Download LK 14:15-24 The Great Invitation and the Lame Excuses Intro

LK 14:15-24
The Great Invitation and the Lame Excuses
Intro:
Likened to the hottest ticket in town
The hottest ticket in town. Have you ever had one? Tickets to a World Series game?
A Superbowl? An invitation to an inauguration ball or an exclusive party or club? Win
a sweepstakes for a free trip? Hot tickets to exclusive events – that’s the overall
picture Jesus is painting with the parable we are looking at this morning. What do
people do with an invitation to a great and lavish banquet? What do we learn about
Heaven, and God, and people, and evangelism, and ourselves? All of that is on the
table for this morning, so let’s read, pray, and study right now.
Read Lk 14:15-24
Pray
I.
Setting (15-16)
Banquets real and for instruction
We begin with the setting in vv.15-16. And we see that the setting is all about
banquets. They are literally at a banquet and then Jesus tells another parable about
a banquet.
Lk 14:15–16- 15 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!”
16 But he said to him, “A man once gave a great banquet and invited many.
So, just as in the previous passage, Jesus is in a Pharisees home at a dinner party
and he just told them a parable to instruct both guests and hosts as to what he
expects to see in all people (humility) and what he demands to see in none of us
(pride).
A man tries to lighten the awkwardness
Upon the conclusion of this parable and among the discomfort that it must have
caused ion the room, one man tries to lighten the mood by saying, “Blessed is
everyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!” Jesus, not wanting the mood
lightened, tells another parable about a banquet thrown by a lavish and rich host who
sends out invitations. BTW, we have lessons later, but here is one in advance.
Whatever Jesus says about being invited to this banquet is worth offending a few
people. He doesn’t want to keep the mood light and ignorant. He wants to speak
truth to people even if it makes them uncomfortable.
So the setting is a banquet that is real and then a banquet that is a story for
instruction.
The banquet = Heaven
Before we look at the invitations, however, let’s look a little deeper at the parable’s
subject – the banquet. The parable is about a banquet and if we know what the
banquet is, then we know what the parable is all about. As in a previous passage
where Jesus talked about a banquet in parabolic form, we know that the banquet
represents heaven. Let me remind us of that and help fill out the intended meaning of
this choice wording.
Heaven is a banquet of satisfaction
Isaiah saw it that way:
Is 25:6–9- 6 On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of
rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well
refined. 7 And he will swallow up on this mountain the covering that is cast over all
peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. 8 He will swallow up death forever;
and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people
he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. 9 It will be said on that
day, “Behold, this is our God; we have waited for him, that he might save us. This is
the Lord; we have waited for him; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.”
Take note here that the banquet symbolizing heaven is not just about food. It is
about ultimate satisfaction and joy. It is not merely a meal, it is a feast. It is like
Tuesday night dinner compared to thanksgiving meal. The feast includes family and
friends and fellowship and joy and contentment. Heaven is the banquet that satisfies
all your longings, all you desires given to you by God. It gives life, ends death, gives
victory, gives joy, brings peace, and maximizes human existence to its fullest. It is the
great lavish party that we all are waiting for.
Trans: So as the parable goes, a rich and generous host is throwing a plentiful
banquet and, what does v.16 say? He invited many! Let’s find out what’s going on
with those invitations.
II.
The Invitations go Out (17)
Lk 14:17- 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.’
Two invitations
Now it is important to know a little bit about how banquets in Jesus’ day worked. If we
don’t catch this detail regarding the cultural background we miss a big point.
There is a gap between verse 16 wheere the host invites many and verse 17 where
the servant goes out to re-invite the guests. Yes, there are two invitations. The first
one goes out and the guests RSVP. Then a second invitation goes out only to those
who have RSVP’d to tell them to come when the bacnquet is actually prepared. So,
v.16 is invitation #1 and it is kind of like a save the date to which you RSVP. And then
v.17 is a second invitation that says, “Come dinner is ready”.
We can trace this all the way back to the book of Esther where an invitation is given
and then later the servant comes to collect the guests (5:8; 6:14). Even from the fifth
century A.D. when the Midrash on Lamentations said of the men of Jerusalem, “None
of them would attend a banquet unless he was invited twice”.
To accept / reject = rude
Now, obviously to accept the first invitation but decline the second was an
unconscionable insult. We will return to this as a lesson for us later.
