Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or
dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich
neighbours; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But
when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind,
and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at
the resurrection of the righteous.’ Luke 14: 12-14
Make sure a selection
of people have been given invitations.
Look what I have! I received an invitation to a party. It is
going to be a really great party. Listen to this, ‘You are invited to a party
at St. Michael’s Church hall on Friday 6th September at 6.30pm. There will be games and fun for all ad plenty
of delicious food.’
Did you receive one of these invitations? You didn’t? I
wonder why you were left out? How does it make you feel to know that you were
left out of what promises to be a great party? Are your feelings hurt? Do you
wonder why I got an invitation and you didn’t? it isn’t a very good feeling to
be left out, is it?
Do you ever leave someone out when you are having a party or
doing something special? So you only invite your very best friends? Do you
perhaps leave out the child who doesn’t have much money and wears old clothes?
Or maybe you leave out the child who is physically handicapped and has to get
around in a wheelchair. Maybe you leave out the child who isn’t very smart and
the others kids make fun of him. Maybe you leave out the child whose skin is a
different colour. Maybe you don’t invite a child because others do not like
them and you don’t want to be singled out for inviting them. Maybe there is
someone at work who is annoying and no-one gets on with them. Maybe no one
invite them for a drink after work. Or
maybe you don’t think it is the right thing to give someone begging on the streets
anything! How do you think those
children/adults feel when they are left out?
You probably know how they feel – most people at one time or
another will have been ‘left out’ of something, somewhere in their life
time. So knowing what it feels like,
why do we leave people out or walk on by a person who is in need?
Jesus commands to love as he has loved. How did Jesus love?
He loved until it cost him. He loved all the way to the cross and death. That
is love. If he had stopped loving before Calvary then it would not have been
love at all. It would have been only for what he could get out of it. But love,
in the sense that Jesus means, is loving even when it means undergoing
suffering for the sake of the other. That is real love, loving for the good of
the other. Like hugging a tramp or extending a hand of friendship to the family
in your road who every Friday night has one or the other child brought home by
the police and who are notorious for drinking
and being anti-social at all hours. That is precisely how Jesus explains
his love in the next line of the Gospel you chose. Jesus said,
No one has greater love than this, to lay down one’s life
for one’s friends. (John 15:13)
Again and again we give God all sorts of reasons to turn his
back on us but he keep on loving us because he made a covenant with us, not a
contract. You can use all sorts of legal means to wiggle your way out of a
contract but a covenant is irrevocable. That is precisely the love of God we
see for us in his covenant with us. And he expects us to do the same to others
we meet on our journey in life.Don’t let anyone you meet miss out on being made
welcome in God’s kingdom here on earth.
Today Jesus is saying that when we are having a party, we
shouldn’t just invite our best friends or the most popular kids in school. In
fact, he said that we should be sure to invite the very ones that we might
leave out – the poor, the crippled, the homeless, the drunk, and those who are
less fortunate than we are. He said that if we only do good things for whose
who can do good things for us that we already have our reward, but if we do
good things for those who cannot do good things for us in return, that we will
receive out reward in heaven. Would you rather be rewarded now, or in heaven?
If you want to be rewarded in heaven, be careful who you invite to your next
party.
Prayer:
Dear Father, help us to be loving and caring toward those
who may not have as much as we have, or are different from us in some way. Help
us to include them in the special things that we do. In Jesus’ name, AMEN.
Oh, by the way, you know this invitation I told you about?
It isn’t a real invitation. I just made it up to help us to understand how it
feels to be left out. It feels pretty good to know your haven’t been left out,
doesn’t it.
Questions:
- What are the things that
stop you from reaching out to those in need? (for instance – man begging
in the street – you walk on by because he probably on drugs or drink – if
I give him money – he will spend it on that).
- Sometimes events of the
past stay with us in later life. Being left out or teased because of some
problem or illness. (Alison Teague had very severe eczema all over her
body – people would call her scabby and never invited her to events and
often singled out other who spoke with her). Such scars can prevent us
from coming forward or being the friend to another – someone once said
(can’t remember who) ‘that scars are reminders of where we have been and
not where we are going’. Maybe there are scars that that needs Jesus’
healing touch. Pray for each other that Jesus will heal and enable you to
reach out and touch others in a way that lead them to Jesus and His
kingdom.
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