasting our time. Especially you St. Peter folk, at Trinity we at least have a building here, why did you make the decision to spend an afternoon in Post/Franklin, when you could have been doing so many other things? There’s a cost associated with being a follower of Jesus. It costs our time, it costs our energy, and sometimes, when the call of Christ leads us to stand up for unpopular ideas, it can cost us relationships. Jesus knew that, and Jesus loved his potential disciples, loves us, enough to make it painfully clear that being his follower was not going to lead to glory and prestige. Jesus himself was on the way to the cross. So before you enter into this life, Jesus cautioned, think about it. Just like you wouldn’t start a building without making sure you can finish it, or enter a war without being sure you could win. Ok, let’s be real, many people do those things, but common sense says you shouldn’t. Just like that, make sure you know what you’re getting into before you enter into this life.
But, here’s the good news. Remember how I talked about how the neat thing about parables is they’re meant to be flipped and read from a bunch of different angles? We’ve been reading these parables this morning from the perspective of us as the man building the tower, or the king leading the army, weighing the cost before we proceed. And that’s certainly a right and good way to read them, but what if we flip them? What if God is the one building the tower, what if God is the one leading the army? What if God is the one picking up the cost and entering into the fray and risking relationships for the sake of the kingdom?
The good news, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, is that God is about the work of redemption. God is in fact in the middle of this work of redemption. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ are nothing less than God redeeming the world for Godself. And the promise we have, from this text and from the whole of scripture, is that God counted the cost before beginning the project. God did not enter into this work of salvation without first knowing what it would take. God is God, after all, God knew, God knows, what God is doing.
What this means, dear brothers and sisters, is that you are worth it to God. You have value, you are valued. God has not entered into this love of you haphazardly, God chose you, chose us, chose this world, as God’s people.
And what I think is even cooler, even more special, even more powerful and meaningful and strong. God did not just choose us to redeem, but God also chose us to be about God’s own work of redemption. God could have done this work on God’s own, God is God, after all, but God chose us to get to be God’s people in the world.
Dear people of God, it is work to be a disciple. There is cost. But, it is worth it, you are worth it, God values you above all else. So let us be about this work of redemption. This work which God has started, which God has promised to finish, and which God is about in us and the world. Amen.
Not going to lie, I was stumped at first with where this sermon was going to go. How I was going to bring together this apparent command from Jesus to turn on our families and God’s Work. Our Hands. Sunday, a day dedicated to going out and showing God’s love for the world through service? But then I started thinking more about the Samaritan, and the risk he took in caring for the man on the side of the road. What repercussions might he have faced from this act of service?
I want to run through this Good Samaritan story again really quick, but first, I want you to picture in your mind the most villainous group you can imagine. And I mean group specifically, don’t think of an individual person here. This is probable the one and only time I’m going to invite you to lean into stereotypes, think of the group of people who you would completely stereotypically think of as the worst sort of people, who have the worst ideas, who are the most off-based, the most selfish, the most self-centered, the most cruel. Got that group in your mind? OK, good. Let’s go on.
If you’re following along, this is from Luke chapter ten, verses thirty to thirty-seven. “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho when he fell into the hands of robbers, who stripped him, beat him, and went away, leaving him half dead.” Jesus was telling this parable to a group of Judeans and Jewish religious leaders, so here’s what we should assume about the man, he was meant to be someone we can relate to, he was meant to be one of us. He was traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho, maybe he was coming back from worshipping at the temple, or trading in the city, or visiting relatives, or whatever. What matters is he’s our sort of person, he’s part of our family, he would be the sort of person that we would feel an obligation to care for. So when the priest and the Levite, two people in well-respected positions of leadership passed him by, they were neglecting one of their own, leaving a brother or sister in the ditch. What if it was someone in your family? Can you imagine being so callous as to walk on by? Picture that scene in your mind.
And now, add to the scene of your loved one in need, a member of the villainous group I had you think about earlier. Imagine they are the one who stop to help your injured loved one. They are the one moved with pity, who bandage their wounds, bring them to safety, and offer to pay whatever the cost for the care that they need. That villainous stereotype, that is how the Judean community viewed the Samaritans. So if that scene was jarring to you, that is how Jesus’ audience would have heard it as well.
