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"When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors" (Luke 14:12-24), says Jesus.
As we look forward to celebrating our national day of Thanksgiving the fourth Thursday of this month, November 22nd, with family and friends, this is strange advice, indeed, from Someone who is so family-friendly and so downright sociable as Jesus is. Who else, pray tell, would we invite to our Thanksgiving Day spread?
As we eagerly anticipate eating, drinking and making merry with our friends, our brothers and sisters, our kinfolk and our neighbors, this is an odd kind of hospitality from One who is so hospitable as to welcome us as His eternal guests and so gracious a Guest as to accept our humble invitation and submit to our lowly table fellowship.
It reminds me of the inhospitality shown invited guests by some unthinking younger members of a household, and of the angry reaction shown them by their embarrassed parents. Both father and mother worked. This being Thanksgiving break, the children were to hold down the fort. This being Thanksgiving Day, with guests coming for dinner, the turkey was already prepared. All the kids had to do was pop the bird in the oven and turn on the heat--and its goose would be cooked.
But, this being the holidays and they being full of holiday good cheer and amnesia and equally engrossed in their computer games, they forgot. Dad got home, just ahead of the invited guests. There were holiday sounds aplenty but no holiday smells. You can guess whose goose got cooked! The kids made turkeys of them all--and that on national Turkey Day!
"When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors", not if you leave your kids in charge and they forget to cook the goose. Your goose will be cooked! You may end up a turkey yourself. But this isn't why Jesus suggests being more selective about the invitation list. His chief concern isn't cooked gooses and stuffed turkeys--or maybe it is.
The reason Jesus urges us not to invite our friends or our family members, least of all our rich associates, when we give a dinner or a banquet, is because they may invite us back and so repay us. Some devious hosts invite the boss over for a feast, expecting a promotion or a raise, or at least a holiday bonus--their own holiday turkey.
Some members of the opposite sex have someone of the opposite sex over looking for their own holiday treat, looking forward to feasting on him or her! Some neighbors wine and dine their rich neighbors, not because they're particularly neighborly but because they, too, expect something in return.
Guess who's the toast of the town! Guess who's coming to dinner! Guess who turns on the heat! (The devil never forgets.) Guess who's goose is cooked! If you can't stand the heat, you better get out of the kitchen. Such generosity is its own reward. And such glad-handers are paid back in full.
Guess who the turkey is now! And that's exactly why Jesus warns us, "when you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your kinsmen or rich neighbors".
Why? Because Jesus is a killjoy and doesn't want us to have any fun? Because He's a spoil-sport and wants to spoil our holiday good cheer? Because He wants us to be rude and crude, at worst, or inhospitable at the very least?
No, but because, depending on the motive for our generosity, we're liable to receive our reward and be paid back in full. We're liable to end up the turkey, our goose cooked, and the devil turning up the heat, and that, on Thanksgiving Day. Then, no Thanksgiving break, no amount of holiday cheer or high and holy amnesia will save us.
"But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the maimed, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed". That's a pretty weird guest list, don't you think?--particularly for a Thanksgiving Day spread! Why will we be blessed for weighting the guest list and weighing down our holiday table with the likes of these? Because they can't invite us back and thereby pay us back.
Therefore our motivation must be altogether different than what's in it for us. Our motive must be akin to that of our gracious Host who invites us to His spread, not because of what's in it for Him, since what's in it for Him is His goose cooked on the devil's spit, but rather, what's in it for us, His dinner guests, namely, tasting and seeing that the Lord is good, and eating and drinking and having our fill not of just any turkey with all the trimmings but of His body and blood.
Indeed, our inspiration is akin to His, being begotten by Him. Spread the word. Invite every beggar you meet to His beggar's banquet. They won't refuse. And the Host won't turn any away. Indeed, He'll hear from us the same report the Host in our parable heard from His servant. "What you have commanded has been done, and still there is room."
And so shall we sing, "There still is room! / His house is not yet filled, / Not all the guests are there. / Oh, bring them in! / Their hunger shall be stilled / With bread, yea, bread to spare. / Go, call them from the lanes and byways, / From winding roads and crowded highways. / There still is room! / There still is room!" (TLH 509:1).
And to keep us in step with the season, and the reason for the season, that is, the Last Sunday in the Church Year, as we look forward to the Last Day and our Host's return and the Feast of Victory of our God, a veritable Thanksgiving Day spread, we sing:
"There still is time! / The Master's voice still rings, / And all His heralds plead: / 'Oh, hide beneath / The covert of His wings / Against the time of need!' / The gracious call is still extended; / The day of grace is not yet ended. / There still is time! / There still is time!" (st 2).
And that we might be prepared in like manner with those virgins wise who are among the actors in this Sunday's Gospel lesson, who help bring about this Sunday of the Fulfillment, this Christ the King Sunday, we sing:
"Now is the time! / How fast the moments fly! / How soon each hour is gone! / Ye virgins, hear / And heed the midnight cry; / Look for the break of dawn. / The Bridegroom comes; prepare to greet Him! / Rise! Trim your lamps! / Go out to meet Him! / Now is the time! / Now is the time!" (st 3). Amen.
- Pastor Erickson