Luke 14:15-24; 1 John 3:13-18; Proverbs 9:1-10
In the Name of the Father and of the + Son and of the Holy Spirit.
Wisdom is not the same as intelligence. A person lacking a formal education, even a person having a lower-than-average IQ, can still be wise, whereas many who are highly educated and have many letters behind their names can be fools. But if wisdom is not intelligence, then what is it? What does it mean to be wise? As it turns out, the Book of Proverbs is a good place to begin! Solomon writes, “The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.” Now, this is not a new concept for Solomon, but it is a restatement of God’s covenant given through Moses in Deuteronomy, “And now, O Israel, what does the LORD your God ask of you but to fear the LORD your God, to walk in all his ways, to love him, to serve the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul.” From this it seems clear that wisdom is not knowledge or information -- some of the most knowledgeable and informed people in the world lack wisdom -- but wisdom begins with a right relationship to the Lord, specifically “the fear of the Lord.” If you are an unbeliever, then the fear of the Lord is a true fear of his judgment and hell, eternal separation from the Lord; if you are a believer then the fear of the Lord is a deep love, trust, and reverence for the Lord because you know and believe that his word, commandments, law, precepts, rules, testimonies, statutes, and ways are true, righteous, holy, and good.
Moreover, in the Wisdom books of Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, and the Song of Solomon, wisdom is personified as a woman, chokmah in Hebrew, sophia in Greek. That wisdom is personified as feminine has much less to do with wisdom having a feminine quality than it does with Hebrew and Greek grammar and the literary form being utilized which is more akin to poetry than to either narrative or history. We might be tempted to conclude that the traditional feminine qualities of nurture, care, love, devotion, and virtue are what are in view, however Solomon later uses the figure of a woman also as a personification of foolishness in contrast to wisdom. Personified wisdom is described as doing traditionally feminine things: Making a home, preparing a meal, teaching and leading others to wisdom. In contrast to the lady wisdom who provides fine food and wine, the woman folly provides stolen water and bread eaten in secret. Wisdom leads to even more wisdom and a lengthening of years; foolishness seduces, deceives, and leads to death and destruction.
“Wisdom has built her house; she has hewn her seven pillars. She has slaughtered her beasts; she has mixed her wine; she has also set her table.” Wisdom has done it all. Everything is prepared. There is nothing to do and nothing to bring; just come to the feast! “She has sent out her young women to call from the highest places in the town, ‘Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!’ To him who lacks sense she says, ‘Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. Leave your simple ways, and live, and walk in the way of insight’.”
There is nothing to do, nothing to bring. If you want to earn, merit, deserve, or buy your place at the table, this feast isn’t for you. Remember, wisdom isn’t about what you have (knowledge, intelligence, or anything at all), but it’s about your relationship to the Lord; do you fear him, love him, and trust that he is good, that his word is good, true, and righteous? And do not think that your “accepting” the invitation is a work that you do, for the fact is that you are invited, and that is the work of the Lord; refusal of the Lord’s gracious invitation is the only possible work that you can receive credit for, and what you will receive is precisely what your rejection of the Lord indicates you desire, judgment and hell and eternal separation from the Lord. If you have been invited, you’re already in; the only way to make yourself to be out is to refuse the invitation.
Jesus used several analogies to describe himself and his mission: “I am the light.” “I am the bread of life.” “I am living water.” “I am the door.” “I am the way.” “I am the Good Shepherd.” “I am the vine.” “I am the resurrection and the life.” All these images serve as analogies for wisdom as well. Indeed, Jesus is wisdom, for he is the word of God made flesh, the light that illumines the path to God, and he is the way, the path itself, apart from whom no one can come to the Father. When someone told Jesus that his mother, and brothers, and sisters were nearby, Jesus replied, “My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.” To follow the path of wisdom is to hearken to, take to heart, trust, and walk in the way of God’s holy word. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom; the truly wise continue to hear the word of God and keep it and do it.
Jesus’ parable of the great banquet follows in response to several events that occurred at the house of a ruler of the Pharisees. First, they likely set Jesus up to entrap him by inviting to the meal a man suffering from dropsy, to see if Jesus would heal the man so that they could accuse him of breaking the Sabbath law. But Jesus sprung their own trap upon themselves by asking them the question first, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” When they refused to answer, Jesus exposed their hypocrisy saying, “Which of you, having a son or an ox that has fallen into a well on a Sabbath day, will not immediately pull him out?” Of course, they all would do this, so they remained in silence. Then, Jesus, having observed how the Pharisees were careful to choose the seats of honor at the table, and that the host had invited only the richest, most powerful and prestigious guests to his home, said 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.” At this, one of the guests exclaimed, “Blessed is everyone who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!” In answer to this outburst and all the preceding events Jesus taught them the parable of the great banquet.
Just as in Proverbs chapter nine, everything was fully and completely prepared – the beasts were slaughtered, the meal prepared, the table set, the wine poured – all that was left was for the invited guests to sit at the Lord’s table and receive his gifts. But those invited each made excuses and refused to come. Here you must remember the meaning of the invitation: Those invited were in. Nothing was required of them, all was gift, pure grace, but they refused the gracious invitation. They were in, but they made themselves to be out. I don’t know that the context of a banquet is really all that important; it’s not unlikely that Jesus chose that context simply because he was attending a banquet in the home of a ruler of the Pharisees. Likewise, I don’t know that the excuses offered by the invitees matter all that much either. Each of the excuses were valid to exempt one from military service under Jewish law. The master was understandably angry and, because the invitees had things they had to attend to and refused his invitation, the master sent his servants to bring in those who had absolutely nothing at all, the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame. Who was now invited? Anyone who didn’t refuse to come. Those who were in chose to be out; Those who were out were made to be in by grace, and by grace alone. There is no other way.
Now, to fully understand Jesus’ parable we must consider the entire context: The pharisees used a man with dropsy, a man they would normally not associate with, considering him a sinner and unclean, to entrap Jesus that they might accuse him. Further, only the wealthiest and most prestigious were invited to the banquet, and they all coveted the best seats for themselves. In sum, they showed no love for Jesus, for the man with dropsy, or even for each other, and they showed no love for God. You are invited to the Lord’s feast, not because of anything you did or who you are, but because of who the Lord is. You are in by his grace alone; only you can make yourself to be out. How then should you treat your brothers and sisters, your neighbors, even your enemies, if your Lord has been so gracious to you? Ah! Perhaps you didn’t see that coming? This parable is not about the banquet or the excuses or about who it was that refused to come, Jesus’ parable is all about receiving God’s good gifts of grace and bearing the fruit of his love. “My mother and my brothers are those who hear the word of God and do it.” It’s all about the fear of the Lord and walking in the way of wisdom, walking in God’s word, commandments, laws, precepts, rules, testimonies, statutes, and ways all the days of your life.
And to help you, keep you, and equip you in the way of wisdom, the Lord has prepared this feast, and wisdom has issued the invitation: “Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. Leave your simple ways, and live, and walk in the way of insight.”
In the + Name of Jesus. Amen.
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