Hamilton Baptist Sermons
28/7/24 Am Luke 14 - Craig Dyer
The reading this morning is from Luke 14 verses 1 to 24. One Sabbath when he went to dine at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching him carefully, and behold there was a man before him who had dropped sea, and Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees saying, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?" But they remained silent, then he took him and healed him and sent him away, and he said to them, "Which of you, having a son, or an ox that had fallen into a whale in a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out, and they could not reply to these things?" Now he told a parable to those who were invited, when he noticed how they chose the places of owner saying to them, "When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of owner, lest someone were distinguished than you be invited by him, and he who invited you both will come and say to you, 'Give your place to this person,' and then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place so that when your host comes, he may say to you, 'Friend, move up higher.' Then you will be honored in the presence of all who sit at table with you, for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted." He said also to the man who had invited him, "When you give a dinner at a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbours, 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." In one of those who declined 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." Another said, "I have bought five yoke walks in 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 did his 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 felt. For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet." Good morning, everyone. Please sit down and be comfortable and flick open your Bibles again to look 14. It's a great joy to add to the welcome that Nathan's already given you as we gather to sing the praise of the Lord Jesus and to hear his word this morning. And welcome to look 14. We come to the end of this short four-part series in the parables. Some of the parables are looks gospel, and as Nathan said for the next few weeks, Margaret and I are going where the sun shines brightly and where the sea is blue. We don't really know where that is, but we're going to have a look at the weather forecast and see if it's true and maybe get ourselves there and maybe get away from these v-necks that keep us warm in the summer as well as in the winter. But please do passage this morning. A little title for this short series has been parables that pack a punch. And I wonder if you've found as I have found that that title is actually no exaggeration at all. I had some expectation that there would be a punch in what Jesus would say, but I didn't really prepare myself properly for what we've seen week by week. So it's been a surprise to me and I've felt it if you have felt it as well, the extraordinary nature of this. And I guess it's true with any part of the Word of God, any part of the Bible, when we set it in its biblical context and in its historical context and sit as it were in the situation that's being described, it's full of surprises. And today is no exception as we ease ourselves into verse 1. Have a look at it with me, one Sabbath, when he, Jesus, went to dine at the house of the ruler of the Pharisees. We'll pause there just for a second. The setting is familiar to all of us, what I've said to you before, what my friends in London call a dinner party, we call it a wee night. We're having a wee night, having the friends around, invited guests, it's a sociable setting designed for people to relax, to interact, to get to know one another better, to enjoy easy conversation, but it didn't work out like that at all. And we get to be, it's maybe not a very nice thought, but we get to be as it were flies on the wall. And over here at times the toe-cuddling interaction between the Lord Jesus and his host and his fellow guests, notice first of all with me this morning, the first point is the setup. Verse 1 again, "Once Sabbath he went to dine at the house of the ruler of the Pharisees, they were watching him carefully." Now we immediately know when we read that last line there, that this is actually not the kind of relaxed, friendly atmosphere you would normally associate with a pleasant dinner experience. For the Lord Jesus, this was something to be endured rather than to be enjoyed. We sang earlier on Ode to see the dawn of the darkest day, Christ in the road to Calvary. Look at this, see him on the road to Calvary, even as he sits around that dinner table that evening. This is not the first time the Lord Jesus was invited to dine by the Pharisees. We read about a very uncomfortable dinner in chapter 11, which ended with these words. We looked at a couple of Sundays ago, verse 53, "Don't have to turn to it, just listen to this." He went away from there and the scribes and the Pharisees began to press him hard to provoke him to speak about many things, lying in wait for him to catch him in something you might see. So when in verse 1 we learn this morning that they were watching Jesus