Luke 14:7-14

The Pharisees had been watching Jesus intently, but not He is watching them intently. 

When Jesus is invited in he always shows up because he is love and when he shows up he starts reordering things because he is holy. When we reject that we are reject Jesus as Lord. We prefer “buddy” Jesus. 

This need for recognition and judging people based on what they look like is a people problem not a Pharisee problem.

Being at the table should compel me not to promote myself, but to celebrate the gracious generosity

of the host. 

Being at the table should compel me to get others, who also have nothing valuable to offer, to the table. 

Since this is a parable the lesson transcends dinner parties. It is a whole life lesson. Wedding feasts were always symbolic of the Kingdom of God. We have been invited not just into the outskirts of God’s Kingdom, but into his family. We are sitting down to dinner with him. 

We live in an era of life hacks and so we approach this parable as a hack to getting to promotion faster. Jesus is calling us to true humility. 

Inwardly we all grab at the sense of more valuable than the person next to us. We all evaluate other’s parenting, giving, service, spirituality, etc. to determine how close to God I am. It permeates how I treat you, how I talk to you, how I talk about you. 

Modern self promotion: speak of themselves in overly flattering terms, claim more responsibility for that organization or event than is true, exaggerate the importance of their associations, guide conversations toward places they excel and away from areas they are limited, they look for ways to display how they are wanted. 

Proverbs 25:6-7, 27:2

Aim at being the least and serving not because it leads to being the greatest and the being served, but because the least is the great! The one we should be promoting and focusing on in greatness is Jesus!

Jesus is not forbidding a standard social life. This is telling us to check our motives. When I do things under the guise of generosity am I only doing it to get something out of it?

Realizing that I don’t deserve to be at the table at all and yet I am should make me want to get as many other people around the table also.