This week, we are looking at a section of an account of
Jesus life in the Bible called the gospel of Luke, where Jesus, after
breaking one of their religious rules by healing a man, decided that it was
time to turn the tables on them. And to turn the tables on them, Jesus tells a
series of parables. Yesterday, we saw Jesus explain that God is the One who extends the invitation to be on
mission. God is the One who will decide who will receive prestige and honor as
a result of how they engage in the mission. And those who humbly place others
before themselves as they engage them will be the ones that God honors. Now if
that was not enough, Jesus continues by telling a second parable, which Luke
records for us in Luke 14:12:
And He also went on to say to the one who had
invited Him, "When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your
friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, otherwise they
may also invite you in return and that
will be your repayment. "But when you give a reception, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame,
the blind, and you will be
blessed, since they do not have the
means to repay you; for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the
righteous."
In this parable, we see Jesus attack the insider vs.
outsider mentality of the self righteous religious leaders of His day. You see,
these self righteous leaders were a part of the in crowd. And as a part of the
in crowd, these self righteous religious people would have dinner parties for their
other self righteous religious friends. The expectation, however, was that if
you were invited to one of these insider dinner parties, that you would invite
the person who invited you to their party to your party.
So, if these self righteous religious people would invite
ten other self righteous religious people over to their house for a dinner
party, the expectation would be that they would receive invitations to ten
other dinner parties. However, if you were an outsider that did not measure up
to the prestige and power of an insider so that you could return the
invitation; you would not get an invitation.
Now has anything changed? Is this not a natural
temptation that we still face today? Are we not tempted to extend invitations
to others so that we can be invited by others to be a part of the insiders?
What is true for us as individuals is also true for us as a church. As Andy
Stanley points out, the natural trajectory of a church is to focus inward. The
natural trajectory of church is to focus on the insiders who are already here
at the expense of the outsiders who are not here.
Jesus responds to this temptation by challenging the self
righteous religious people of his day to change their focus. Instead of
focusing on what they would receive from those who are already on the inside,
Jesus calls those listening to focus on the needs of those outside without any
expectation of receiving anything in return.
Jesus then explains that by focusing on those who are
outsiders without any expectation of receiving anything in return, one will
experience the blessing of being the recipients of God’s Divine favor at the
end of God’s story, when followers of Jesus will be a part of God’s royal reign
throughout all eternity as part of the kingdom of God. Jesus point in this
parable is that the focus of His followers is to be on the outsiders who are
far from God. The focus is to be on receiving recognition from God, not from
others who are already insiders.
So here is the hard question when it comes to living on
mission: What are you focused on when it comes to how you engage people? Are
you focused on engaging insiders because of what you will receive from them in
return? Are you focused solely on what the church will do for you? Because that
is what self righteous religious people do. Or are you focused on engaging
outsiders who may be far from God without any expectation of receiving anything
in return? Are you focused on what you can get from people or are you focused
on what you can give to people?
Because, as Jesus makes abundantly clear in this parable,
the focus of His followers is to be on receiving recognition from God as a
result of our investment in those who are far from God, not from others who are
already insiders. Luke then records for us how the self righteous religious
people responded to Jesus challenge in verse 15:
When one of
those who were reclining at the table with
Him heard this, he said to Him, "Blessed is everyone who will eat bread in
the kingdom of God!"
Luke tells us that one of the
self righteous religious people at the dinner party responded by making a
statement that was designed to make himself look spiritually mature. This
statement, if communicated in the language we use in our culture today, would
have sounded something like this: “How especially favored by God are those who
will get to go to the dinner party that God will have for us in Heaven”.
You see, this self righteous
religious person believed that, just as it was for those at this dinner party, the
invitation to God’s dinner party for all eternity in Heaven would be for only a
select few. From this self righteous religious person’s perspective, only a
select few would be invited to be a part of God’s kingdom in Heaven.
Luke then tells us that this
self righteous religious person’s statement led Jesus to launch into a third
parable, which we look at Friday…
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