carefully, it's not because they were fascinated by him and couldn't take their eyes off him. They were furious at him. And why would that be? Well, let me tell you what happened just in the previous chapter, chapter 13, verse 10. He was teaching him one of the synagogues on the Sabbath. And there was a woman who had a disabling spirit for 18 years. She was bent over and could not fully straighten herself. Jesus saw her and called her over and said to her, "Woman, you're freed from your disability." And he laid his hands on her and immediately she was made straight and she glorified God. But the ruler of the synagogue, indignant because Jesus had healed on the Sabbath, said to the people, "There are six days in which it worked out to be done. Common those days are be healed and not on the Sabbath day." Really nice guy. Verse 15, then the Lord answered, "You hypocrites. Do not each of you on the Sabbath untie his orcs or his donkey from the manger and lead it away to water." And outnot this woman, a daughter of Abraham who sat in bound for 18 years, be loosed from this bond on the Sabbath day. And as he said these things, all his adversaries were put to shame and all the people rejoiced at all the glorious things that were being done by him, glorious things being done by him. And the religious leaders were furious. So now let's get Jesus for dinner on a Sunday. Let's hoodwinkle on the idea that we want to be friends. And I suppose we would get an idea of the kind of atmosphere if you saw the news coverage of, for example, Paula Vennell's being cross-examined at the horizon, scandal and query. If I felt any sympathy for her and it was very little that I did feel for her, but if I felt any, it was just that experience of being bound to rights and surrounded by people asking you questions and everything you see makes it worse. That's what they were hoping to do with Jesus. They singularly failed, but that was the environment. They haven't invited him for dinner to show him kindness, they're gathering evidence to have him killed. And they've even set up Jesus to incriminate in verse 2, "Behold, there was a man before him who had dropsy." Now, we don't really know dropsy nowadays, I don't think any of the doctors here would ever use that term. It's short for high dropsy, it's an obsolete term for, I think, what the modern doctors call oedema, a severe form of the gathering of fluid in the body that causes skin to swell, very painful, makes mobility difficult, normally indicates a heart problem. And how this poor man got access to Jesus in verse 2, we don't know, and we'll see in verse 4 that after healing him, Jesus sent him away, which suggests that this man wasn't one of the invited guests. It looks as though he was just wheeled in as exhibit A. In the hope that on this Jewish Sabbath, the Lord Jesus would be snared into breaking the law. They were hoping that he would, so that he could have an arrested before the soup course even arrived. So the question is, what will Jesus do for this sick, sore man on the Jewish Sabbath? The law made provision for a day of the week for rest and recreation physically and spiritually, and God's people enjoyed that day and break away from their normal work, and a day when they could think about the promise of eternal rest, from all the labors and all the pressures and all the miseries of life and the new creation that God is preparing for those who love him. And that's what Sabbath is meant to be for, as it's meant to be not a pressure and a miserable day. It's meant to be a day of joy and rest and reminder of what is coming. And you see all the way through, as we see Jesus heal this man of dropsy, as we see him straighten up that poor woman in chapter 13, we see little evidences of what that new creation is going to be like when the last tear will have been shed forever, when the last misery will have been experienced, when the last sense of isolation will be gone forever more, when the last sense of depression and meaningless of life will be finished forever for those who trust in the Lord Jesus. We have a great future ahead of us if we're in Christ. But what's he going to do for this man today? The prohibition on working on the Sabbath was actually a blessing. It was to protect people. It was to bring balance to their weak. So there is no debate that ordinary work was off the agenda that day is part of God's blessing. It's funny what we rebel against, isn't it? I mean if God had demanded that we work seven days and never take a break, we'd be raging that he didn't even give us a day off. The fact that he gives us a day off and we rage against that and say, "No, we're not having it." It's extraordinary. The issue was would Jesus be breaking that law if he helped and healed a man who was an absolute desperation? Would that be work? And the Lord Jesus knows full well what's going on. He sees the set up. Secondly, have a look at the silence. That's 13, Jesus responded and noticed that until this point, not a word had been recorded as having been said by anyone else in the room at the dinner party. So this response of Jesus is to behavior. Jesus responded to the lawyers and Pharisees