One Sabbath when Jesus went to dine at the house of a ruler who belonged to the Pharisees, they were watching him.The Gospel accounts of our Lord’s earthly ministry very often start out with a simple description of the setting, and then build up to give us an important lesson about the Faith. The Gospel for this Sunday is no different. It begins by setting the scene: “One Sabbath when Jesus went to dine at the house of a ruler who belonged to the Pharisees…” So far, the story sounds ordinary. An ordinary invitation, a well-prepared meal, the potential for some convivial conversation, a nice social event. But it goes on to say: “they were watching him.” And the whole mood changes.
- St. Luke 14:1
Jesus had been invited to this Pharisee’s house, along with several other guests, just so he could be “watched.” What might have been an innocent meal with a young and interesting rabbi was turned into an occasion when the host and the other guests hoped they would be able to catch Jesus doing or saying something wrong.
Remember who the Pharisees were. They were the spiritually elite of their day, the educated ones, the experts. They knew the Law. They knew the writings of the prophets. In fact, the Pharisees were the pride of Israel. Nobody knew their religion like they did.
So the meal begins. When Christ begins to speak, His words seem inoffensive enough – although if we’ve paid attention to the Gospel account, we can see that Jesus’ first words were in response to what he saw going on. Apparently the other guests were elbowing themselves forward for the best seats at table, the place which would denote the best honour. And so Jesus speaks: “When you are invited by any one to a marriage feast, do not sit down in a place of honour, lest a more eminent man than you be invited…” It seems like common sense, and one would think they would have been embarrassed. At formal meals there is a proper order in the way guests are seated. We are accustomed to having a head table at a banquet, and we fully expect any visiting dignitaries to take a place there. And unless we ourselves fall into that category, we wouldn’t expect to sit there ourselves. Even at family gatherings, this is true. A father has “his place” at the table; a mother has “her place.” Even if the children squabble over who is going to sit where, there is respect for certain places at the table. So Christ is making a point in a very simple way. It points out that there is greater honour in hearing the words “come up higher,” rather in being put down with “move over and make room” for this other person.
On the surface, this seems to be all Jesus is saying. An ordinary observation, making a case for modesty and humility, which in the end is better for us than being self-important and overly-assertive. But when we look at the totality of the scriptural teaching from this Sunday’s readings, we can see that there is much more to what our Lord is saying.
In the reading from Sirach we hear these words: “The greater you are, the more you must humble yourself; so you will find favour in the sight of the Lord.” Here are words that take Christ’s teaching out of the earthly realm of how we should behave at a dinner and applies what He has to say to the spiritual realm of the kingdom of God. If at a banquet it is better to wait for the master of the house to give you honour, rather than to take honour to yourself, then it is certainly true that in the kingdom of God we cannot choose our place, or exalt ourselves on our own.
In fact, this point is so important that the lesson goes on to say, “the affliction of the proud has no healing, for a plant of wickedness has taken root in him.” So then, it appears that we have two choices: either we can try to exalt ourselves, try to grab a role or position or function that we want, and do all in our power to attain it, or we can humble ourselves, and make the effort to free ourselves from all personal ambition, and from the need to have a certain place or a certain role.
We should consider that more closely.
The desire to have a place or position that suits our personal desires, and then putting all our energies into obtaining it can take different forms, and not all of them bad. Is it wrong to have ambition to achieve some good thing? Certainly not, if our desire is in accordance with God’s plan for us. But, if it means that a person puffs himself up so as to appear better or more important in the eyes of others, it becomes something else altogether.
We’ve all seen this: the elected official, supposedly the servant of the people, who expects his constituents practically to do obeisance when they’re in his presence; or the priest or bishop, who is supposed to be Christ in our midst, but who is “too busy” to speak to ordinary people; or the low-level government clerk who hides behind mountains of official forms and regulations, making members of the public go from line to line, hoping to find someone who might help. This a kind of pridefulness in which that person has made himself the center of all things, and it is a grabbing of power over others which props him up in his own conceit.
But God speaks to us of “humbling” ourselves, to remember that we are small because we are always in the presence of the Lord. This involves a willingness to live in such a way that we remember that we are completely dependent upon God. Christ tells us that if you want to be the greatest, they you must make yourself the “least of all.” But that doesn’t always sit well with many people. They mistake “humility” for “humiliation,” and they would see being the “least of all” as a giving up of their liberty and the right to make their own decisions about themselves and their own talents and expectations from life.
But quite the opposite is true – and we see it in this Sunday’s appointed reading from the epistle to the Hebrews. We are told “You have not come to what may be touched, a blazing fire, and darkness, and gloom, and a tempest…” In other words, we’re not supposed to be wrapped up in those things that are intended to impress others on a merely human plane. Hebrews goes on, “But you have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem… to Jesus, the mediator of a new covenant.” In other words, the believer is someone who approaches something and someone far greater than mere human things. It is the “heavenly Jerusalem,” the kingdom of God – indeed, it is Jesus Christ himself to whom we come.
This is the humility Christ teaches us. It involves a choice: either we choose to be strong in our own eyes and in the eyes of others, or else we choose to have a share in the kingdom of God. And if we choose the share in His kingdom, then we accept the fact that everything is of Him, and by Him, and for Him. So “humbling oneself” isn’t the negation or the destruction of what is truly human in us; rather, it is choosing to put ourselves into the hands of Almighty God so that we can be conformed to what He wants us to be.
This is part of the paradox and the mystery of our faith: in order to be strong, we must make ourselves completely dependent upon God; in order to be free, we must make ourselves completely subservient to our Lord; in order to be proud, we must take upon ourselves complete humility. But, of course, this is also the joy of our Christian faith. We are not standing by ourselves against the world. We don’t have to make our own way through life, hoping to garner some share of human respect, and depending upon our own small accomplishments to earn us a place at this world’s banquet. No, we have come to the city of the living God, where our place is already set, and where the master of the banquet waits for our arrival, and where our own accomplishments count for very little because Christ has done all things for us.
How clear the choice is. We can choose our own will, and inherit eternal death. Or we can choose the will of God, and live in that heavenly Jerusalem, which is the kingdom of God.
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Painting: "The Wedding Feast" by Tintoretto (1518-1594)