And now, I want you to flip the script one more time. This is the cool thing about parables, they invite us to read them from a variety of different perspectives. Flip the script and imagine the person in the ditch is a member of that villainous community. They are not your family member, quite the opposite, they are someone who wishes your family harm. And you, a follower of Jesus Christ, do the thing that Jesus was commanding here. You step in and play the roll of the Good Samaritan. You pick this person up off the ground, you bandage their wounds, you care for them, you bring them to safety, you pay for their bills. Of course, on the surface, we all know that is the right thing to do, “love your neighbor” is second only to “Jesus” as the best possible answer to every Sunday school question. But think for a second if you actually had the opportunity to do that. Would you get pushback from some in your family, in your community, for helping out someone like that? Someone who wants to do harm to you? I invite you, again, for the first and probably only time, to lean into the stereotypes in your mind and really ask the question, if you did something as radical as the Samaritan did and helped someone whom was understood to be truly and really other, would you get pushback for that decision? I’d be willing to guess you would. When that Samaritan went back to his family and said, “I helped a Jew today,” I bet he took some heat from it. Just like you’ve maybe been forced to have uncomfortable conversations with some of your family members about your faith. Conversations you’d maybe rather not have had.
But then I need to ask, was it worth it in the end? To help the person in need, to follow the way of Christ, even though you had to have that awkward conversation, even though it caused some conflict, even though the people you love, the people who are your family, couldn’t understand the choices you made? I don’t know all of you super well, but I would guess, knowing the cultures of both St. Peter and Trinity, I would guess that you would say that it was. That it was worth it to follow Jesus, worth it to love the outsider, worth it to take that risk for the Gospel, even though it made people uncomfortable.
Following Jesus, being a disciple, being part of the kingdom of God, has a cost associated with it. It’s not all puppies and rainbows and everybody loves you. Sure some people, many people, maybe most people, thought what we did yesterday, going out and being God’s hands and feet in the world, was great. But some probably questioned if we were wasting our time. Especially you St. Peter folk, at Trinity we at least have a building here, why did you make the decision to spend an afternoon in Post/Franklin, when you could have been doing so many other things? There’s a cost associated with being a follower of Jesus. It costs our time, it costs our energy, and sometimes, when the call of Christ leads us to stand up for unpopular ideas, it can cost us relationships. Jesus knew that, and Jesus loved his potential disciples, loves us, enough to make it painfully clear that being his follower was not going to lead to glory and prestige. Jesus himself was on the way to the cross. So before you enter into this life, Jesus cautioned, think about it. Just like you wouldn’t start a building without making sure you can finish it, or enter a war without being sure you could win. Ok, let’s be real, many people do those things, but common sense says you shouldn’t. Just like that, make sure you know what you’re getting into before you enter into this life.
But, here’s the good news. Remember how I talked about how the neat thing about parables is they’re meant to be flipped and read from a bunch of different angles? We’ve been reading these parables this morning from the perspective of us as the man building the tower, or the king leading the army, weighing the cost before we proceed. And that’s certainly a right and good way to read them, but what if we flip them? What if God is the one building the tower, what if God is the one leading the army? What if God is the one picking up the cost and entering into the fray and risking relationships for the sake of the kingdom?
The good news, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, is that God is about the work of redemption. God is in fact in the middle of this work of redemption. The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ are nothing less than God redeeming the world for Godself. And the promise we have, from this text and from the whole of scripture, is that God counted the cost before beginning the project. God did not enter into this work of salvation without first knowing what it would take. God is God, after all, God knew, God knows, what God is doing.
What this means, dear brothers and sisters, is that you are worth it to God. You have value, you are valued. God has not entered into this love of you haphazardly, God chose you, chose us, chose this world, as God’s people.
And what I think is even cooler, even more special, even more powerful and meaningful and strong. God did not just choose us to redeem, but God also chose us to be about God’s own work of redemption. God could have done this work on God’s own, God is God, after all, but God chose us to get to be God’s people in the world.
Dear people of God, it is work to be a disciple. There is cost. But, it is worth it, you are worth it, God values you above all else. So let us be about this work of redemption. This work which God has started, which God has promised to finish, and which God is about in us and the world. Amen.
