Luke 14:15-24

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This transcript has been automatically generated, and therefore may not be 100% accurate.

One of our lay readers is going to come and preach for us.

When one of those at the table with him heard this, he said to Jesus, blessed is the one who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God. Jesus replied, a certain man was preparing a great banquet and invited many guests. At the time of the banquet, he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, come for everything's now ready. But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said, I've just bought a field and I must go and see it.

Please excuse me. Another one said, I've just bought five yoke of oxen and I'm on my way to try them out. Please excuse me. And still another said, I've just got married so I can't come. The servant came back and reported this to his master.

And then the owner of the house became angry and ordered his servant, go out quickly into the streets and alleys of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame. Sir, the servant said, what you ordered has been done, but there's still room. Then the master told his servant, go out into the roads and country lanes and compel everyone to come in so that my house will be full. I tell you, not one of those who were invited will get a taste of my banquet. This is the word of the Lord.

Good morning.

We're going to do something differently today. This may go horribly wrong or it may be a resounding success, but you're going to need your mobile phones with your 3g data on, okay? So I'm going to hand over to my wonderful assistant here who will explain things, and then we'll have a bit of a preamble while you're getting yourself sorted, okay?

I don't think she's understand quite how much chaos I can bring to these procedures, proceedings. So let's hope we just get it right. Right. I think it's quite small on the screen, but if you can go to the website menti. Menti.com, and at the top there will be, or scan the QR code.

If you need to stand up to scan the QR code, do that.

And then if you've typed in the website at the top there's sort of a pink banner which says, enter code here. I'll read out the code. I don't know if you're ready. Anybody on the website? Okay, the code is 8712-8292 and I can see we've got nine people already in 13.

Yeah, press the like button as well so we can cheque that everyone who's in is. It's working. Read the code again. Okay. The code is 8712-8292 okay, how we doing?

I think we've got 37 people in. 37. Oh, that's not bad. 38 still coming in. Okay.

There'll be a bit of time in a minute while you have to put your name in, but we're not at that stage. We're not at that stage yet. We're not going to do that. So while just carrying on doing that, I'll just leave a bit of a talk. So the story we've just had.

Yeah. Jesus had gone to have a meal with a prominent pharisee. We hadn't read that bit, but that's where he was. He was having a meal with a prominent pharisee, one of the local religious leaders. Now, during that meal, Jesus had healed a man suffering from dropsy.

Okay. On the Sabbath, big no no. Okay. Would that challenge their views on what they should be doing on the Sabbath? And comments after that about inviting people in was challenging their position.

Okay. Jesus was said before our reading, it is better to invite those to this kind of dinners, those people who can't repay you and host you back. Yeah. So, you know, he was already having a go at them. So after listening to Jesus, one of the guests at this Sabbath dinner, one of these self righteous people comments, blessed is the one who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God.

And it's at this point that Jesus responds with the parable of the great feast. Okay, that's the background. Now, how many have we got, Mel? 47. Oh, well, we're going to give it a go.

All right. So the first question isn't a question, it's just a test. We're going to do a poll. Yeah. Four options will come up.

Yeah. You will have 10 seconds. 10 seconds to answer. Okay. So the four questions will come up.

We'll see how clear they are. And if they're not all that clear, I'll read them out or I'm actually, I'll hang over to methamphetamine. Okay. Yeah. So it should have come up on your phone screen.

Now. It should be on your phone. Yeah.

So it's what you think is the best thing about a party. So if you've not got a smartphone, just sit and enjoy the chaos.

And I thought, I can't see the answers.

Okay. No, fantastic. Okay. Right. I think we've got an overwhelming winner, which was the right answer.

Of course. Some people put presents down. I like presents as well. We can't really have a party with nobody else there, can you? So.

Okay, now, moving on. This is the point where you're going to need to put your names in. Okay, hang on. Tell me to put your name in. No.

Okay, we're in a problem.

Need the keypad on. So we're going to be testing you. If this doesn't work, I'll just do it the old fashioned way. Okay, but we're going to be testing you on how well you can remember the story. Now, I would say don't look at the service sheets with the region on, but you're not going to have time to put the service sheets with the region on because you're still only going to have 10 seconds.

