Although there isn’t a meeting this week (the next meeting is Sept 9), I can’t help but comment on today’s reading because it is too awesome. If you haven’t read Luke 14:1-14, then do so now and come back.
The context is Jesus dining at the home of a Pharisee on the Sabbath. Friends and important guests were often invited to a Sabbath meal after the Synagogue service. This is the Jesus’ 3rd banquet with the Pharisees and scribes. This is not just happenstance, as they are trying to trap him to discredit him. After Jesus’ harsh criticism of the Pharisees and scribes at the 2nd dinner (Luke 11), it says “they began to act with hostility toward him… and plotting to catch him at something he might say.” They had also accused Jesus of breaking the Laws of Moses and were furious that He defied their correction. So now they invite him to another banquet, this time at the home of a leading Pharisee; so they really must be ratcheting things up. I can hear the head Pharisee saying to his fellow Pharisees, “You guys obviously can’t do this so I’ll handle things and show you how it’s done.” The stage is set!
Note how when everyone is arriving, it says in verse 1, “They were watching him (Jesus) carefully.” Then, they placed directly next to Jesus a man suffering from dropsy. It’s so obvious they want to see if he will heal again on the Sabbath that it pains me. (Dropsy was an abnormal accumulation of fluids in the connective tissues or cavities of the body that caused swelling, distention, and pain.) The guests have barely arrived and Jesus asks all of them, “Is it lawful to cure on the Sabbath or not?” No answer! Then he asks them, “If your ox or son fell into a cistern on the Sabbath, would you not pull them out?” No answer! Why didn’t they answer? Probably because the way Jesus framed his question, if they said they would not save their ox or son, they would look foolish and wicked. So, Jesus cures the man with dropsy.
Before the Pharisees can regain their composure and cry foul, Jesus had been noticing how the guests had been very careful to choose the best seats at the table, according to their status. So Jesus starts telling them that when they attend a wedding banquet, it’s best not to take the seat with the highest honor, for the host may have to come and ask you to move down to make room for someone more important, which will cause you great embarrassment. Rather, he says, take the lowest seat so the host might come and ask you to move up to a place of higher honor. He concludes his little lecture by saying, “For everyone who exalts themselves will be humbled, but the one who humbles himself will be exalted.”
What’s amazing about this is that they invited Jesus to put him on trial for his healing on the Sabbath, etc., but instead Jesus seems to have turned the tables (again) and put them on trial. But wait, he’s not done. Jesus now directs his attention directly to the host (the leader of the Pharisees). Jesus tells him that when giving banquets, don’t invite your wealthy friends and neighbors, for no doubt they will return the favor and pay you back. Instead, invite the poor, the lame, and the blind, for they cannot pay you back. All that the poor outcasts have to bring to the banquet is who they are, and that is that matters to the Father. He finishes by saying, “You will then be repaid – at the resurrection of the righteous.”
And who are the righteous? The just (justified); which just so happens to include those who attend the Annandale Catholic Bible Study.
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