saying, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?" But they remain silent. They were the kind of people who were probably only certain of what a person could not do. You do get people like that, and they're experts in what ought not to be done, what we shouldn't do. They're not very clear on what we shouldn't do. So Jesus phrased the question positively, "Is it lawful to heal?" And they don't know what to say to him. Verse 4, "The remains silent." Then he took him and healed him and sent him away, "Run for your life as the impression I get." All right, sister. Run for your life. Just exactly as Jesus said to this man. And we do find in life, don't we, that religious people, I don't mean Christians, I mean those who live by and justify themselves by a kind of fanatical religious law keeping. They can be some of the most heartless people you will ever meet, and Jesus made hundreds of them. I mean, how much would you need it to be a swinging brick that was in your chest cavity rather than a heart, to bring this poor man to Jesus with zero regard for his well-being, and merely using his misery to test case, and then to set things up in such a way that you instinctively oppose helping the man, and then to do all that in God's name. Verse 5, he said to them, "Which of you having a son, the word might be donkey? Some donkey, same thing. Which of you having a son or an ox has fallen into a well on the Sabbath day will not immediately pull him out?" You see, the man who likely, the man with dropsy who likely had a severe heart problem and the associated terrible swelling, he went the way healed. Jesus had, as it were, pulled him out of that pit of ill health in which he was otherwise helplessly trapped, but he wasn't the only one in the room with a serious heart problem. Jesus knew that these men who'd invited for dinner, these religious leaders, couldn't care less for the man who was suffering with dropsy. So he asked the question, "If there was someone or something you did care about, what would you do on the Sabbath day?" Silence. Verse 6, "They could not reply to these things." You see, the trap was set by them. The trap was sprung, but it's now the trappers who are trapped. Those around the table with him were the finest legal minds of the day, and yet by two simple questions. The Lord Jesus has them tied in knots, they've fallen into their own trap. And presumably they thought that they had the upper hand with Jesus setting out to set him up, but now they find his penetrating questions unanswerable, and I draw your attention to that this morning, because this little incident, when they are silent before Jesus, this is a preview of what it's going to be like for millions when finally we stand before the Lord Jesus at the end of time. Millions of people go through life treating Jesus with some measure of suspicion or hostility or keeping their distance from them, and feeling that they have good and just cause for doing so, and they've got all these reasons in their mind that they think spanned us, strong rationale for having nothing to do with him, and then they will meet him one day, and he will ask one question, and he will be silent, it will be unanswerable. So learn from this experience now. What was the atmosphere like? Having healed the man as Jesus settled himself again at the table, and the starter was served, what was the atmosphere like? Well it was one nil to Jesus. To set up the silence, thirdly notice the seating plan. Verse seven, now he told a parable to those who were invited to those, when he noticed how they chose the places of honour. So he'd been watching as they all filed in. As the butler however said, dinner is served and they all walked in, and of course they reclined at the table, but he'd been watching how they fought over the positions of honour. He noticed this, and he said to them, verse eight, "When you're invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not sit down in a place of honour, unless someone more distinguished than you'd be invited by him, and he who invited you both come and say to you, sorry this is a bit awkward, but would you mind giving your place to this person? You'll find somewhere else to sit." Then you begin with shame to take the lowest place. But when you're invited verse ten, go and sit in the lowest place so that when your host comes, he may say to your friend, move up higher, then you'll be honoured in the presence of all who's sitting at the table. Now anyone who thinks Jesus is dull company has never read the Gospels. Can you imagine this being said? Can you imagine the reality of what the fellow guests of the Lord Jesus that day were really thinking and thought was secret and undiscoverable and thought that they thought that their way of behaving was not obvious? Can you imagine being served up to them at the table? There they were sitting in judgment on him, there they were seeking to be exalted among their peers, their fellow guests just rungs on the ladder for them to climb over. So Jesus tells this little parable and warns them that their plan to assume the best seat is risky and could result in acute embarrassment. I remember being in a long haul flight in cattle class economy