Matthew 18: Will We Accept God's Invitation 

God’s incredible heart for the lost

I do sometimes get frustrated when reading my Bible, as its little added subheadings get in the way of appreciating the story flow. In doing so, they give the impression of a series of set pieces, a bit like free kicks and throw-ins in football, rather than the ebb and flow of open play. I was struck by this in Luke 14 just the other day. The first half contains three sub-headings, dividing it into three stories, whereas if I read it as a single unit I can see a tremendous flow and progression of Jesus teaching and insights therein.

One Sabbath, Jesus was having dinner in the home of an important Pharisee, and everyone was carefully watching Jesus. All of a sudden a man with swollen legs stood up in front of him. Jesus turned and asked the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law of Moses, “Is it right to heal on the Sabbath?” But they did not say a word. Jesus took hold of the man. Then he healed him and sent him away. Afterwards, Jesus asked the people, “If your son or ox falls into a well, wouldn’t you pull him out at once, even on the Sabbath?” There was nothing they could say.

Jesus saw how the guests had tried to take the best seats. So, he told them: “When you are invited to a wedding feast, don't sit in the best place. Someone more important may have been invited. Then the one who invited you will come and say, ‘Give your place to this other guest!’ You will be embarrassed and will have to sit in the worst place. When you are invited to be a guest, go and sit in the worst place. Then the one who invited you may come and say, ‘My friend, take a better seat!’ You will then be honoured in front of all the other guests. If you put yourself above others, you will be put down. But if you humble yourself, you will be honoured.”

Then Jesus said to the man who had invited him: “When you give a dinner or a banquet, don't invite your friends and family and relatives and rich neighbours. If you do, they will invite you in return, and you will be paid back. When you give a feast, invite the poor, the paralysed, the lame, and the blind. They cannot pay you back. But God will bless you and reward you when his people rise from death.”

After Jesus had finished speaking, one of the guests said, “The greatest blessing of all is to be at the banquet in God's kingdom!” Jesus told him: “A man once gave a great banquet and invited a lot of guests. When the banquet was ready, he sent a servant to tell the guests, ‘Everything is ready! Please come.’ One guest after another started making excuses. The first one said, ‘I bought some land, and I've got to look it over. Please excuse me.’ Another guest said, ‘I bought five teams of oxen, and I need to try them out. Please excuse me.’ Still another guest said, ‘I've just now married, and I can't be there.’

“The servant told his master what happened, and the master became so angry he said, ‘Go as fast as you can to every street and alley in town! Bring in everyone who is poor or paralysed or blind or lame.’ When the servant returned, he said, ‘Master, I've done what you told me, and there is still plenty of room for more people.’ His master then told him, ‘Go out along the back roads and make people come in, so my house will be full. Not one of the guests I first invited will get even a bite of my food!’” (Luke 14:1-24)

Setting the scene

It’s a Sabbath, or Shabbat, and Jesus is eating at the house of an important Pharisee. It’s worth noting here that in Chapter 13 Jesus has just been advised, by Pharisees, that Herod is looking to kill him. I suspect most people’s response to that news would be to vacate the area asap. Not Jesus – his response is ‘let’s have dinner’. It is also worth noting that the people warning him were Pharisees. I say this because invariably Pharisees are cast as the bad guys, when in reality they were the closest in belief, practice and teaching to Jesus, particularly the charismatic (with a small c) ‘Hasidim’.

It would have been a great honour to be invited to such an event, and an honour that would normally see guests following the normal courtesies. However, Jesus was never a normal guest.

Sabbath questions

A man with a swollen leg stands up in front of him (the act of standing up would suggest that the man was a dinner guest), and Jesus immediately asks if it is right to heal on a Sabbath. No-one responds. They can’t really, because, although the Torah allows healing on Shabbat, they were hidebound by the ‘hedges’ that they had developed around Shabbat, and these extra rules, designed to avoid any chance of breaking the laws in the Torah, said no healing. (Despite this, it was Pharisees who re-interpreted Shabbat rules less than two centuries previously to allow the Maccabean rebels to defend themselves against the forces of Antiochus Epiphanes on Shabbat.)

