Where is your place at the table?
When, in Luke's Gospel, a Pharisee invites Jesus to dinner on the sabbath, Jesus takes the opportunity to offer a lesson in humility to all those who have been invited, presumably a rather affluent group, likely the relatives or wealthy neighbors of Jesus’ host, who are choosing the places of honor at the table. Jesus encourages them not to seek positions of power at the dinner table, but rather to take the lowest place; the sabbath is not an occasion to vie for power but rather to come together over a meal at which all those invited are equals. Jesus’ kingdom is not one based on hierarchy, but on intentional equality amongst all: no matter our financial situation, we all share the love of God. Jesus further encourages the Pharisee and his guests to invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind to their common meals, those who can’t repay their host, that they might be lifted up to that that intentional equality that is a core tenet of Jesus’ teaching throughout his ministry, echoing Psalm 68, God gives a home to the forsaken.
The kingdom of God is one in which everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, but everyone who humbles himself will be exalted. Only when we conduct our affairs with humility, as the Book of Sirach encourages us to do, searching not for things beyond us, will we find what is truly sublime, that is, God himself. The Letter to the Hebrews likewise encourages us to humbly open ourselves to God the judge of all and Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant in the city of the living God. In that city, God, with Jesus beside him, gathers us in mercy. We have but to humbly accept our place at the table, a table to which everyone, poor and affluent alike, has a standing invitation.
This post is based on Fr. Pat’s Scripture class.
Image source: www.wordclouds.com
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