Of course, some excuses are downright laughable - here are some excuses as to why people were unable to attend an important function:

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Pierce Blankenship
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1 Sermon Transcript John Merson Luke 14:15-24 The Parable of The Great Banquet 26 th July 2015 I don t know if you are the kind of person that is good at making excuses - some people are very polished in this field, while others just stumble through unconvincingly. Making excuses is a kind of defence mechanism in which we come up with some questionable explanation for not doing something or not attending something. We hope our valid explanation will sound good enough to avoid suspicion and mask the truth that we really just don t want to go. Of course, some excuses are downright laughable - here are some excuses as to why people were unable to attend an important function: I decided to go to the function in my experimental solarpowered scooter. Unfortunately, it started to rain and I was powered off on a country road. It proved too far to walk. There was a big spider in my bathroom that would not leave me alone long enough to put on my evening dress.

2 I cut my hair myself for the banquet and made a right mess of it. The only time I could get an emergency appointment at the hairdresser was the time of the function. Sorry! My goldfish was up all night distressed. It desperately needed my company so I could not come! The dog buried my Volvo in the back yard, so I was unable to attend! I thought I was sick when I got home from work and wanted to make sure I wasn t. I wasn t, but by the time I found out, it was too late to attend! These are pretty ridiculous excuses; poor cover up attempts as to why these individuals did not want attend the function. Of course, to a greater or lesser degree we have all made these ourselves. I m sure all of us can think of times when we have been caught on the hop and come up with a pretty lame excuse to avoid attending a certain event. I know I have, and we are not always the most supportive of things that we selfishly think are of little or no consequence to our lives. However, some events and invitations need to be considered very carefully because our response to these invitations will have far reaching and long term consequences. Our parable today fits into that category. It is a parable of excuses, excuses that are lame but have far reaching consequences. 2

3 Jesus tells the story of a man who gives a banquet and invites many people along. Now, the custom of the day was a double invitation : firstly, an invitation was given well in advance of the meal, and then a follow-up, come now invitation at the time of the meal to those who had already accepted the first invitation. This makes perfect sense: those organising the wedding or the banquet need to know how many to prepare for and cook for - nobody likes surprises, like fifty guests more than you were expecting! According to Jewish culture, a chicken would be for two to four guests, a duck for five to eight, a lamb for ten to fifteen, a sheep for fifteen to thirty five and a calf for thirty five to seventy five. In other words, the amount and type of meat depended on the number of people who accept the invitation. With no fridges or freezers to cool the meat, once a bird or an animal has been killed it needed to be eaten more or less immediately; otherwise it would spoil and leave the company with a big risk of food poisoning. Therefore, the second invitation is a notification to the guests that the tatties are boiled It s now, COME! The Greek word, come literally means continue coming. This is consistent with the custom of a double invitation. The invited guest who responded yes to the first invitation are now duty bound to attend the banquet. They have already given their word. However, we learn that between the first and second invitation the circumstances of the guests seem to have changed. When the second invitation was given, ( come now ) rather than dropping everything and heading immediately to the banquet, they began to make excuses. 3

4 The first guest said he had just bought a field and needs to go and see it. In the Middle East, no one buys a field without first seeing it. A prospective buyer would firstly want to examine it thoroughly. He would want to know about condition of the soil. Were there wells on the land, stone, walls, trees and paths? What s the anticipated rainfall? All of this information would need to be gathered before thinking about buying. You would not buy the land and then go and see it - you would go and see it and then after consideration put in your offer. So the excuse is a poor one and this guest is stating in no uncertain terms that the field is more important than his relationship with the host. In a community where interpersonal relationships are very important, this excuse would be seen to be deeply offensive. The second guest said I have just bought five yoke of oxen and I m on my way to try them. Please excuse me. In the Middle East, oxen are sold in two ways. One way is that the oxen are taken to the market place, which is generally located next to a field suitable for ploughing. Anyone wishing to buy the oxen may then drive them himself and examine the animals thoroughly to see if they work well as a team. The other way is to announce that a team of oxen is for sale, let s say next Tuesday. On Tuesday, the team of oxen would be working in a certain field. Prospective buyers would then go to the field, watch, examine, and test them for themselves. Only 4