as I normally did, and there was a couple next to me with a little one who was very distressed and I thought this is going to be a long 14 hours. And I saw through the curtain that in premium economy, not first class or even business class, but in premium economy, there was dozens of seats. And I thought the kindest thing for me would be to move up and give them a bit more space. I thought I'm willing to do that. Premium economy, well it's not like a big deal, but it's better. So after the meal I slipped through the curtain and settled in and I thought, "Never going to care. Never going to notice." And the hostess came by and said, "Can I just check your premium economy tickets out?" And then with shame I had to walk back, back through the curtain, horrible feeling. And that's what Jesus is talking about here. Then you will begin with shame to take the lowest place. So he warns them that their plan to assume the best seat is risky. It could result in acute embarrassment. But taking a humbler position may result in promotion. Now all the way through these parables these last four weeks, we've been saying Jesus, hearing Jesus say these things and we've been thinking, "What does that mean? What does that mean for me? Is that the big idea of the Christian life? What's going on?" Well, notice fourthly the standard. As Jesus says these things, the question is, "What would be driving this concept of not assuming the best seats of honor for myself? Where would anyone get the idea not to exalt themselves, but to humble themselves in anticipation of being exalted one day? Where would that idea come from?" And the answer is it is the standard in the kingdom of God, in the lives where God reigns and makes it very clear to us that Jesus is the king of that kingdom and he's brought that kingdom near. So what we hear is Jesus applying the standards of his kingdom to ordinary life and we might have expected these men who are spiritual leaders in Israel to know this kind of thing because they were meant to be close to God. They were meant to know what he was like. They were meant to know what he valued. But Jesus noticed that they were not kingdom then. He noticed that they competed with each other for the best places. He noticed how they wanted to give an impression of their own importance over others. He noticed how they wanted honor now in this world and frankly that's perfectly normal. That's just the way life is. But here's the standard of God's kingdom expressed with crystal clarity in verse 11. "For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and he who humbles himself will be exalted." Jesus moves from the parable, from this may happen to absolute certainty. Everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and he who humbles himself will be exalted. And the Lord Jesus lays this down as an unshakeable truth and no one knows it better than he does. He humbled himself and became obedient to death as we sign this morning, even the death of the cross and therefore God has exalted him to the highest place, Philippians chapter 2 tells us. And although it would have been very embarrassing for the host to have his guests, minds and hearts read and exposed like this, the host may have had a sense of relief that as one who'd invited everyone he couldn't be accused of honoring himself. But if so, his relief was short lived verse 12, the standard continues. 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 and sisters or your relatives or rich neighbors. Lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid." You see, the Lord saw through the host as well, just as the guests were jostling with each other for honor and the best seats as a way of showing who was the greatest among them. So the host had invited them not to serve them, but actually as a means of being served by them. So Jesus has an alternative approach for him, verse 13, "When you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind and you'll be blessed because they cannot repay you." There's an economy there that we cannot understand. How can you be blessed if you can't be repaid? There's just no way that that's an equation in this world. But this is the standard of Christ and His kingdom. We can imagine the host and the guest choking on their food as Jesus says this, because they lived in a world as we do where you really only give to get. Rarely is anything done purely for the benefit of the recipient of your care. But even though they are the religious leaders, they are stunned by this. And they can't fathom why you would invite people who are only going to be a drain in your resources. Why would you have people in your home and in your life who cannot contribute? People who, to use the modern horrible phrase, cannot add value. Because they've so exalted themselves, they can't see that this is how God treats us. They can't see that we are only a drain in resources. We cost God His Son. We cost His Son His life. We are those who cannot possibly add value, but we are invited graciously to His table. And it's when you see that, it's the wonder of how the Lord and grace has treated me. That is the fuel that empowers a heart that treats others well, not because I