WWUTT 2423 The Parable of the Great Banquet (Luke 14:12-24)

Jesus told a parable about a great banquet and those who were originally invited turned down the invitation so it went out to many more, including us, if we believe we get to come in and feast when we understand the text.

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Once again, it's Pastor Gabe.

The Great Banquet in Luke 14

Thank you, Becky. In our study of the Gospel of Luke, we continue on in chapter 14 to the second parable that Jesus tells at the house of the Pharisee. This is the parable of the great banquet. Let me begin reading here in verse 12.

We'll go through verse 24. Hear the word of the Lord. Jesus also said to the man who had invited him, when you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid.

But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just. When one of those who reclined at table with him heard these things, he said to him, Blessed is everyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God.

But he said to him, A man once gave a great banquet and invited many, and at the time for the banquet he sent his servant to say to those who had been invited, Come, for everything is now ready. But they all alike began to make excuses.

The first said to him, I have bought a field, and I must go out and see it, please have me excused. And another said, I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to examine them, please have me excused.

And another said, I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come. So the servant came and reported these things to his master. Then the master of the house became angry and said to his servant, Go out quickly to the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in the poor and crippled, and blind and lame.

And the servant said, Sir, what you have commanded has been done, and still there is room. And the master said to the servant, Go out to the highways and hedges, and compel people to come in, that my house may be filled.

For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet. So again, Jesus is speaking at the house of a Pharisee who had invited him to come and.

Eat.

Humility, Mercy, and Caring for the Least of These

And as we read yesterday, he healed a man with dropsy right there in the presence of the Pharisees and the lawyers. And then he gave the parable of the wedding feast that we read from verses 7 to 11. And at the end of that, Jesus said, For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.

And this was something that Jesus had said to everybody in the room. At this point here, with regard to this parable, it starts with Jesus turning to the man who had invited him to this feast and says to the man, When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors.

So this is still on the heels of him saying, Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted. So still talking here about humility and giving application to his parable on humility by telling the man who had invited him that you need to be reaching out to those who cannot pay you anything, who cannot give back to you in return.

You would not receive any benefit for caring for them. And this is the way that you humble yourself. This is the way that you don't exalt yourself to those seats of honor. But instead, before the Lord, you are giving in secret, and the Lord who sees what is done in secret will reward you.

Remember, that's a lesson that Jesus gave in the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew chapter 6. When you give to the poor and the needy, don't sound a trumpet, but you're giving in secret not to receive recognition from others.

But your father in heaven sees all that you do. You don't have to sound a trumpet. You don't have to carry around your resume. You don't have to be a walking billboard for yourself. The father sees he knows what you do.

And as you care for these, the least of these, even these people would apply. According to the lesson that Jesus gives in Matthew chapter 25 about the judgment that happens at the great white throne, that what you have done to the least of these brothers of mine, you have done also to me.

So Jesus is talking about those who are the lowest, who are among his sheep, who are of his followers. Here's who you care for. If you're just bringing in your brothers, your relatives, your rich neighbors, you're just caring for those who are going to give back to you in return.

And you've lost nothing. You've not really sacrificed anything. It's kind of like you've kept up appearances. You have continued to rub shoulders and elbows with the right people. Nobody's ever at any loss.

It's just kind of a circular thing. But you need to give what you have to benefit others who don't have and those who cannot pay you back. When you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, which means you're going to have to care for them.

It's more than just inviting them to come to a feast. You're actually going to have to care for these individuals that come to your home. You have to lead a blind man to the seat where he is going to sit.

You're going to have to carry someone who is lame to the place where they are going.

To sit.

And if this is how you show love to others, if this is how you humble yourself, not exalting yourself to the places of recognition and honor, but you humble yourself to care for those who can't care for themselves or cannot pay you anything back, then you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just.

The great reward that you will get will be in heaven above when you are rewarded by your father who has seen all that you have done. And again, going to the lesson in Matthew 25, that which you have done to the least of these brothers of mine, Jesus said, you have done also to me.

Now, so you understand that I'm not taking that out of context. Jesus makes reference to brothers of mine, so it's not caring for any and all poor. Those would be the brothers of Jesus, but specifically caring for those that are actually believers that are followers of Jesus and the least among those who are the followers of Jesus.

That's not to say that we don't care for all the poor. But especially those who are of the household of faith, as set in Galatians chapter six. Now that's not necessarily the context here in this particular parable.

I'm just saying when you draw the lesson from Matthew 25, even into this parable that's about to be given here, we understand our first priority is to the church. But then as we have opportunity, we show grace to those in need as well.

The Banquet Invitation and the Excuses of the Invited

So then as Jesus has said this to the man who invited him to this dinner, one of those who reclined at table with him heard what Jesus said. And he said, blessed is everyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God.

Now we don't know the motivation behind this individual. We don't know if this person was a Pharisee or a lawyer of some kind. As it is said, there are, uh, this dinner that Jesus is at is made up of mostly those the lawyers and the Pharisees, those who deal together in their, their respective occupation.