Tuesday, September 3, 2019
Accessibility: A Sermon on Luke 14:1, 7-14
This morning’s passage is a bit of a weird one. On first read through it always feels a bit like a page from the book “How to Win Friends and Influence People,” like Jesus is giving sage advice for social climbing. Our text this morning started out with Jesus noticing how the guests were jockeying for position at the table to guarantee themselves a place of honor. This is one of those places where first century culture and our culture differ, so it’s important to stress just how much of a big deal seating assignments were. In a society where one’s social standing affected one’s access, to be seen as more or less important in the eyes of the culture, was crucial. So at first, Jesus’ advice here, to take not just a lower seat, but the lowest seat at a party, so that the host will need to point out your humility and raise you to a higher place, seems like nothing more than good advice for social climbing. If you take a seat lower than the one you deserve, not only will you not get the humiliation of being moved down in rank, but you will get the added glory of having your humility on display, thus earning you an even higher ranking and more social status, this person is important AND humble, what a winner!
But humility for the sake of humility is not actually humility at all. Maybe you’re familiar with the concept of the humble brag? The social media trope of putting oneself down for the purpose of fishing for compliments. That sort of self-deprecation isn’t humility at all, it is in itself a sort of gamesmanship, of using humility to draw attention to yourself. And what’s more, if the advice was to take a low seat so that you could be raised up, Jesus never took that advice. Jesus took the low seat all the time, but not so that others would thing better of him. In fact, his taking of the low seat is what got him killed. Jesus hung out with beggars and thieves and outcasts because Jesus genuinely wanted to spend time with those people, not as some sort of show of what a great egalitarian hero he was. And I wonder if he wants to spend time with the bottom of the social status people not only because he cared about those whom others had overlooked, but also because they were less annoying than those at the top of society. When you’re already at the bottom you don’t need to flaunt your humility, and there is a certain freedom in that, an honesty that is refreshing for those of us who are stuck in the game. So, I don’t think what’s going on here is Jesus giving advice for more effective social climbing. But what is going on here?
More than just successfully navigating the social game, what I think Jesus was doing here was completely throwing out the social order entirely. Taking the lowest seat at the table isn’t about getting to be raised up to the higher one, its about making a statement about the value of ranking people in the first place. When Rose Parks sat in the front of the bus, she wasn’t making a statement about her personal value against everyone else on the bus, she was making statement about the entire concept of grouping people by the color of their skin. Taking a place of lower status when society thinks you clearly deserve a different one puts the spotlight on the entire unjust system and forces us to ask uncomfortable questions about the nature of power, who has it and who wields it. The good news in this first half of Jesus parable is for those who find themselves cast down to lower status, because Jesus is saying, that position is a false position. In the kingdom of God those who exalt themselves shall be lowered, and those who lower themselves shall be exalted, and I think by default then, those who do not lower themselves, but are lowered by others, will too find themselves lifted up in the great upswelling of the kingdom of God. The challenge is for us who have some power in society, those of us who have something to lose. Which, pro tip, is all of us in one way or another. The challenge for us is to be on the lookout for those who have been unjustly demeaned, to put ourselves alongside of them and shine a light on the injustice. This is delicate work, for it is all too easy in doing this to shine a light on our own nobility and “wokeness,” but it is the work I think Jesus is calling us to. In the topsy-turvy calculus of the kingdom of God, my honor means nothing if it comes at the sake of someone else’s.
And Jesus didn’t just have instruction on how to be a good guest, he also had words for the hosts of the party. “When you give a luncheon or a dinner,” Jesus said, “do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors… invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed… for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” At first read, again, great advice for social climbing. Invite those lower on the social ladder than you, and you look like a great person for being so open and welcoming. But then I thought about it from the point of view of the poor, the lame, the crippled, those being invited to the dinner party for the sake of meeting Jesus’ words and I wondered, do they even want to come to the dinner party? Would they feel comfortable there? Would there be accommodations made for them so that they could participate fully? Or would they be on display, look at this poor person I invited to my party, what a great person am I! And again, if this is Jesus’ advice, Jesus never followed it. Jesus threw a couple of dinner parties in his day, think the feeding of the five-thousand or the post-resurrection breakfast on the beach, but in neither of them did Jesus specifically invite those in need. In the feeding of the five thousand there was no guest list at all, it was just food for whoever happened to be on the hill. And the breakfast on the beach was a very specific guest list, just his closest followers. And anyway, Jesus was way more likely to be a guest, to be the one doing the uncomfortable work of culturally commuting to a different group. So again, what’s going on here?