Meaning = Israel had two invitations
Now, we looked at the meaning of the parable in terms of a banquet, now let’s look
briefly at its meaning for Israel in terms of invitations. Israel has had two invitations to
the Messianic banquet. The first had come through the Law, the Prophets, and the
Writings. They had answered yes. But when the Son of God came saying “The
Kingdom of God is at hand”, in effect “the banquet is ready”, they said “no”.
Trans: The parable moves now, to why? Why say no? Now we move to the Lame
Excuses.
III.
The Lame Excuses Pour In (18-20)
Take a look at the beginning of v.18
Lk 14:18- But they all alike began to make excuses….
Jesus is now noting the excuses that come in for saying yes to invitation #1 and now
that the meal is prepped and the candles are lit and the host is ready, they say no to
invitation #2.
All alike = lumped together
In fact we will see three excuses, but Jesus uses the words “all alike” in v.18 which
mean “with one mind” or “in consent” or “Unanimous”. In other words, all these
excuses are different in their detail, but they are all alike the same - lame intolerably
rude excuses.
Let’s look at the three excuses:
#1 – I bought a field (18)
Lk 14:18- 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.’
There is some reality to this excuse. In some real estate deals in Jesus’ day the deal
could not close until the buyer had come to inspect the property. So the excuse is
based in a real situation, it is probably not a lie. But the man making the excuse says
that he “must” go see it. Does he have to do it right now? Can he not do it tomorrow?
He is making a value judgment.
#2 – I bought five yoke of oxen (19)
The next excuse is also one of dealing with a recent purchase.
Lk 14:19- And another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I go to examine
them. Please have me excused.’
This man bought some livestock and he has to go examine them. Notice that he
bought five yoke of oxen. This suggests that he was a very rich and successful man.
The average farmer of the day would have owned two yoke of oxen, so this man was
the head of a pretty large enterprise. Landholings in this day would have been
somewhere between 20-50 acres. The man in this parable would have had a 250
acre spread.
Now with that much land and enough capital to run it, it stands to reason that he,
having been invited to a banquet and said yes, would have some hired help he could
send to pick up these oxen. Does the owner of the big farm really want to be the one
to go drive all these oxen back anyway?
What a lame excuse, but apparently he wants to do that more than he wants to go to
the banquet.
#3 – I married a wife (20)
The third excuse is actually the lamest and the rudest! If you look at how the excuses
heighten ion their rudeness, this one takes the cake. The first guy said “I must go
inspect my land, please have me excused (it’s part of a deal, sorry); the second guy
said “I am going to examine my oxen, please have me excused (that’s just what I’m
doing, sorry); the third guy has no sorry and just tells the servant basically I ain’t
coming!
Lk 14:20- And another said, ‘I have married a wife, and therefore I cannot come.’
This curt and lame excuse has no bearing in tradition or culture or anything other than
personal selfishness. The OT did excuse a newly married man from war (Deut 20:7),
but there is nothing that says that you can’t go to a banquet to which you already said
yes. Rude. Lame.
IV.
The Host Responds (21-23)
How do you think the host will respond with all this food in the kitchen ready to be
brought to table and finds out no one he invited is coming?? Let’s find out.
Anger
Lk 14:21- So the servant came and reported these things to his master. Then the
master of the house became angry …
The host, justifiably, is angry. He has provided for the feast for those he invited and
now they have basically said to him, we have more important things to do.
It is rude and wrong to refuse our generous God. If we do, the result is anger and
wrath. He is trying to help us and if we refuse, then he has no choice but to judge us.
A Change of plans (necessitated by a ready feast and empty table)
But the host does something else too. He changes the plans. He has a ready feast
and an empty table. This will not do.
New invites to the needy
So he immediately sends out new invitations.
Lk 14:21- 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.’
Go invite people who need me. Go invite people who don’t have anything better to do.
Go invite people who can actually the value of this banquet. And they come.
More invites to the highways = Gentiles
But the servant notices that there is still more room at the table. Look at vv22-23
Lk 14:22–23- And the servant said, ‘Sir, what you commanded has been done, and
still there is room.’ 23 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.