And so this person who speaks up, we don't know who that is, but says everyone who eats bread in the kingdom will be blessed of God. It could be, and this might be the intention here of why Luke includes this.

It could be that this person was saying, well, why do we really have to exert ourselves in that way? Why do we have to go out of our way to reach out to those who are poor and destitute like.

That?

Because everybody's going to be blessed when we get to the kingdom of God. Everybody who eats bread in the kingdom is going to receive the same blessing of God. So what difference does it make here? And that's not something that's just typical of the Jews.

There are other religions and belief systems out there. Like for example, the, uh, the caste system and some of the Eastern religions or even a karma, the whole concept of karma, a person has received the poor lot in life that they have because this is karma paying them back.

And through a process of reincarnation, they have finally come to this place where they're poor and destitute because in a past life they were really bad and had afflicted and abused people. So this is how karma is repaying them.

And if you were to try to help person, help a person who is in that poor place, you're disrupting their karma. They have this opportunity to do well and kind of pick themselves up so that when they die and enter into the next life, they'll move a level up.

They had the opportunity to do that, correcting the wrongs that they did in the past. So the way that this religious system is set up, you shouldn't even be helping the poor because you could be affecting or harming their ability to move up in the next life.

And of course, really, this is all put together so that we don't have to help the poor. I don't want to have to give up what I have to help those who are less than me. That's beneath me. I don't want to do that.

It's it inconveniences me. People are so full of themselves. They don't want to humble themselves on behalf of someone else. So they build these things into their religion. So there are other religious beliefs out there that will say you don't need to help the poor because they're going to advance later on in a next life or in the afterlife or whatever.

Else.

And that could be even what's behind this person's comment, though, from a Jewish perspective, not from a far Eastern religion perspective, but from his Jewish perspective, saying, hey, we're all going to be blessed when we get into the kingdom of God.

So what's the rush? Why do we need to care for those who are poor? They're going to feel all the more blessed when they get to the kingdom because they went from their poor estate to the riches in the kingdom of God.

But what do the scriptures tell us concerning this Philippians chapter two, consider the needs of others even ahead of your own, because Christ considered our need, as said in Philippians two five, let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God, a thing to be grasped.

But he emptied himself, taking the form of a servant and being found in human form. He humbled himself even to the point of death, even death on a cross. Nobody is ever going to be as humble as Jesus, God himself, who put on human flesh and dwelt among us and entered into this poor estate, wasn't even born in a palace, wasn't even born with with a king's welcome and living a king's life.

He was born in a peasant's home, in a manger laid in an animal's feed trough. And he grew up a poor life as a carpenter in a small little bitty town, a town called Nazareth, of which people said, what good can come out of Nazareth?

And then when Jesus begins his ministry with preaching and healing others, showing that the kingdom of God has come through the son of God incarnate, born as a man who has humbled himself to care for even the lowest of the low in their culture, those that people wouldn't even go near.

They would walk on the other side of the road to avoid the lepers, the sick, the lame, the mute, the blind. And Jesus is going right over to them, helping them walk, making them to see again, giving them new legs, curing them of their leprosy.

Jesus was by far the most humble man who has ever lived. He would never be able to accuse God of not being humble. He's been more humble than we have ever been. And so when we read there again in Philippians 2 .5, let this mind be in you, which is in Christ Jesus, we are to have the same kind of mind toward one another, caring for those who cannot care for themselves, putting their needs ahead of our own.

We are to care for them just as Jesus cared for us. And that is an outworking of our faith that doesn't save us. But if we've been saved by God who humbled himself in this way, then shouldn't we demonstrate that we belong to God by humbling ourselves for the sake of caring for others?

So Jesus gives this parable, a man once gave a great banquet and invited many. And at the time for the banquet, he sent his servant to say to those who had been invited, come for everything is now ready.

Now, as I've said before, regarding parables, be careful not to overread the parable. Don't overanalyze all the different symbols to mean different things. Who is this servant that's gone and has said the banquet is ready?

Is it Jesus? So the father has sent the son to go out and say the banquet is ready? Or is this going to be the messengers, the disciples, the apostles that are going to be sent out to preach the gospel into all of the world?

Most likely it's the second. But I don't think we need to overanalyze it in a sense to pinpoint exactly who this is in reference to. It could also be the son, because the son has come to say that the kingdom has come and the people to whom he came rejected him.

That's in John 1. He came to his own, but his own did not receive him. But to anyone who has received him, who has believed on his name, he gave the right to become the children of God, as said in John chapter 1.

So here the messengers have gone out to say, come, everything is now ready for the banquet. But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, I have bought a field and I must go out and see it.

Please have me excused. And another said, I have bought five yoke of oxen and I go to examine them. Please have me excused. And another said, I have married a wife and therefore I cannot come. Now are all of those things bad?

