“Move Up to a Better Place”
Luke 14:1-14

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Pastor Kevin Vogts
Trinity Lutheran Church
Paola, Kansas
Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost—August 28, 2016

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.  Amen.

The humorist Garrison Keeler imagines what it would be like if there was an airline called Lutheran Air: “All fares are by freewill offering, and the plane will not land until the budget is met.  Basses and tenors, please sit in the rear of the aircraft. We’re going to start lunch about noon, and then we’ll have the hymn sing—hymnals in the seat pocket in front of you.  Meals are potluck. Rows 1-6; bring rolls; 7-15 bring a salad; 16-21 a main dish; and 22-30 a dessert.”

Potlucks and other meals really do play an important role in the life of the church.  We now are blessed to have many such events not only in our basement fellowship hall but also in our beautiful new shelter house, including in a few weeks our annual Blocktoberfest.

Meals together also play an important role in the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ life and ministry.  There are recorded many happy scenes in the Gospels of Jesus eating with his disciples, family, friends, and followers.  The wedding feast at Cana where he turns water into wine; the feeding of the 5,000; at the home of Mary and Martha; the poignant Last Supper before his crucifixion; and, after his resurrection, the breaking of bread at Emmaus, and joyous breakfast with the risen Lord beside the Sea of Galilee.

Luke begins today’s Gospel Reading by setting the scene for us: “One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched.”  This particular dinner Jesus is attending, he is not among friends, but enemies.  A few chapters earlier Luke tells us, “The Pharisees and the teachers of the law [were] . . . lying in wait for him, seeking to catch him in something he might say, so that they might accuse him.” 

Jesus has been invited to dinner this evening at the house of a prominent Pharisee not so they can enjoy his company, or have a friendly conversation, or listen to his teachings, which he often presents at such meals.  No, the other guests at this dinner reject his teachings, and reject him as the Messiah.  They consider him at worst a charlatan, deceiving the common people with his trickery. 

Preserved in a collection called the Talmud is one of the most interesting ancient documents we have outside the Bible related to Jesus, the actual arrest warrant against him, which declares: “He shall be stoned because he has practiced sorcery.” This accusation against Jesus of “sorcery” is no doubt a reference—outside the Bible—to the miracles Jesus performed.  They were so well-known that his enemies could not deny they occurred, so instead they tried to disparage his miracles as trickery, or even sorcery.  As Matthew reports, “But the Pharisees said, ‘It is by the prince of demons that he drives out demons.’”

To the Pharisees, Jesus is at worst a charlatan, deceiving the common people with his trickery, even sorcery.  But, even at best, Jesus is to the Pharisees an unworthy upstart, a country bumpkin carpenter turned rabbi, who doesn’t deserve the following and attention he is getting.

If people are going to listen to and follow someone on the topic of religion, it shouldn’t be this nobody from Nazareth.  It should be THEM, the Pharisees.  After all, aren’t they the most knowledgeable, the most holy, the most righteous in the sight of God?  That’s what they think, anyway.

But, they’re losing power and prestige to this nobody from Nazareth.  They need to find some way to discredit Jesus among the common people.  So, they’ve invited him to dinner this evening, hoping to find some ammo to use against him, “lying in wait for him, seeking to catch him in something he might say, so that they might accuse him.”

Paul says in 1st Timothy, “God our Savior wants all men to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth.”  For Jesus, that’s why he accepted the invitation, that’s why he is there at the meal that evening.  He wants all men to be saved, he wants to somehow get through to these enemies of his, so that they will come to a knowledge of the truth. 

But, how can Jesus possibly get through to these men gathered for dinner that evening, who already are so set against him and his teaching?  Luke says, “When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable.” 

Jesus often uses parables, with engaging stories, to get peoples’ attention, and to get them thinking.  A good teacher or preacher uses illustrations that his hearers can really relate to, something from their own experience.  Jesus is, of course, the best teacher and preacher of all time, and so for his parable that evening he uses as his illustration something which is happening right there at the dinner.

“When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: ‘When someone invites you to a wedding feast. . .’”  The deeper meaning of this parable starts to reveal itself when you realize that the Bible often pictures heaven and eternal life like a great wedding feast, with Christ as the bridegroom, and his Church, all who trust in him, as the bride.  As Revelation says, “Blessed are those who are invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb!”

So, this isn’t just a lesson in proper etiquette and social graces that Jesus is giving.  A parable is an earthly story with a heavenly meaning, and this story he tells about guests being seated at a wedding feast is really about heaven: who gets in, or doesn’t get in.

This deeper meaning of the parable also comes out in the Greek word for “invited,” which literally means “to call.”  Because, that happens to be the very word from which we get our word “church,” which literally means “those who have been called out.” 

The Holy Christian Church is all those who from the mass of humanity have been called out by Christ.  Called out to follow him, called out to serve him, called out to bear witness for him.  The beginning of this parable, “When someone invites you to a wedding feast,” is really talking about YOU, called out by Christ, graciously invited to join him at his feast in heavenly glory.

So, this isn’t just a lesson in proper etiquette and social graces.  This earthly story Jesus tells has a deep, heavenly meaning.

“When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited.  If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this man your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place.  But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all your fellow guests.”

The first point of the parable is: Don’t think you deserve it.  Don’t think you deserve to be seated at the heavenly banquet.  For, none of us is worthy to enter eternal life.  The irony is, the very thought that you are qualified for heaven, that you have earned it and deserve it, that actually disqualifies you.  That puts you into the category of those who exalt themselves.  “Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place,” which is actually hell itself. 

“But when you are invited, take the lowest place.”  The second point of the parable is: Repent!  That’s what it means to “take the lowest place.”  Acknowledge that you are a sinner, not worthy to sit at the heavenly banquet table.

“The host will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’”  The final point of the parable is the Good News: Though you don’t deserve it, God is your friend, who invites you to move up to a better place.  “For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

The greatest example is Jesus himself, as Paul says in Philippians, “He made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being made in human likeness.  And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient unto death—even death on a cross!  Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name.” 

God invites you to “move up to a better place,” God exalts you to heaven, because his Son came down from heaven and humbled himself for you on the cross, taking your sins upon himself, earning your forgiveness by his suffering, death, and resurrection.

God is the host in the parable, and when you die, it is simply God’s way, on account of his Son’s sacrifice, of inviting you to: “Move Up to a Better Place.”