Grace, mercy and peace be to you from God our
Father and our word and Savior Jesus Christ.
Would you pray with me, please? Lord God, we
thank you that you build faith in our hearts
through the power of your word and the working
of your Holy Spirit. As we consider the word
you bring to us this day through your servant
Luke, we pray that you would open our minds to
understand and transform our spirits and our
hearts to believe. Let your spirit guide us in
living in the way you have chosen for us. so
that we might serve you and serve others humbly
and joyfully. Amen. Up is down and down is up
in the kingdom of God. Or so it seems to those
of us who are living here in this world. But
for God's perspective, The way things are in
his kingdom are the way things ought to be. The
kingdom is all about turning things right side
up. But sometimes right side up looks upside
down to those of us living in this sinful world.
In our gospel text for this morning, Jesus made
one of his many paradoxical statements, a statement
that initially looks upside down from our perspective,
but is very much right side up from a kingdom
point of view. Jesus said, for everyone who exalts
himself will be humbled and he who humbled himself
will be exalted. This is so typical of Jesus.
If you remember, he said in last Sunday's Gospel
text, There are those who are last who will be
first and first who will be last Later on in
the book of Luke We will hear Jesus say the very
same thing that we heard him say in today's gospel
text And this is something we find to be true
in many places in the Bible for instance Mary
said of God He has scattered those who are proud
in their inmost thoughts He has brought down
rulers from their thrones but has lifted up the
humble. Both James and Peter in their epistles
quote the very same verse from the book of Proverbs
when they write God opposes the proud but gives
grace to the humble. This theme runs throughout
the entire Bible and theologians call this the
great reversal. The idea that in the end God
is going to turn everything around from the way
it is right now. He will set things right side
up from his perspective. And he is already at
work doing exactly that. You and I, in our human
nature, are sinners. And in our faulty human
wisdom, We hope that we can be good enough, that
we can be moral enough to earn God's favor. We
go through life living in a way that seems right
to us, but the Bible tells us that is the way
of death. Faithfully living under God's precepts
does not come easily or naturally to mankind.
No one is able to do it without God's power at
work in them and the Holy Spirit's guiding us
in humble obedience. And who better to demonstrate
this for us than the one whom God sent into this
world in a humbling way. Jesus came into this
world through a virgin's womb. Maybe the greatest
paradox, God... as man. Born in a stable, surrounded
by noisy, smelly animals, born into a lowly carpenter's
home, having to flee to Egypt to escape the hateful
infanticide inflicted by Herod and not able to
return to live in Galilee until after Herod's
death. This humbling was done for us. for our
salvation. Jesus gave up the glory of heaven
and took on human flesh. If he did not take this
low place he would never experience hunger or
thirst. He would not be a man of sorrows. He
would not be one who had no place to lay his
head. If he did not lower himself. He could not
be under God's law. He could not fulfill all
of God's law for us perfectly in order that we
would not suffer the punishment that our breaking
God's law deserves. And who could whip, beat,
and crucify God if God did not first humble himself
and allow them to do so. So who better to teach
a lesson in humility? In our gospel reading Jesus
had been invited to a dinner party at the home
of a prominent Pharisee and the text tells us
that their intent was to watch him very closely.
Most likely to embarrass or to humiliate him
or even better to find a reason to get rid of
him. And present at this gathering was a man
with dropsy, a disease which causes the body
to swell with fluid. Disfigured, ceremonially
unclean, certainly not an appetizing sight or
presence. And the host seated Jesus across from
this man at what would be the lowest place at
the table. This was certainly a humiliating snub
to a teacher who'd become well -known by this
time. In the Pharisee not only placed Jesus at
this most disgusting seat to humiliate him, but
he also placed a challenge before him. Then he
and all of his guests watched Jesus waiting for
him to rise up in outrage and demand to be moved.
But Jesus turned this challenge upside down.
He asked the guests gathered at the table, is
it lawful to heal in the Sabbath? And no one
could answer that question. So Jesus answered
it by healing the man with dropsy. From that
humiliating place at which Jesus had been seated,
he used his power to heal the disease that was
humiliating and ravaging this man. But this physical
healing was only an outward sign of what Jesus
had really come to do. God would use the blood,
sweat, tears, pain and death of his son to heal
and redeem the spiritually sick, the sinfully
disfigured. the morally humiliated. These are
the ones that Jesus came humbly into this world
to heal, to rescue, and to save. Jesus proceeded
to challenge the men sitting around the table
to adjust their thinking some more by comparing
his act of healing with another situation. but
another situation that presented the very same
ethical issue. If one of you has a son or an
ox that falls into a well on the Sabbath day,
will you not immediately pull him out? The essential
question that Jesus was asking is, is it lawful
to show mercy? To help? To rescue on the Sabbath?