Should we not be buying fields? Should we not be gathering much cattle or getting married? No, none of those things are bad. But what is being illustrated here is that these people are caring more for their worldly concerns.

Then they have a mindset on the kingdom of God. They're not thinking about the kingdom of God or even of other people. They're just thinking about themselves. And so the servant comes back and reports these things to his master and the master of the house became angry and said to his servant, go out quickly to the streets and lanes of the city and bring in the poor and crippled and blind and lame.

These people that were not being cared for, were not being attended to or thought of or lifted up in their poor condition. That's who's going to come in here. That's who's going to care about the banquet.

That's who's really going to enjoy this feast. Those who had none. Those who were poor in spirit, even remember, as I said yesterday, referencing the beatitudes in the sermon on the Mount, blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of.

God.

I guess yesterday I just referenced the meek passage, blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth. But same with those who are poor. We understand ourselves to be beggars before God. We have nothing when we recognize in our sin that we deserve the judgment of God.

We come before God and we say, I cannot save myself. I have nothing of my own by which I can be saved. No good works that I could even give you that are worthy of the attention of God. And so we come in our, in our spiritual depravity before God with nothing and like a beggar with his face to the ground, holding out our hand that he would show us mercy.

This is what it means to be poor in spirit. Blessed are the poor in spirit for they will inherit the kingdom of God. So we should be able to identify with the poor here in this sense. We were poor, crippled, blind and lame.

Remember what we sing in amazing grace. I once was blind. Now I see. So we come to God needing healed, needing lifted up, needing fed. And these are the ones that are going to enter into the great banquet.

Now again, as we recognize that about ourselves, I made this point yesterday, then we need to look at those who even have material needs and care for them. God has cared for us in this spiritual emptiness that we had and has filled us up with good things.

And so now being spiritually filled, shouldn't we want to care for those who have nothing? And we have that opportunity, even as we care for them to share the gospel with them so that they would come to faith in Jesus Christ and so believe and be saved.

So they're gathering up the poor, the crippled, the blind, the lame. And then the servant says to the master, sir, what you have commanded has been done and still there is room. Really talks about the vastness of the kingdom of God and how many people are going to be there on that day.

When we enter into glory and we sing the praises of the king, it is going to be a vast number. As John says in revelation, it's a number that is so great it could not be counted. And the master said to the servant, go out to the highways and hedges and compel people to come in that my house may be filled.

And so Jesus says in verse 24, I tell you, none of those men who were invited talking about the first ones, the ones who were too caught up in their own personal concerns to be bothered to stop what they were doing and attend the banquet.

I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet. And these are going to be those to whom the gospel was first given. As we read about in Romans three, it was to the Jews were first given the oracles of God, the first to receive the law.

It was to the Jews that the savior of the world came, but they did not know him. They did not receive him. And so the message of the gospel has gone out into all the world. So that Jews and Gentiles, anyone who believes on the name of Jesus will be saved.

No one is automatically saved. No one is automatically going to inherit the kingdom of God because they're a Jew. Nobody. We come into the kingdom of God by the grace of God through faith in Jesus Christ.

That is the only way that anyone enters heaven because God was gracious to us. And we believed on Jesus Christ and the message of the gospel and we are saved. No one will enter the kingdom of God by virtue of being poor.

All the poor, all the lame, all the sick, all the destitute, all those who were not looked after or cared for in this life, they're not automatically good and therefore entering the kingdom of God. Poverty does not make someone qualified for the kingdom.

There were people who were poor in life who will go to hell. Again, the only way that somebody comes into the kingdom is by faith in Jesus Christ. But we must recognize that all of us are poor before God.

All of us have nothing and it is Christ who gives us everything. And so as we have received everything from him, let us be willing and humble to go out and invite others to come into the banquet, especially caring for those who cannot care for themselves and not thinking to ourselves that we're only going to care for those who can give back to us, but we'll even care for those who cannot give us anything.

And your father who sees will reward you greatly in the kingdom of God. Heavenly father, we thank you for what we have read here with regard to this particular parable, and I pray it does stir in us an understanding of how important it is that we care for one another.

Let us look out for each other, lifting one another up in love, caring for those who have none or who cannot give us anything in return. And we do all of this to the praise of your glorious name and whatever opportunity that we may have to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with somebody else, telling them that we are sinners worthy of judgment, but Jesus was given to be an atoning sacrifice for our sins.

He died on the cross. He rose again from the dead so that whoever believes in him will not perish, but have everlasting life. As we have opportunity to share that message with others, let us do so, so they too will believe and be saved.

Thank you for considering our need, and may we consider the needs of others. In Jesus name, amen.

Closing Announcements

You've been listening to When We Understand the Text with Pastor Gabe Hughes. Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, Gabe will be going through a New Testament study. Then on Thursday, we look at an Old Testament book.

On Friday, we take questions from the listeners and viewers. Tomorrow, we'll pick up on an Old Testament study, When We Understand the Text.