5 after a thorough examination and trial would the oxen be bought. So again, this excuse, like the other one, is a poor one and just as insulting. The third guest said, I have just got married so I can t come! He doesn t even bother saying please excuse me! In the tightly knit community of the Middle East, a wedding calls for a celebration for the whole community - it is therefore highly unlikely that this big banquet and the guests wedding would have been scheduled for the same day as a number of people would be attending both. Was it not more the case that even though he said yes originally, he was now all so loved up and could not be bothered going? So, when the invitation rang out, come all things are now ready, the first two pulled out because of economic priorities. The third pulled out because of relational priorities. All of them probably felt their excuses were legitimate, but how does the master feel? Well, he is not impressed - in fact, he s mad! He has been insulted by all three. Despite having said yes, they have each now registered other priorities, which they hold to be more important than coming to the banquet. The scary thing here for me is that their priorities are not in themselves bad. It s not like they are saying, I ve just opened a strip club in Tiberius, please excuse me or, I ve a large shipment of cocaine arriving at Caesarea, therefore please excuse me, no, these were just normal things that good citizens engage in in the course of everyday life. 5

6 The point is this: for the most of us, It is not our sinful agendas that keep us from God s banquet table of delights, but our own best agendas and priorities. John Piper writes: The greatest enemy of hunger for God is not poison but apple pie. It is not the banquet of the wicked that dulls our appetite for heaven, but endless nibbling at the table of the world. For all the ill that Satan can do, when God describes what keeps us from the banquet table of his love, it boils down to this: a piece of land, a yoke of oxen, and a wife. The greatest adversary to loving God is not his enemies but his gifts. And the most deadly appetites are not the poison of evil, but the simple pleasures of earth. For when these replace an appetite for God himself, then idolatry kicks in. So subtle is that idolatry that it is scarcely recognizable, and therefore almost incurable. How true that is! It s the good stuff, the everyday legitimate and joyous stuff that deceives us and robs us of the joy of God. We can all relate to this - you hear the Word of God here every week and perhaps as a result, a deeper desire for God is awakened in your heart. You leave the service with a genuine desire to pursue God more; to run harder after Christ and the joy of heaven. You are going to sort out your priorities. But then, as the week gets going and the commitments keep coming and the pressures keep building, these desires for the deeper joys of feasting with the king are choked out with the worries and riches and pleasures of this life, riches and 6

7 pleasures that are not evil in themselves. In fact, many of them could be seen as the blessings of God on our lives: the prime piece of property, the new car, the house extension, the holiday, the sports we enjoy, the golfing, cycling fishing, the advancing career, the shopping trips, the exercise regime, the new wife, the new boyfriend and so on. All of these are good things to be enjoyed, but make no mistake - they can become deadly substitutes for pursuing intimacy with God himself. God calls us to come to feast on his delights, but how often we miss the banquet because of our own pressing priorities, priorities that look from an earthly perspective to be so important! So, we need to ask ourselves honestly in the midst of these pressing priorities, Is Jesus really my chief joy and delight, or has God s wonderful gifts of fields, oxen and wife and sports and shopping and Facebook subtlety replaced the giver? Am I an incurable idolater who constantly has an excuse for avoiding feasting with Christ? The Bible says that if you are not feasting on Christ then you are feeding on ashes. Where do your true delights lie? How much time have you spent with Jesus this week? What s your excuse? Now, up to this point Jesus listeners would not have been surprised by the parable. Who hasn t organised a big banquet and had a number of guests pull out at the last minute, offering one flimsy excuse after another? As host you will be deeply insulted, but you have are more pressing problem: what are you to do with all this meat? The calf is killed and the food is on the table! Well, that it might not be wasted, you must go out again and invite other people to come, and of course, you would once again be inviting people of the same social standing, right? Wrong - here is the twist and knockout punch in Jesus parable. Rather than inviting the well-to-do folks from the same social 7