Okay, so how are we doing, Molly? I'm not sure. Let's not jump to the next question. I just need to go back to the beginning.

Just bear with us. Just bear with us. First time you've ever done this? Say you're guinea pigs. Chris, can you just kill me from the screen a minute so they don't see the answers?

Just adjust your microphone so that it's.

I don't know why it's just not onto that one.

Right. It's doing the results from when we did it the other day. You just need to clear the results.

Okay. Should have fixed it. Thanks, Chris. Right. Okay.

I should have my phone. I could have seen it on my phone then. Okay. Oh, no, it's. Everyone got.

Oh, no, we're all in. Are we all in? Okay. Everyone's coming back. Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. Right. First I'm going to hand over to Mel now because she's controlling all this end. So you should be putting your name in now, and it'll give you a little face, a little symbol, and we've got to just wait for death to like it.

Right? I think most of us are in.

Okay. Right. We'll move on to the first question. Right. With the questions.

There is a time. The faster you are, the higher you score. Okay, so there's only five questions, but if you. If you're fastest off the mark, you get a higher score. Okay, so are you ready?

It'll give you a bit of time to read the question. It'll count down, and then it'll give you the answers. Okay, off we go.

Oh, sorry. I've gone past the question.

Okay, so in the story, a man prepared a great banquet. How many people did he invite?

4321. Okay, well done. The answer is correct. It doesn't say most people got that. Right.

Let's have a look at the leaderboard. Okay, excellent.

Well done.

Okay, who's Gucci master Henry. Oh, well done, Henry. Excellent. Okay, next question. Okay, now we've got the hang of it.

How many excuses are mentioned in the story?

Okay, well done, well done. Let's see who got that right. Oh. Oh, it's still getting the hang of this. Now it's pretty even.

Kate misses. Lancaster is leading the top of the leaderboard.

Well done.

Okay, question three. Ready?

Which one of these was not an excuse given in the Bible verse?

Well done, well done.

Oh, who's monkey? No one admitting to being monkey. That's fine. Okay, well done, well done.

Kate's still in the running, though, so race for the top. Okay, so what did the man do next? This is your last chance. No, there's one more question. Did he cancel the party, invited out casts, give food away?

Or did he go on holiday?

Excellent. Right, let's see who was fastest.

Oh, goo. Gucci masters. There again, monkey. Fernie halves are doing very well.

Is that last question, Claire, did you put the extra one in? Yes. Okay. Yes. Ah, this is the last question.

Here we go. What happened to those who were originally invited? They will not get to taste the banquet. They went away angry. They went to the banquet or they had their own banquet?

Oh, okay. It's pretty good results. I think most people got them right, but let's just see who is going to be the overall winner.

Who won that? Add those points.

Who is monkey? Who is monkey? Who is monkey? Oh, right, the full setup. Monkey.

And I think Kate was the fastest adult. Right, this is for monkey and kate.

You probably won't get these tweets, but there you go, Kate, that's your prize. Okay, I brought quite enough chaos. I'm going to sit down and let Clare carry on. Okay, thank you very much. As I said, that was the first time we've tried that, so we had no idea how it was going to work.

So thank you for your patience at the start. But behind it all, there is a very serious message, an important message. Kids, can you imagine sending out a party invitation? Right? It's a special party.

Everyone says, yeah, they'd love to come see your mum, goes for a lot of expense or hires a venue and puts it a great big do on, and then nobody turns up. I mean, how would you feel? How would you feel, come to that? If you're an adult and you've done a big dinner party and no one turns up, how would you feel? Yeah, everybody said they had something better to do, but the man who is, in fact God, didn't want this amazing party to go to waste, so he invited loads and loads of other people, sent out his servant to the poor, the crippled, the blind.

That is, those people on the fringes of society, those people who thought they weren't of value, those people who've been told all their life they weren't worth anything because it didn't fit the social norms, people who felt that they weren't valued. People like you. People like me. Okay, so why did Jesus tell this particular story? And why does it matter to us today?