feel great about myself by doing kind things for loads of crap with me, but because I'm constantly in awe of the God who did that for me, and therefore it's nothing to be able to help others similarly, but these guys didn't see that. And then the Lord Jesus lifts their sight beyond the days of their pathetic posing and posturing among themselves and the power play. And He tells them there is a day coming, verse 14, you'll be repaid at the resurrection of the just. The Lord Jesus often did that. You know, He got people to look beyond life as we know it, look beyond death as we know it, to the day when we stand before Him. And it's very extraordinary that what will be exposed on that day is not just everything I ever did and everything I failed to do. That will be exposed, but not just that, but the motivation behind it. Listen to Paul writing in one Corinthians chapter 4, verse 5, just a little cross reference for us as one. Listen to this. Do not pronounce judgment before the time, before the Lord comes, who will bring to light the things now hidden in darkness and will disclose the purposes of the heart. So there's a day coming where not only what I've done and thought and said and failed to do and think and say, will be judged and opened before the Lord, but my motivation for all that activity and all that inactivity, and I can't answer for you. But for myself, the main piece of information I receive from this understanding is that I desperately need a Savior. God not only knows what I've done and what I've failed to do, He knows why. He knows the motivations of my heart, even for the good things. He knows is it well-motivated and I don't know about you, but I can't even work out myself at the time. I'm like the man with dropsy. I have a heart problem. I am swollen with instinctive selfishness and self-promotion, even the good things that I do and the Lord not only sees that, but He sees the motivation of my heart. But the Lord Jesus isn't like that. He's the only utterly selfless person, selfless person ever to live. He's the person who live with perfect action and perfect motivation. And what we have in the gospel is one like the Lord Jesus who has reached into the pit where I am helplessly trapped and He's pulled me out, and that's exactly what He's able to do for you, so that we don't need to fear that day. And the verdict of that day can be spoken over as now in Christ, or what a relief. And that's why He's having dinner with these Pharisees and lawyers. He's exposing the truth of their corrupt hearts behind their puffed up legalistic religiosity. And He's doing it out of love and kindness that they might see it and flee from it. He's very frank, it is uncomfortable, but we have to know the truth finally this morning then, the shock. Jesus had just said, "You'll be repaid at the resurrection of the just." And I guarantee you could have cut the atmosphere with a knife at this point at the dinner party. And perhaps that's why one of the guests tries to change the subject. There's always one, isn't there when it gets a bit awkward? We used to laugh at the, I don't know where it originated, but there was someone who apparently used to say in a situation like that, they would just quite listen, "Oh, good, oh good." But the modern phrase as it was 20 years ago was heavy ox, this is heavy ox now. And this man wants to get away from an examination of damaged hearts and motivation, he wants to get away from the standard of the kingdom, he wants to get away from the gap between what these guys expect others to do and what they actually do themselves. You don't like that. So he tries to get away with it. So he jumps in verse 50, one of those who reclined at a table heard these things, he said to him, "Blessed is everyone who'll eat and drink in the kingdom of God." And what is he hoping? He's trying to raise the topic of conversation that he's confident that everybody can agree on and they'll be a kind of, "Oh, thank goodness, we're back on safe ground." The implication of his comment in verse 15 is that to feast one day in the kingdom of God is what everybody ultimately wants. But the shock is that according to Jesus, that is fundamentally untrue. Not everybody wants it. And so Jesus tells them and Luke tells us what Jesus told them, the most astounding reason as to why some of these people around the table won't be in the kingdom of God, even though they talk about it with certainty. And I'll tell you in advance, here's the spoiler. It's because deep down they can't bear God. Deep down these religious people can't stand God and Jesus will now show us that. Verse 16, he said to him, "A man once gave a great banquet and invited many and at the time for the banquet sent his servant to say, 'Come to those who've been invited. Come for the banquet is now ready. Everything is now ready.'" So in these days, not like today when you're given a precise place and time and day. In these days, if you had asked your friend, when's the great banquet? Instead of saying two o'clock, they would say, "Oh, Friday, Friday. Just be ready and Friday, and what will get to us?" The invitations have already gone out. The replies have already come in. They've