The Athenians knew what was right… but did not do it.

I am not very good at hospitality. Partially because I spend most of the working week with the poor, crippled and lame. But more because (In Real Life) I am not that outgoing, not that social. I’m quite introverted, and my sons are fairly similar.

But this passage is not about that. It is about the use of feasts, in part as a power play, in part as a way of cementing alliances. I lived for many years within the Overseas Chinese Community, and I understand precisely what these banquets mean.

And we are told to invite the poor in. Unless our business keeps us from the gospel.

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 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.”

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!” 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.’ And another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, 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 there is 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 filled. For I tell you, none of those men who were invited shall taste my banquet.’”

(Luke 14:12-24 ESV)

Now, the passage seems obvious, but Calvin draws the meaning out fairly clearly. It is worth noting that Calvin commented on all three synoptic gospels as if they were one, hence the comparison with Matthew and Luke.

The kingdom of heaven is like a human king As it was long ago said by a Spartan, that the Athenians knew what was right, but did not choose to practice it; so Christ now brings it as a reproach against the Jews, that they gave utterance to beautiful expressions about the kingdom of God, but, when God kindly and gently invited them, they rejected his grace with disdain. There is no room to doubt that the discourse is expressly levelled against the Jews, as will more plainly appear a little afterwards.

Matthew and Luke differ in this respect, that Matthew details many circumstances, while Luke states the matter summarily, and in a general manner. Thus, Matthew says that a king made a marriage for his son: Luke only mentions a great supper The former speaks of many servants, while the latter refers to no more than one servant; the former describes many messages, the latter mentions one only; the former says that some of the servants were abused or slain, the latter speaks only of their being treated with contempt. Lastly, the former relates that a man was cast out, who had gone in to the marriage without a wedding garment, of which Luke makes no mention. But we have formerly pointed out a similar distinction, that Matthew, in explaining the same thing, is more copious, and enters into fuller details. There is a remarkable agreement between them on the main points of the parable.

God bestowed on the Jews distinguished honor, by providing for them, as it were, a hospitable table; but they despised the honor which had been conferred upon them. The marriage of the king’s son is explained by many commentators to mean, that Christ is the end of the Law, (Romans 10:4.) and that God had no other design in his covenant, than to make him the Governor of his people, and to unite the Church to him by the sacred bond of a spiritual marriage. I have no objection to that view. But when he says, that the servants were sent to call those who were invited, these words are intended to point out a double favor which the Jews had received from God; first, in being preferred to other nations; and, secondly, in having their adoption made known to them by the prophets. The allusion is to a practice customary among men, that those who intended to make a marriage drew up a list of the persons whom they intended to have as guests, and afterwards sent invitations to them by their servants. In like manner, God elected the Jews in preference to others, as if they had been his familiar friends, and afterwards called them by the prophets to partake of the promised redemption, which was, as it were, to feast at a marriage It is true that those who were first invited did not live till the coming of Christ; but we know that all received an offer of the same salvation, of which they were deprived by their ingratitude and malice; for from the commencement, God’s invitation was impiously despised by that people.

In this time, we have to be concerned that we are as one with the Jews. In the West, we have the witness of a thousand years (if not more) of Christianity: the very fact that I can easily find the relevant passage, written by a Frenchman exiled in Geneva some 500 odd years ago (and translated from Early Modern French) gives you an idea of how rich our knowledge base is.

As a people, as a society and individuals, we were once taught what is right, and chose not to do it: that witness still stands. This is one reason why the elite try to silence the Kirk, for it preaches what is true and right, but the elite want error proclaimed with one voice.

We should be a confessing church, proclaiming the gospel. and I praise God when we are. But we also need to remember to respond to the call of God, and not reject it. I like the expansion of the analogy that Calvin makes: we are not invited to the table of our Lord, to his Kirk, to his feast randomly. We are invited by name. We are called by those who he sends in our way to bring us to him, often from the business of life.

But at certain time you put your pen and your clinic aside. When your daughter weds, you are there. When your family grieves, you are there. Priorities exist.

And in our business, let us not shut those who love us out, particularly Christ.