August 29 2010 Sermon Luke 14:1-14 And it came about that on a Sabbath, Jesus went up to the house of a certain leader of the Pharisees to eat bread and they were scrutinizing him to try to catch him breaking their laws. And behold, a certain man (suffering from) dropsy (was) before him Addressing the legal experts and the Pharisees, Jesus asked them, Is it permitted in the law to heal on the Sabbath or not? But they remained silent. Grasping hold of the sick man, attaching him to himself, [Jesus] healed him and dismissed him with his blessing. And he said to them: Who among you, if *your+ son or ox falls into a well on a Sabbath day does not immediately draw him up? But they were not able to answer him. Observing how they chose the places of honor at the meal, He began speaking a parable to those who were invited, saying to them: Whenever someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the seat of honor (in case) someone more important than you is invited too. For then the one who invited both you and him will come and say to you, Give *this+ place to him, and embarrassed, you will have to move to the last place. But whenever you are invited, sit in the last place so that he who invited you will come and say to you, Friend, come up higher. Then you will have honor before all those invited to dine with you. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted. He also said to the host: whenever you make a meal or a banquet do not invite your friends, or your brothers, or your relatives, or even rich neighbors lest they invite you back to repay you. Rather, whenever you make a feast invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. Then you will be blessed because they cannot repay you, so you will be recompensed in the resurrection of the righteous. The occasion was a Sabbath meal at the home of a prominent Pharisee. In the context of this meal, there are three scenes in our text today. But before we look at each of these scenes, we must first understand a little about the Sabbath meal where these scenes took place. The Sabbath meal is a family worship service, celebrated at home. It is led by the father or head of household. The Sabbath meal is patterned after the Passover meal, just a shorter version of it. It was this Sabbath meal, worship service, that was the forerunner or model after which the Christian church celebrates Holy Communion. In fact, the Sabbath meal is the closest that the church before Christ came to Holy Communion. It was a memorial meal of the Passover and it looked forward to the death of the Lamb of God. When Jesus died on the cross, he fulfilled the Sabbath meal and it was transformed into a Sacrament in which we don t merely remember his death, but partake in his death by eating his body and drinking his blood. Luke. This holy meal, this worship service, is the setting for three scenes in our text written by St.
Open the first scene, Jesus enters into the Pharisee s home to celebrate the Sabbath meal with him. The Pharisee had also invited several of his friends, other Pharisees and experts in Jewish law, relatives and rich neighbors, to share in this meal with the now famous rabbi, Jesus. By this time, though, there was mounting opposition to Jesus among the Jewish leadership and the Pharisees. The text says that the guests were scrutinizing Jesus, watching him closely, to see if they could find something they could criticize him for. They were legal experts. They were Pharisees, dedicated to strict observance of Jewish law, and they were watching to see if Jesus would slip up, break one of their laws, do something that they could use to discredit Jesus among his followers. Now this was not an unusual thing. On several occasions we are told that the Pharisees came to Jesus with trick questions trying to trip him up on something so they could point the finger of blame at him. Nor is it uncommon today. It is like attending some high society social function, when in comes a poor man. Everyone watches to see if he uses proper manners, eats with the correct knife, or places his napkin in the right place. Ready to criticize and point out how uncivil he is. Or perhaps it is like those who go to church, watching what everyone else is wearing, just so they can gossip about them over the noon meal. How much we seem to enjoy finding some slight fault, or catching someone slip up on some minor detail so we can criticize, accuse, and condemn. Sometimes we even go around purposely looking for something someone might have done wrong, just so we can accuse them. It makes us feel important. It makes us feel as if we are better. Of course we never make any faux pas. Don t you remember that Jesus said, Before you cast the speck out of your neighbor s eye, cast the log out of yours? But that s the way it is with self-righteous pride. And all of us suffer from self-righteousness. It is part of fallen human nature. It is sin against the first commandment and deserves the severe wrath of God s eternal punishment. No one is exempt. We are all Pharisees when we get right down to it. Now it just so happened that there was a man present who was suffering from dropsy. Dropsy, also called edema today, is an illness where too much fluid is stored in the tissues of the body causing swelling. It can effect different parts of the body. We take note of the fact that this gospel was written by St. Luke, a physician, who often gives us specific details about a person s medical condition. Why was this sick man there? It could have been innocent enough, but it is hard to resist the temptation of thinking that the Pharisees were setting a trap for Jesus. Now there I go doing the same thing; looking for something to accuse them of. Jesus realized what they were doing, so he took the initiative and challenged them. He asked a question: Is it permitted by the law to heal someone on the Sabbath? He knew that they would accuse him of breaking the Sabbath if he healed the man. They did not reply. So Jesus seized the man. Now the word Luke uses here means to hold on to him with force. Attaching himself to the man, something like a policeman grabbing someone to arrest him. It makes us think of how Jesus attached our sins to himself, taking our sin into his own flesh and suffering for it,