Again, they did not answer. They could not answer
because their answer would demonstrate how their
man -made idea of keeping God's law had turned
the intent of God's commandment with regarding
the Sabbath upside down. Then, having witnessed
all the guests arriving and eagerly choosing
the places of honor at the dinner table, Jesus
began to teach by means of a parable. He spoke
about a wedding feast and the choosing of seats
there. He did not tell them that he was referring
to their own actions earlier in the day. He simply
taught them about true humility and how it might
lead to true honor. Choosing seats stood for
something else in this parable. The parable was
not intended to instruct men on how to choose
seeks at a banquet in hopes of their own glorification,
but rather about who and how God chooses to raise
up and glorify. How God does things radically
different in his kingdom than men do in their
world. Jesus was turning their finite understanding
of these things on its head. In this passage,
Jesus clearly demonstrated the difference between
being humble and being humbled. He was teaching
how to live in God's right side up way of living
by faith. And there was one man at this dinner
party who got it. One man who understood that
Jesus was not talking about how to give or to
attend a banquet. We know that because the verse
immediately following our text today says, When
one of these at the table with him heard this
he said to Jesus blessed is the man who will
eat at the feast in the kingdom of God Apparently
this person had been watching Jesus very carefully
How about you The lesson for us in Jesus teaching
today is that humility will lead more surely
to honor and glory than will pride Self -importance
most often results in humiliation. We who are
citizens of the Kingdom of God are not to seek
honor and position for ourselves. We are not
to presume that we are better than others. Rather,
we are to understand that we are sinners, confessing
to God and seeking His forgiveness and salvation
and guidance for living. the life of faith and
to that end the Lord invites us to come to the
feast which is set before us today to his holy
supper and the places of honor at this table
do not belong to those who choose them but to
those who have been chosen by God each one of
us deserves to be outside We are nothing and
we deserve nothing from God We are not here on
account of our worth our wealth our status our
skills our intelligence or our cunning We are
who we are and Where we are by the grace of God
Our Lord Jesus is at the head of this table And
we are here by His grace alone. So let us come
to this table today, delighted that we have been
invited and prepared, rejoicing in His goodness
and grace and mercy. And let us not look for
a place of honor or position. Rather, let us
take the lowliest place and consider others to
be more important than ourselves. Let us be humble.
Then we can await together the ultimate invitation
of the Lord to come up higher to that great and
glorious wedding feast in heaven. God is at work
turning things right side up by bringing fallen
broken lost sinners like you and me to faith.
Christian faith truly is a divine work. It has
to be because everything about faith is contrary
to human nature. It is unnatural to us and it
goes against our natural proclivities. It is
upside down to us. God works faith in us by the
power of His Word and His Holy Spirit. God opens
our minds to understand and He transforms our
hearts and our spirits to believe. God also guides
us every step of the way in order for us to do
what is right and good and to remain faithful.
So let us come before God in humility. This humility
is to be found only by living outside of our
worldly selves and living in Christ Jesus. Only
in Christ Jesus are we freed to set aside the
upside down world's ways and thinking. Only in
Christ are we free to show love to others, to
do good to them, to be the source of joy and
happiness in their lives without any concern
for their worthiness or what we may receive.
return. As God's people let us live humbly toward
one another and walk humbly before our God to
take the lower position and to let God exalt
us. This is the way of greatness and honor in
God's right side up. Kingdom. This is what the
apostle Paul encourages in his letter to the
Ephesians. As a prisoner for the Lord then, I
urge you to live a life worthy of the calling
you have received. Be completely humble and gentle.
Be patient, bearing with one another in love.
The kingdom of God is all about turning things
right side up. It is all about the great reversal.
Jesus came to become sin for us so that we might
become righteousness in Him. Our sinful, haughty,
arrogant hearts are changed and renewed so that
we might joyfully take the lowest position and
be a servant to others. On that last day, death
will be life. The judge will be our savior. The
humility that we know now will become exaltation
in heaven. The poverty we experience here will
become riches. And there will be no last or lower
seats at the table. Only the seats of the highest
honor for those who are forgiven and redeemed
by our Lord Jesus Christ. That's how things are
in the Kingdom of God. Right side up from His
perspective. Just right. The way things ought
to be. How good and gracious our God is that
He invites us in. Amen. Now may the peace of
God which passes all understanding keep your
hearts and minds through faith in Christ Jesus
our Lord.