An Invitation

He said also 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 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.’”
Luke 14:12–24
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An Invitation
We love parties. Being invited means we are wanted. We like the recognition that someone else wants us to make their event better. It makes us feel good. The old Adam in us also delights when we can turn down an invitation. When we do so for mean and selfish reasons, we get a sense of superiority. We are simply too important or too busy to make time for someone else's party. We want the invitation but don’t want to bother with going. We just can’t seem to make the time. And we never run out of excuses for why we can’t be bothered. Yet God’s invitations overcome people’s rejections. Too often, we view God’s gifts as being more important to us than He is, the giver. The creation becomes our focus of worship and not the Creator. But God does not give up on us so easily. He reaches out again and again wherever His servants carry the Good News, so that all may receive His gracious invitation. May the Lord’s grace move us to treasure most the invitation to fill His house and love those who are despised by the world.