8 and economic circle, the host turns instead to the streets and invites the poor, the maimed, the blind, the lame and finally (because there is still room) he invites the homeless and landless, people outside the city gates and people on the highways and byways. These people were so surprised by the unexpected invitation that they had to be urged to accept it! They could hardly believe their ears that they were on the guest list for the banquet, a bit like a homeless person living by a rubbish skip whose eye catches a discarded lottery ticket that turns out to be last week s winning numbers. So utterly shocked, he needs to be urged to go and collect his winnings. It s all too good to be true! Grace is like that, it s overwhelming! Who, me? On God s banquet guest list? Surely not! I m poor! I m a cripple! I m blind! I m a nobody! There must be some kind of mistake? No, no mistake - the cripple, blind and lame are all invited. So, who do these people represent? Well, these are the people whose experience in life seems to mock them. It s like they have been given some concept of what life could be like if it were truly and fully fulfilled. But, sadly, they find their present condition is frustrating their potential, cheating their appetites and leaving their deepest longings unfulfilled. There are many people who find themselves in this place, if not in a physical sense then certainly in an emotional and spiritual sense. In this broken world, where sin pervades everything, we all live with unfulfilled longing for wholeness and completeness. We are all cripple in one way and blind in another. Sin handicaps us 8

9 of our true life and true potential. But in the midst of these frustrations come the call of grace and the invitation to God s banquets, where every desire and longing for wholeness and completeness will be truly satisfied for ever. The great thing about grace and our response to the invitation is that God s banquet will more than compensate for life s broken dream boulevards. That why the metaphor here is not just of eating but of feasting. Feasting is more than eating. Feasting celebrates the fact that no true potential appetite, desire, or longing given to us by God will prove to have been a deception; rather, all of our lives deepest longings will be granted their richest and most sublime fulfilment in Christ, and wow, it s all of grace, it s all of God s unmerited favour! The final guest list at the banquet must have been a very surprising (if not startling) to the Jewish man who said, Blessed is the man who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God. Jesus seems to sense the man s words are spoken with a pious assurance; of course, I am going to be one of them, I m in for sure! But what this man needed to grasp was that Jesus Kingdom is the upside-down kingdom, where there are many shocks and surprises; where first will be last and last will be first. It is one thing to be invited to the party; it is another to truly accept the invitation through grace and enter into the abundant life to which Jesus invites us. 9

10 This parable throws a number of challenges: are we like one of the initial people receiving the invitation that allow legitimate business deals and relationships to hinder us from coming to the banquet? Are we one of the later persons who can t believe their good fortune on being on Gods guest list? We marvel at God s amazing grace! Are we one of the servants, out looking for other needy people to bring to the table, that the master s house might be full? How good are we at spreading the message of grace and urging others to come? Maybe we can identify with all three challenges! Now, strictly speaking, those who received the initial invitation were the Jewish leaders, privileged to be brought up within the God s covenant community. They believed that because of their heritage and ethnic identity, their name tags were already on the banquet table. As God s covenant people, they saw no need to come when Jesus invited them. They believed they already gained their seat anyway and saw no need of grace. Some people brought within the new covenant community - the Christian church - can make the same mistake because they have a rich Christian heritage, or because they have been baptised into the church, or learned all of the Bible stories as a kid, or live an upright life. We may feel we merit a space at the table and our name tag is already there. 10

11 Big mistake! This parable teaches us the need to respond to the invitation. We get a place at the table not by Christian heritage, or by merit, or baptism, or by Bible knowledge, but by responding to God s grace. We must personally respond to Jesus invitation; it needs to be the priority of our lives! It s not enough just to be invited; we must come, and come wholeheartedly! For I tell you, says Jesus, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner. Why? Because although they were invited, they still did not come. The parable should serve as a warning to us all to make sure we have responded to God s offer of life and grace. If you excuse yourself for whatever reason, you do it at your own peril with very long term consequences. Now is the accepted time; now is the day of salvation! But what about those who say they do believe and have come to Jesus but never get round to feasting on him because of other priorities? The most dangerous excuses are those with which we delude ourselves. One of the unrecognized characteristics of excuses is that they accuse as well. Why? Because they reveal our true priorities. One of the saddest churches mentioned in the bible is Laodicea. They really felt because of their acquired wealth that they needed nothing, not even Jesus. 11