We're going to come to that in part two.

Thank you so much, Claire. And we'll come back to that in a few minutes time. As Claire said, they sound like rubbish excuses, don't they? Oh, I've bought a field. Oh, I got married.

Probably not today, but on some other day. I can't come to this amazing feast that I said that I'd come to. But if you're anything like me, then you're probably quite good at making up excuses for not doing what you think you probably should do. And so it's right that actually, whenever we come together as a church family, that we say sorry to God, and we're going to do that with an action. Okay?

So what I'd like you to do is I'd like you to make a fist. Make a fist. And the Bible's words, for not doing what we should do or for doing what we shouldn't do, it sometimes calls it sin. And the thing about our sin is our sin hurts us. So I'd like you to say that as you put your hand on your heart, our sin hurts us.

Our sin doesn't just hurt us, though. It also hurts our relationships with others, doesn't it? And so, very gently, especially if you're. If you've got a lot of strength, I want you to gently put your fist on somebody next to you or near somebody next to you and say, our sin hurts our relationship with others. Sin hurts our relationship with.

With others.

But the Bible tells us it doesn't just hurt us in our relationship with others, but our sin also hurts God. So we're going to shake our fist at God and say, our sin hurts God. Let's do all those three together. Our sin hurts us. Our sin hurts our relationship with others.

Our sin hurts God. But do you know, the amazing thing is that God forgives us. So what I'd love you to do is hold your hands out like this. And I'd love you to picture in that some of the things that, you know, you've done that have hurt you, hurt people around you or hurt your relationship with God, just imagine them there in your hand, maybe as a word, maybe as an action, maybe it's a picture.

And I want you to hear this. If we say sorry to God, Christ has forgiven us. Can you say that as you move your hand away from you? Christ has forgiven us. Forgiveness.

The cross has set us free. The cross has set us free. And God's spirit helps us to live for him. And God's spirit helps us to live for him. Do you know, that's an amazing truth that you can say to yourself again and again and again?

Yes, our sin hurts us, hurts others, hurts God. But Christ has forgiven us. The cross has set us free. God's spirit helps us to live for him. And we're going to sing an ancient hymn next and an ancient hymn that picks up on that amazing promise that Christ sets us free.

It's called blessed assurance. Jesus is mine. Oh, what a foretaste of glory divine speaks of wonderful truth. Christ setting us free. And of that amazing banquet that we're invited to.

Let's stand and sing blessed assurance. If there are any young people in the church who are older than toddlers, we do have some colouring sheets and things at the back if you want to make use of those. Okay, so part two. Okay. Not quite as interactive as part one.

Okay. Now, the story of the great feast has its roots in Isaiah. Isaiah is a book in the Old Testament. It's chapter six, verse nine, that reads, on this mountain, the Lord Almighty will prepare a feast of rich food for all peoples, a banquet of aged wine, the best of meats and the finest of wines. Or in the message, which is a more up to date interpretive version of the Bible, it says, but here on this mountain, God of the angel armies will throw a feast for all the people of the world.

A feast of finest foods, a feast with vintage wines, a feast of seven courses, a feast lavish with gourmet desserts. Sounds wonderful, doesn't it? Can't wait.

The main point, though, in both readings, was that the feast is for all people, all the people of the world, not just the Jews. And that's important because, as we read in Matthew and the great commission, the good news is for everyone, everyone is invited to the feast. How we respond to that invitation is the key question. Now, a bit of history here. There's a wonderful writer called Kenneth Bailey, a Middle Eastern expert who I do refer to quite a lot.

And he says that after they returned from the exile in Babylon, these original verses, although written in Hebrew, were often spoken in Aramaic. But by the time of Jesus, there was a written aramaic version which interpreted this verse quite differently. There's also the Book of Enoch and the messianic rule from the Qumran community where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. Now, that might seem a bit dry and irrelevant, but these new versions, these new interpretations and writings made it very clear that Gentiles, non Jews, would definitely not be included in this feast. At the banquet, they'd basically written it to actually suit their interpretations.