The highways and hedges are symbolic of that which is outside of the city. They are
not part of the “in crowd”. They are people totally unassociated with that social
circle. Here, as it pertains to the Israel, Jesus the host is saying, go outside the city to
the highways and backroads and bushes and bring in the Gentiles! Israel received the
two invitations and said yes then no. Bring in the Gentiles then.
V.
Jesus’ Lesson(s) (24)
So the parable is basically about a refusal to come to God’s banquet on God’s terms.
Jesus will tie it all up in a lesson in v.24, but before we get to that, I want us to see
several other lessons that come out of this parable as well and then we’ll end with
Jesus’ lesson in v.24.
6 Subsequent Lessons
#1 A lesson from the servant – If the host is God and the banquet is heaven, then
there is something to be learned from the servant. He is probably Jesus himself – the
one sent of God to bring in the guests to the banquet. The Jews rejected Him and
then he was sent to the Gentiles. But if the servant is Jesus, then his ministry of being
the messenger has been passed to us. We are the ones to invite more people to the
banquet. We need to care enough to look at that banquet table and see empty chairs
and then go to the highways and hedges to invite more people. Do not be ashamed
of the Gospel it is the power of God to banquet!
#2 A lesson from the rudeness – Jesus’ picture of the rudeness of the refusal to
come to the banquet was purposeful. He wanted his listeners to know how
astoundingly rude that was. Why? Because when you are being astoundingly rude it
is your own fault. The lesson from the lame excuses is that people exclude
themselves from Heaven. If they do not go, it is solely their own fault.
Ro 1:18–20- 18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness
and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth. 19 For
what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
20 For his invisible attributes, namely, his eternal power and divine nature, have been
clearly perceived, ever since the creation of the world, in the things that have been
made. So they are without excuse.
You cannot send yourself to heaven, but you can send yourself to Hell. How? Lesson
#3.
#3 A lesson from the lame excuses - The excuses were lame because they were so
flimsy. It wasn’t that they literally could not make it. It was that they had something
better to do. In that is the lesson. Rejecters have other priorites higher than heaven,
plain and simple.
Overvaluing possessions, self, and human affections and undervaluing the invitation
God has made to the world covers almost every reason why men and women remain
unsaved.
#4 A lesson from the change in plans – Yes God is angry at rejection, but that does
not mean he pouts. It means he made a change in plans. Why? Here is the lesson –
God wants his heavenly banquet full. God is a generous and merciful God. He wants
the joys of heaven fully experienced.
#5 A lesson from the poor etc – There is no one not invited. In fact, it is often those
you would not expect to be invited who end up seated in seats of honor at the
banquet of God.
#6 Another lesson from the change in plans – God changed his plan. This tells us
something important and scary. He moves on from those who reject Him. He is still
gracious and ready to receive them, but if they reject Him, He will move on to others.
You cannot continue to reject God and expect that it will always be so easy to comes
to him.
#7 = Jesus’ summary Lesson
Now we come to Jesus’ lesson in v.24.
Lk 14:24- For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet.’ ”
#7 Many who were previously interested and assumed they’d be there, will not be at
the banquet
Maybe you’ve said a half hearted “yes” to Jesus in the past. But today you look at
your life and you don’t see anything that look Christ-like at all. Maybe there is not fruit
in your life. You are working hard at being a Christian, but it’s just that, work.
Maybe when you take stock you see that Jesus is really not a priority to you at all.
You hold other things higher than him.
Maybe you just said yes to things about Jesus, but you haven’t really said yes to him
at all. Saying yes to Him means forsaking all to follow Him. Are you going to the
banquet or not?
Conc:
Supper of the lamb
Revelation tells us this
Re 19:9- 9 And the angel said to me, “Write this: Blessed are those who are invited to
the marriage supper of the Lamb.” And he said to me, “These are the true words of
God.”
Are you going to that banquet? If you think so, remember this: it is the marriage
supper of the lamb. What’s that mean? It means a lamb was sacrificed for your sin.
It means that you and your life was offensive to a holy God. It means that you
actually believe that and that you recognize that you desperately need a savior – a
lamb to die in your place.
The people at that banquet will be celebrating the lamb. Do you know Him? Have
you turned from your sin and to Him? You are invited to do just that right now.
Song
Benediction
Heb 12:28–29- 28 Therefore let us be grateful for receiving a kingdom that cannot be
shaken, and thus let us offer to God acceptable worship, with reverence and awe, 29
for our God is a consuming fire.