already RSVPed. They've said, "Yes, we're coming." And the preparations are now complete. The food is cooked. The table is set. The place is already. What happens next? There's guests at that table expect. What do they expect in Jesus now to say in this parable? And if they had learned that often Jesus had a sting in the tail with his parables, if they were expecting a shock, they might have been bracing themselves for a host in the parable who ultimately finds his invited guests unworthy and who says, "I have changed my mind. None of you is worthy to come and have a feast at my home." Maybe they were expecting that, but the shock is even greater because it's the opposite of that. Not a man who has a feast and invites everybody and then decides they're not worthy to come. I actually use someone like that. He invited people over to his home and sometimes they would come in, other times he would just shout through a letterbox, "Go away." And maybe that's what they were expecting, but it's the opposite. Verse 18. "It's already..." This is not the first invitation. The invitations have already gone out, they've been received, they've been responded to. Places have been made for them. This is the dinner gone, but they all alike, verse 18, began to make excuses. The first said to him, "I've bought a field. I must go out and see it. Please excuse me." Another said, "I bought five yoke of oxen. I'm going to examine them. Please excuse me." And that is that sense of politeness with the word "please" there. But actually the way Jesus casts these excuses, he exposes the deliberate snub behind the good manners. He could tell the parable any way he wants, but the way he tells it is to present these talk huddlingly poor excuses for not going. No one would buy a field or even one ox for lesser five teams without inspecting them. And if they had employees who did the purchasing for them, there was then no pressing need for them to go and make the inspection. You see, these are deliberately insulting excuses. These are calculated by the lameness to show how little value the invite's guests place on the invitation, how little value they place on their hosts. And the third example is one where the politeness fades, completely another said, "Have married a wife there for I, I cannot come." I wonder do you see that Jesus is speaking about how the men of Israel who were around the table with him that day treated God's invitation to be in his eternal kingdom. You represent those who may talk about the future kingdom, but in reality Jesus nails it. He wants them to know that's what you're like. You're talking about, "Wouldn't it be great to eat bread in the kingdom of heaven?" Here's the reality of how you feel about God. Yes, you like the idea of heaven, but you're not one bit interested in God in his kingdom. The thought of heaven really appeals to you, however you can see it in your mind. The thought of being with God, the living God and knowing him really turns you off. And they're determined that they will not be gathered in. And this is a precise context for this parable. I wonder, do you recall the famous expression that appeared just a few verses earlier in chapter 13, verse 34 where Jesus said, "Oh Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to it. How often I would have gathered your children together as a hen gathers her brood under her wings and you would not." You wouldn't come to me. The invitation went out. You were on the list. You're the people of Israel. But when the servant came, you stoned them and killed them. When this servant came, you crucified him. I would have gathered you, but you would not. And you know, the reality is they probably, as they refuse, they then, as now, when people still refuse to hear anything about the Lord and his gospel, they feel some at least feel smart and smug and justified. And they make sometimes transparently pathetic excuses as a form of mockery. But when Jesus returns to this world, he just wants them to know that sheer panic is going to replace mockery, the mockery of those who rejected his invitation. And he's been warning about that since chapter 13. So let me read to you verse 24 of the previous chapter, "Strive to enter through the narrow door," says Jesus. For many, I tell you, we'll seek to enter and we'll not be able. When once the master of the house is risen and shut the door and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door saying, "Lord, open to us," then he'll answer you. I don't know where you come from. Then you will say, and imagine this for those who had dinner with him that day, "We ate and drank in your presence, and you taught in our streets." But he will say, "I tell you, I do not know where you come from, depart from me." And in that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God, but you yourselves cast out. And now Jesus is telling us why that will happen. Because although one of them boldly says in verse 15, "Be great when we all get to heaven, be great unto it," Jesus says, "No. In this reality, you're actually not interested in the servant who God has said. The invitation has gone out to you, tacitly you've received it, but actually in the meantime