I think the good news in this parable is God wants and expects that everyone is invited to the party. When you feel excluded or overlooked by others, the good news here is Jesus is making a very firm stance on the expansiveness of welcome. The challenge is for us who find ourselves in the hosting role. This parable of Jesus means we need to find ways to make our gatherings accessible to all whom God wants included. As we talked about as we were going through the RIC process, it is not enough to say “all are welcome” and then not do the work to make sure that all really does mean all. Rather, what matters is to first do the background work so that we can then make a very specific invitation. You are welcome, and you will know you are welcome because I have done the work in advance to make sure I am prepared to be a good host. We’re doing this ADA work now, to make sure our building is accommodating to people with a variety of disabilities, and the question we keep asking as council is how can we be as accessible as possible to as many different people as possible. ADA has very specific requirements, but like any list of regulations, they need to be tailored to fit our unique setting. Like, for example, per ADA, our handicapped spots in the front of the building are not valid because, fairly, they force you to walk in what is a lane of traffic. True ADA-approved handicapped spots need to be in the parking lot, one for every twenty-five spots, and one spot specifically to accommodate a handicapped van, which means a designated walkway on either side to accommodate a wheelchair ramp. So, in the interest of accessibility and being ADA compliant, we’re working on getting the parking lot ready to make those spots. But, for a lot of our community, both in the congregation and the Co-op, the problem isn’t a handicapped van so much as its limited mobility, and the difficulty in walking all the way from the parking lot to the door. So, even though the front spots are not really valid handicapped spots, we talked in council about how we’re going to keep them, and maybe even get them signs to indicate they are for people with limited mobility, so that in our efforts to be ADA compliant we don’t accidentally become less accessible rather than more. And, let me encourage you to say thank you to Wayne, who spent an entire afternoon measuring and calculating the square footage of the parking lot, and Tish who called multiple asphalt companies, and ended up finding one who filled the pot holes for free, and to thank Diane Andert and Kendra in advance, because when you’re trying to think about how to make your building accessible, it’s super helpful to have people helping you who think through how to make spaces accessible for a living.
Yes, it’s a lot of work and no, it’s not going to be cheap. But it’s important work, and I think it’s even kingdom work, to make sure that when we invite people into our space, when we welcome people to our building, that we know we have done the work in advance to make sure that they truly are able to come and participate fully, in all ways. Not as tokens of how welcoming we are, but as full participants with gifts to give and wisdom to share. And we will be blessed. Not just at the resurrection of the righteous, but right now, with the gifts and wisdom that come from experiences not our own. Thanks be to God. Amen.
But humility for the sake of humility is not actually humility at all. Maybe you’re familiar with the concept of the humble brag? The social media trope of putting oneself down for the purpose of fishing for compliments. That sort of self-deprecation isn’t humility at all, it is in itself a sort of gamesmanship, of using humility to draw attention to yourself. And what’s more, if the advice was to take a low seat so that you could be raised up, Jesus never took that advice. Jesus took the low seat all the time, but not so that others would thing better of him. In fact, his taking of the low seat is what got him killed. Jesus hung out with beggars and thieves and outcasts because Jesus genuinely wanted to spend time with those people, not as some sort of show of what a great egalitarian hero he was. And I wonder if he wants to spend time with the bottom of the social status people not only because he cared about those whom others had overlooked, but also because they were less annoying than those at the top of society. When you’re already at the bottom you don’t need to flaunt your humility, and there is a certain freedom in that, an honesty that is refreshing for those of us who are stuck in the game. So, I don’t think what’s going on here is Jesus giving advice for more effective social climbing. But what is going on here?
More than just successfully navigating the social game, what I think Jesus was doing here was completely throwing out the social order entirely. Taking the lowest seat at the table isn’t about getting to be raised up to the higher one, its about making a statement about the value of ranking people in the first place. When Rose Parks sat in the front of the bus, she wasn’t making a statement about her personal value against everyone else on the bus, she was making statement about the entire concept of grouping people by the color of their skin. Taking a place of lower status when society thinks you clearly deserve a different one puts the spotlight on the entire unjust system and forces us to ask uncomfortable questions about the nature of power, who has it and who wields it. The good news in this first half of Jesus parable is for those who find themselves cast down to lower status, because Jesus is saying, that position is a false position. In the kingdom of God those who exalt themselves shall be lowered, and those who lower themselves shall be exalted, and I think by default then, those who do not lower themselves, but are lowered by others, will too find themselves lifted up in the great upswelling of the kingdom of God. The challenge is for us who have some power in society, those of us who have something to lose. Which, pro tip, is all of us in one way or another. The challenge for us is to be on the lookout for those who have been unjustly demeaned, to put ourselves alongside of them and shine a light on the injustice. This is delicate work, for it is all too easy in doing this to shine a light on our own nobility and “wokeness,” but it is the work I think Jesus is calling us to. In the topsy-turvy calculus of the kingdom of God, my honor means nothing if it comes at the sake of someone else’s.