12 They were a church that celebrated Gods gifts, but left the giver outside. What a tragic situation! Jesus had to knock at the door of this church to get in! You say, I am rich; I have acquired wealth and do not need a thing. The church goers were self-satisfied and had no appetited for Jesus. But their wrong priorities left them greatly deceived: but you do not realise that you are wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. Jesus calls them to repent of their wrong priorities; to be earnest and repent. Here I am! he says, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me. Jesus wants them to respond to his invitation to eat with him; to feast on him, to fellowship with him, to find true joy and satisfaction in him, to remember that without him and his grace they were indeed wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked. I don t care how blessed you have been in life! If you are not fellowship and feasting on Christ as a way of life then you are greatly impoverished! I don t know if the Laodiceans responded to Christ s call to repent of their wrong priorities and feast on him. Maybe some did, maybe some didn t - but these texts have been preserved as a warning to us so that we do not make the same mistake. Sometimes we just need to confess the truth about our wrong values and priorities, and put our hands up and say, Lord, I 12

13 love business life more than you, I love sports more than you, I love cars more that you, I love sex more than you, I love my family more than you, I love wealth more that you, I love movies and Sky television and soaps and Facebook more than you. What s keeping you from feasting on Jesus? What other priorities and poultry excuses are robbing you of delighting in Christ himself? What things have subtly replaced an appetite for God himself in your life and set you on a course of idolatry that is hardly recognizable and yet deeply destructive to your spiritual wellbeing? Jesus calls us to examine ourselves and repent. Jesus calls us to come. He still longs for us to feast with him and cherish him above all else. This is the challenge today. Will you seek to cherish Jesus above all things today? Only he can satisfy your deepest longings of your soul. This challenge is about to go deeper, because Jesus invites us to his table this morning. The Lord himself is the host. On offer are simply bread and wine, but make no mistake about it, this table is a banquet! These emblems represent Christ and his self-giving love, his body given and blood out poured as the ultimate expression of God s generosity and grace to us, the poor, the needy, the wretched, and blind that we might be made whole. Jesus calls us to come, so that we might feed and drink on him, that we might find grace, satisfaction, righteousness, true riches, security and joy. Come, all you who are weary and are heavy laden and I will give you rest! 13

14 Come, perhaps firstly confessing wrong priorities; priorities that have robbed us of his rest and his joy. Come to the table, not because you are worthy but because you have been invited. Come to the table, not because you are strong but because you are weak. Come to the table, not because you are rich but because you are poor. Come to table, not because of you merit a place but because your name tag is written in blood; in Christ s blood through his self-giving love on the cross. Come to the table, not because you are full but because you are empty. Come and feed off his body, that you might be nourished and strengthened and satisfied. Come; drink deep in his love through the royal wine of heaven. Will you come? Will you examine yourself and come to this table of grace this morning? This communion feast is an anticipation of the feast to come, when all our longings and deepest desires will be truly satisfied for ever. This feast is a 14

15 foretaste of the lamb s great feast of bliss and joy. This is real food and real drink; the only meal that can sustain us while we await the Kingdom come and are fully transformed into Christlikeness. How could we prioritize a field, oxen, a wife or anything else over this feast? Let s examine ourselves, be done with wrong priorities and excuses! Let s (perhaps for the first time in a long time) celebrate Christ and Christ alone, his beauty, his perfection, his self-giving love, his triumph, his grace, his joy, his extravagance. Let s feast on him this morning as we take the bread and wine! 15

Series: The Parables of Jesus No Excuses: The Parable of God s Party Rev. Dr. Scott Field Matthew 22: :15 AM Service

Series: The Parables of Jesus No Excuses: The Parable of God s Party Rev. Dr. Scott Field Matthew 22: 1-14 9:15 AM Service The Kingdom of God is Like a Party The parable of the dinner party seems to give