So when one of the guests of the meal with Jesus said, blessed is the one who will be at the feast in the kingdom of God, he certainly didn't mean to include those people on the outskirts of society. The Gentiles, the unclean. Once again, Jesus response, a parable, a story was designed to challenge and to address their complacency, their arrogance and their self righteousness. Now, in the time of Jesus, an invitation was twofold. A bit like a save the date that we do now.

Don't know why we started doing that, but anyway, we do a save the date now. And then the guest would be told that the feast was ready to come and join. Now, when my children were younger and I was cooking tea, I would say, tea, be ready in half an hour and I'll shout you when it's ready. I'm sure we all do that. Yeah.

I would shout them. It was ready and on the table and they were so busy playing on the xbox that when they came down 30 minutes later, they would find their dinner in the bin. Because if I had gone to the trouble of cooking it and they couldn't be bothered to come downstairs, they didn't get it. I'm a hard mum, wouldn't I? But it's similar, you know, you tell people that the party's going to happen, the invitation goes out, they say, yes, I got a yes, mum, you know, and then when it's ready, nobody comes.

The excuses these people gave were pretty feeble and actually were downright rude. So the invitation is extended. Now, this list is identical to the verse in chapter in verse 13, which is we haven't read. Okay? They were the people who were the outsiders often looked down on the Pharisees at dinner with.

Jesus despised these people, those who were more upper class, though he was making the point that those who were more upper class had rejected the invitation. But those who were rejected by society were now invited. But even after he'd invited them. There was a lot more space still. There was still room for more people to come.

So he asked his servant to go out into the road, that is, outside. Outside the normal boundaries, outside into the countryside, outside the jewish nation, outside into the world.

Jesus was telling us that this amazing party we have all been invited to is a party with God. God has sent his invitation to each and every one of us, a party and to be part of his kingdom. So I've got three key points to conclude with. Don't make assumptions about your place at the banquet. Being religious, turning up to church, doing the motions, does not guarantee you a place at the banquet.

The key is simply, how have you responded to Jesus invitation to repent and be part of the kingdom of God? Jesus is reminding us that just like those first guests who were invited, we can also make excuses today and forget to accept him and to enjoy that wonderful life with him .2. Jesus really wants God's house to be full. The ultimate reference is, of course, to the final day and the great feast when Jesus comes back. But for now, it refers to his community, his churches, his community of believers, those who celebrate at the Lord's supper in anticipation of this great feast.

The parable reminds us that there's always room for more people, and we can invite others to accept God's invitation and join us. It's for everyone we meet, no matter what, no matter what background, no matter who they are, no matter where they are in society, we can tell people about Jesus amazing love and experience his presence right now.

And three, it is our job to invite people to the banquet. And that's for everybody, young and old. It's for the oldest person in this church and for the youngest person who can. Can talk, right? That's how young and old people, we've got a lot of work to do, folks.

But to invite, we must go out. Jesus, in this story, went out, went out to the people on the outskirts of society, went out into the world. We can't expect people just to come here. That doesn't work. We have to go out to them.

We need to invite everybody. The third invitation doesn't specify who was invited because there isn't a limit. It is everyone. We have to keep inviting and not give up, keep trying. And we need to urge people to come, okay?

Encourage them to come and receive the blessing of this banquet. So, two final questions. If you've said yes to Jesus, then you are one of these people who will be at this greatest party ever. So the question is, will you be there? And if you want to find out more about what it means to join this great party, to be invited this party, then speak to Ben or me or one of the other leaders after the service.

And second, if you will be there, who could you tell about Jesus and invite them to join the party? Amen.

Thank you so much. Thank you so much, Clare. And a great challenge for us. We are invited to fantastic party that one day we will enjoy in its fullness. We can enjoy it in part now.

And one of the things that we can do as part of that is speak to our father, the one who's throwing the banquet. And so we're going to do that now. Angela is going to lead us. Excellent. I spy.

I had that horrible moment where I was like, Angela's somewhere here. And like the lady of the lake, you came forth.