And Jesus didn’t just have instruction on how to be a good guest, he also had words for the hosts of the party. “When you give a luncheon or a dinner,” Jesus said, “do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors… invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed… for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” At first read, again, great advice for social climbing. Invite those lower on the social ladder than you, and you look like a great person for being so open and welcoming. But then I thought about it from the point of view of the poor, the lame, the crippled, those being invited to the dinner party for the sake of meeting Jesus’ words and I wondered, do they even want to come to the dinner party? Would they feel comfortable there? Would there be accommodations made for them so that they could participate fully? Or would they be on display, look at this poor person I invited to my party, what a great person am I! And again, if this is Jesus’ advice, Jesus never followed it. Jesus threw a couple of dinner parties in his day, think the feeding of the five-thousand or the post-resurrection breakfast on the beach, but in neither of them did Jesus specifically invite those in need. In the feeding of the five thousand there was no guest list at all, it was just food for whoever happened to be on the hill. And the breakfast on the beach was a very specific guest list, just his closest followers. And anyway, Jesus was way more likely to be a guest, to be the one doing the uncomfortable work of culturally commuting to a different group. So again, what’s going on here?
I think the good news in this parable is God wants and expects that everyone is invited to the party. When you feel excluded or overlooked by others, the good news here is Jesus is making a very firm stance on the expansiveness of welcome. The challenge is for us who find ourselves in the hosting role. This parable of Jesus means we need to find ways to make our gatherings accessible to all whom God wants included. As we talked about as we were going through the RIC process, it is not enough to say “all are welcome” and then not do the work to make sure that all really does mean all. Rather, what matters is to first do the background work so that we can then make a very specific invitation. You are welcome, and you will know you are welcome because I have done the work in advance to make sure I am prepared to be a good host. We’re doing this ADA work now, to make sure our building is accommodating to people with a variety of disabilities, and the question we keep asking as council is how can we be as accessible as possible to as many different people as possible. ADA has very specific requirements, but like any list of regulations, they need to be tailored to fit our unique setting. Like, for example, per ADA, our handicapped spots in the front of the building are not valid because, fairly, they force you to walk in what is a lane of traffic. True ADA-approved handicapped spots need to be in the parking lot, one for every twenty-five spots, and one spot specifically to accommodate a handicapped van, which means a designated walkway on either side to accommodate a wheelchair ramp. So, in the interest of accessibility and being ADA compliant, we’re working on getting the parking lot ready to make those spots. But, for a lot of our community, both in the congregation and the Co-op, the problem isn’t a handicapped van so much as its limited mobility, and the difficulty in walking all the way from the parking lot to the door. So, even though the front spots are not really valid handicapped spots, we talked in council about how we’re going to keep them, and maybe even get them signs to indicate they are for people with limited mobility, so that in our efforts to be ADA compliant we don’t accidentally become less accessible rather than more. And, let me encourage you to say thank you to Wayne, who spent an entire afternoon measuring and calculating the square footage of the parking lot, and Tish who called multiple asphalt companies, and ended up finding one who filled the pot holes for free, and to thank Diane Andert and Kendra in advance, because when you’re trying to think about how to make your building accessible, it’s super helpful to have people helping you who think through how to make spaces accessible for a living.
Yes, it’s a lot of work and no, it’s not going to be cheap. But it’s important work, and I think it’s even kingdom work, to make sure that when we invite people into our space, when we welcome people to our building, that we know we have done the work in advance to make sure that they truly are able to come and participate fully, in all ways. Not as tokens of how welcoming we are, but as full participants with gifts to give and wisdom to share. And we will be blessed. Not just at the resurrection of the righteous, but right now, with the gifts and wisdom that come from experiences not our own. Thanks be to God. Amen.
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