taking it to the cross bodily and putting it to death by crucifixion. Jesus, the Lamb of God grabbed our sin and took it to the cross. And for that reason God does not count our sin against us. Then, holding tightly to the man, Jesus healed him. He absorbed the man s sickness right into himself, drawing it out of the man, renewing the man s health; restoring him to wholeness. Then Jesus let the man go; sending him away with his blessing, Go in peace, your faith has saved you. Now this miracle of Jesus taught the meaning of the Sabbath meal. For the Sabbath meal memorialized the Exodus when God freed Israel from their bondage, and it pointed forward to Holy Communion where God sets us free from sin; making us whole and restoring us to the image of God; and then dismisses us with his blessing, Go in peace. Jesus asked, Which one of you, if your son or ox falls into a well on a Sabbath, would not immediately draw him out, contrary to the law which forbids work on the Sabbath? God works on the Sabbath. God saves his children on the Sabbath. Jesus rested in the tomb on the Sabbath and by his death freed us from the tomb; and God raised Jesus from that tomb, and by his resurrection restores us to wholeness and eternal life. God does not take leave from saving us. Open scene two: as the guests were sitting down to the meal, Jesus noticed that these selfrighteous men were all trying to sit in the places of honor at the table; like sitting at the head table at a banquet today. They all thought that they were important and deserved the honor and respect of the others. Now, who doesn t want to be in the spotlight and be honored by your peers. We all like to be praised and told how great we are. It makes us feel important and special, even superior to others. That s what self-righteousness does to us. It makes us think more of ourselves than what we really are. St. Paul warns, I say to everyone among you not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, rather, in humility count others more significant than yourselves. Jesus says, Not so with you, but let him who is the greatest among you become as the least and the servant of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve and give his life a ransom for many. So Jesus gives them a little practical advice; a lesson on manners: Take the seat of least honor, so that the one who invited you will say to you, Come up here, and you will be honored in the eyes of all the other guests. But perhaps this was more than just advice on proper etiquette. He was teaching them what it means to be baptized into Christ. Let this mind be in you, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant he humbled himself to the point of death Jesus is teaching that pride stands in the way of our relationship with God. Pride, selfrighteousness, that thinks highly of yourself, actually cuts you off from God. It is making yourself into a god; it rejects the grace of God in Jesus, and is again, a sin against the first commandment deserving of eternal death. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, by God, and he who humbles himself will be exalted, by God. As Jesus said, the first shall be last and the last first.
Open scene three: Jesus addresses the host of the banquet. Once again, Jesus noticed that all the invited guests were friends, and relatives of the Pharisee or else rich neighbors. Jesus tells him, When you make a wedding banquet, don t invite your friends, brothers, relatives and rich neighbors, rather invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind. For these will not be able to pay you back. Seems as if in our society we have the notion of reciprocity. I do something good for you, so I expect that you do something good for me in return. In fact, this idea is ingrained so deeply in you that you think it is rude, possibly even sinful, if someone does not return a favor. But the fact is, if when you invite your friend to dinner you are expecting that he invite you back, or give you a thank you gift, or at least bring an expensive bottle of wine with him, then your action is selfish and motivated by selfcentered love. You are not loving your neighbor as yourself, you are merely loving yourself. Once again, sinful self-centeredness is so ingrained in us, that we all feel as if we have a right to get something in return. But Jesus says, when you invite the poor, the crippled, the lame and the blind who cannot repay you, you will be blessed. In fact, you already have been blessed, and you will be exalted and honored at the resurrection of the just. Do not do good unto others hoping to get something good back in the future, you have already been given your blessing: redemption and forgiveness of sins. Don t expect your friends to repay you for your good deeds, you have already been paid by God; he has given you his grace; he has given you eternal life. Jesus once told of a man who gave a wedding banquet for his son and invited many important people. They did not come. So he sent his servants out to bring in the poor, the lame, the crippled and the blind. This wedding banquet was the kingdom of heaven. The point of all this is that God made a feast and called us to come to it. We are the poor, the lame, the crippled and the blind. He sent His Spirit out to bring us in. Jesus, the Son of God, sat in the lowest seat. He humbled himself to take the most despised, the humblest seat of all. He did this so that we could have the higher seats. He took the lowest seat to give us the higher places. And just as the Sabbath meal was a foretaste of Holy Communion, so Holy Communion is a foretaste of heaven. At that Sabbath meal Jesus tells us that in Holy Communion we do not come to exalt ourselves, we do not come seeking the honor and praise of others, nor to point out the sins and mistakes others make. Before coming to the altar, go, first be reconciled with your brother and then come to the altar. Come to the altar to receive the body and blood of Jesus who humbled himself to the point of death on a cross. We come in humility, confessing our sins, not exalting ourselves. We come to receive, not honor from others or payment for the good things we have done, but to receive the healing and renewal of God, to be restored to the image of Christ, to have our proud hearts humbled so that we can be exalted by God. We come not as the first, but as the last and least among men, in order to be raised up to glory and exalted in honor on the last day, at the resurrection of the righteous. This is our
Sabbath meal, the banquet in heaven where Jesus himself will come to you and say, My friend, come up here, sit in the seat of honor at the eternal wedding banquet. Amen.