So, with no concerns about ritual cleanliness or anything of that nature, Jesus grabs hold of the man, heals him and then sends him on his way. Then he turns back to all the guests asking them about the accepted Sabbath practice of pulling someone, or an animal, out of a well they had fallen into. Again, there is no response. I often imagine there is just a group of people sitting there open-mouthed.

I often imagine there is just a group of people sitting there open-mouthed.

Honour-seeking

However, Jesus is not finished. He is watching the behaviour that comes with an honour-based society and how people are literally scrabbling to gain the best seats.

Jesus then drives home a point that would have been quite shocking. He urges people to humble themselves by taking the lowliest spot. This was the very antithesis of that honour-based society where you would only ever be humbled, and where you sought honour at every opportunity. Academics call this mindset ‘limited good’, where there is a restricted amount of something, and so people have to scrabble for what they can get. Jesus, in effect, says ‘Do not play this game, you don’t have to’.

In its own way, it parallels Jesus’s statement that “the truth will set you free” (Jn 8:32). Once we refuse to live and die by the things that the world seeks, fashion, position, branded goods etc., then we are liberated, we can find our identity in something other than what the world sees, we find our identity in what God sees.

Once we refuse to live and die by the things that the world seeks, fashion, position, branded goods etc., then we are liberated, we can find our identity in something other than what the world sees.

Having shocked, or even offended most, if not all, of the guests, Jesus then turns his attention to the host, almost certainly a man steeped in the honour culture, and tells him not to invite friends and colleagues who will invite him back, but rather to focus on the poor who can never repay his hospitality.

Evidently his wisdom starts to seep in, because one of the attendees jumps in, maybe trying to look good before Jesus, and says, in essence, ‘I get it! Blessed is everyone who eats bread in the Kingdom’ – obviously thinking that the behaviour Jesus is describing guarantees you a good seat in heaven. In his mind, he is determining that this will enable him bag one of those seats. Reading this parable, I can almost hear Jesus sighing as he says, ‘I am going to tell you a story’.

A vast banquet, open to all

And it is in this story that we can see the hooks that bind this all together. In the Greek, this entire passage is peppered with the Greek word ‘kaleo’, which is translated as called, invited, or summoned. ‘Kaleo’ pops up in verses 7, 8, 9, 12, 13 and 16. I see it as the Velcro joining the elements of this picture. Invited, invited, invited.

The story is about a man who plans a great banquet. The invitations are sent and eventually the great day arrives. The man’s servant is sent to advise the invitees that the time has come, but, instead of thanks, the servant is met with a wall of excuses around work and family. The report of these excuses angers the master, and it is at this moment that the rhythm of ‘kaleo’ is broken. He instructs the servant to go right across the city and bring – ‘eisagage’ – in the poor, the lame, the crippled, the blind, literally those on the periphery of society. The servant does this and still there is room.

Just pause there for a second and reflect on the sheer scale of the banquet Jesus is envisioning here. It is vast.

Then the master steps it up a level, in every respect, instructing the servant to go outside of the city into the country and compel – ‘anankason’ – everyone to come in – no refusals, no ifs and buts. Only those who refuse the invitation are to miss out.

Abundant grace

For me, this echoes the ‘lost’ parables (Luke 15) and is a direct reference to God’s great grace, a grace so lavish that the only way you get to miss out on the banquet is to consciously refuse the invitation.

Speaking personally, I am aware that I have failed to grasp the full scope, the sheer scale of God’s grace.

God’s grace is such that he desires the company, the presence, of everyone; he desires that none should perish. However, his grace is such that he allows people, invariably people who refuse to humble themselves, to consciously and deliberately refuse the holy summons. Speaking personally, I am aware that I have failed to grasp the full scope, the sheer scale of God’s grace. This is not about those who come to Jesus, this is about everyone. As Jesus said, “For the Son of Man came to seek and save what was lost” (Luke 19:10), which echoes and builds on what God himself says in Ezekiel: “‘For here is what Adonai ELOHIM says: “I am taking over! I will search for my sheep and look after them, myself. Just as a shepherd looks after his flock when he finds himself among his scattered sheep, so I will look after my sheep. I will rescue them from all the places where they were scattered when it was cloudy and dark” (Ezek 34:11-12).

This is our God, and this is his great grace. Amen.