This week, we will continue our study of Luke’s gospel with Luke 13:1-14:35. You can join us at any time on our journey. These readings today are about earthly and eschatological banquets.
Feasting:
As we see throughout the Scriptures, particularly the New Testament, feasting and banquets are a sign of joy, not only in this age but also in the age to come. It’s why the central Christian rite is a Thanksgiving feast. And within the Hellenistic culture of Luke and his audience, banquets were where people gathered to discuss philosophy – the love of wisdom. In Greek, the word symposium literally means “drinking party.” Within this section, he brings together a series of banquet-themed stories. Within these stories, Jesus imparts his wisdom and teaching on the Kingdom of God. Luke will continue the banquet theme into Chapter 15 and the three parables on finding the lost.
A Parable on Dinner Etiquette: (vv.1-11)
This chapter opens with Jesus dining with the Pharisees and the lawyers on the Sabbath, and a man walks in with dropsy. Jesus poses a question for the symposium – “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” This time, the lawyers and the Pharisees and lawyers do not take the bait and simply sit in silence. Jesus answers his own question – “Which one of you having a child who has fallen into a well won’t immediately pull him out on the Sabbath.” Jesus then heals the man.
Jesus follows up his question and answer with the parable on dinner etiquette – “When you are invited to a marriage feast, do not sit in a place of honor but in the lowest place.” The parable is a softer version of Jesus’ prior denunciation of the Pharisees and lawyers in Luke 11:37-54. The parable is about how the good religious people jostled for position at God’s table. The heart of the parable is Jesus’ warning about assuming one’s place in God’s kingdom.
Knowledge of the law and strict obedience to its provisions was assumed to make someone great in the Kingdom of God. This is a problem within a strictly Jewish context since only the well-off and educated have the benefit of this knowledge. But it becomes a more significant problem in the church when Gentiles, who have neither the knowledge nor desire to obey the Jewish law, enter. This is the topic that will occupy most of Paul’s letters. See, Rom. 14, 1 Cor. 8, Gal. 3.
The parable, of course, is not limited to pious Pharisees but easily translates into our churches today. Those of us who know the right things, believe the right things, and do the right things, often place ourselves at the head of the table. But as Jesus says, every one who exalts himself will be humbled v.11 or as Paul writes, “Knowledge puffs up, but love builds up.” 1 Cor. 8:1.
The Parable of the Great Banquet: (vv.12-24)
At the same dinner, Jesus once more gives an unusual teaching – someone throwing a party should only invite those who cannot return the hospitality. He then tells the parable of the Great Banquet that we have discussed previously with Fr. Robert Capon. In the parable, the host invites all the good religious people who all have good, sensible, legitimate excuses to decline the invitation. The host is not disappointed but angry, and this is Jesus’ way of dramatizing the futility of living a good, obedient life as a way of achieving salvation. In his anger, the host tells his slaves to bring in the poor and disposed for the party. In other words, God’s grace, as an unmerited invitation into the kingdom, only works on the untouchable, the unpardonable, and the unacceptable. Grace only works by raising the dead, not by rewarding the right living.
With this teaching, the banquet at the home of the Pharisee ends.
Cost of Discipleship: (vv. 25-35)
Luke inserts these teachings of Jesus on discipleship immediately after his banquet lessons that the exalted will be humbled and the humbled will be exalted. Jesus gives these teachings to the crowd. v.25. Jesus had previously given similar teachings to his newer disciples before he began the march on Jerusalem. Luke 9:51-62. Jesus begins by saying that unless you hate your family and your own life, you are not worthy to be his disciple. (Matthew records Jesus as saying, “If you love your family more than me.” Matt. 10:37-39.) Jesus is saying that his disciples, particularly at that time on their way to Jerusalem, but be willing to give everything up, including their most important relationships.
To be his follower is like a builder who knows the cost of the building or a warmonger who knows the strength of his adversary. He wants us to understand the potential cost if we are going to build up the kingdom with him and be at war with the Adversary. Jesus’s demands on us must come before the demands of this world. Otherwise, we are like salt that has lost its saltiness.
Dinner is at 6. The menu is a fish fry. Please make sure to let us know if you will attend. Discussion about 6:45. Hope to see you here.
On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of fat things, a feast of wine on the lees, of fat things full of marrow, of wine on the lees well refined. And he will destroy on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death for ever, and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth; for the Lord has spoken.
Isaiah 25:6-8