you've changed your minds, you've rejected the invitation, you've rejected the servant. And the way that you treat the Lord Jesus who has heaven come down is the way you treat heaven. I'm sure no one as they heard Jesus say these things in chapter 13 could imagine the circumstances under which they would find themselves catastrophically locked out of the kingdom of God. But now we see why. It's because people despise the servant of God. Think of that man at the table that day who said, "Blessed is everyone who leaped bread in the kingdom of God," verse 15, "How do you think they felt when the last word from Jesus," in verse 24, "was for I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet." So shock, isn't it? It's stunningly clear they won't taste these delights, not because they weren't invited, but because they suffer spiritual dropsy. Their hearts are so defective, puffed up within them. They despise God's servant, the Lord Jesus, and they despise the invitation of the gospel. The fact that they ate and drank in His presence and heard Him teach in the streets makes it all the more tragic. It's terrible to see in verse 13 how Jesus knows on that day what's going to be said, how people are going to imagine that being around the general proximity of Jesus and His people will guarantee them a place, but that's not it. Well, that was a very difficult dinner, wasn't it? But actually Jesus was looking ahead to a glorious eternal banquet of joy. Verse 21, "The servant came and reported the refusal to the master, and the master of the house became angry and said to the servant, 'Go out quickly to the streets and the lanes of the city and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, the lame.' The servant said, 'Sir, what you've commanded has been done.' Still there is room. Hear that this morning, still there is room, and the master said to the servant, 'Go to the highways and hedges and compel people to come in that my house may be filled.' And so when Israel rejected the gospel, what happened? It went to the Gentile nations, which is the rest of the world, which is you and me. Maybe someone here has a background, who is Jewish by background, wonderful to have you, if that's the case, but the majority of us are Gentiles. And the invitation of the gospel goes out, not just to Israel, but to all the nations and peoples of the world. And that's how sinful people like me get to be with the Lord and glory forever, not by what they've done, but by responding to the invitation and the light of all that God has done for us by His Son. And that's a very striking word in verse 23, "Compel people come in." It doesn't mean get their arm up their back and frog-marks them into the kingdom, whether they want to or not. No, it means the opposite, you see, there are those who won't be there because they reject it. They reject the invitation and they reject the servant, but there is another category of person who thinks they couldn't possibly be there because they're not worthy of it. And Jesus says to His servants, 'They're the ones you're to compel, you're to say to them, 'No, really,' and they say, 'Yeah, but you don't know what I've done.' No, really, yeah, but honestly, if you knew, no, really, you can be long. This Jesus has gone to the cross. He has paid in death and blood so that whatever is in your past can be forgiven and you can be put right with God. Oh, no, really it can. So we're compelled, we're not forced against our will, but we're persuaded that we really are welcome in the kingdom and there is a really a way for us to be there. And if you've been gathered to Jesus, if you have taken refuge under His wing, if you love and gladly respond to His invitation, you know, as I know, that you bring nothing to that but your brokenness and you marvel at the grace that's been shown you and so you show it to others. When we look forward to a day, being with those from every highway and every hedge on the planet in glory with Jesus, for a never lasting banquet of unimaginable delights, when suffering cease and sorrows die and every longing, rightly and appropriately satisfied in Him. Oh, you be there, let's pray. Father, help us to fuel the shock. Note that there's a God who delights in preventing people from entering His kingdom, but there is a mentality among us that makes us despise His invitation and despise His servant and treat us a small thing, the grace of God that has come to us in the Lord Jesus Christ. But we thank You this morning that still there is room and we ask, gracious Father, for the power of Your Word, by Your Holy Spirit, even to day to awaken us to this, that we will not be among those in that day banging at the door and saying, "Lord, open to us." Because we spent our lives ignoring the openness of the door that there is now and the love that has been shown in the coming of the Savior. The grantors are heavenly Father, if we've tasted of that love and that grace, grant us to never forget how gracious You've been and to show that grace to others and for it not to be a big deal, a big gesture, but just the overflow of hearts that have been so touched and so transformed by Your grace, we pray in Jesus' name, amen.