Between Two Worlds

“(Jesus) said… ‘When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors… but… invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.”  

Jesus is kidding, right?  He’s not really serious about this, is he?  This must be one of those instances he purposely exaggerated to drive home a point, isn’t it? Or is it?

A lament we frequently hear nowadays is that criminals and aliens have more rights than decent people and citizens. Many people express concern about the victimization of society by dangerous or marginal people.  Fear and feelings of insecurity are used for everything from selling security systems to advancing political agendas.

But to be true to this scripture we must take seriously Jesus’ stance toward dangerous and marginal people.  Let’s take a quick inventory of the kind of people Jesus spent time with and even seemed to enjoy. 

Think about all the lepers Jesus encountered in the gospels.  One thing you need to know is that the biblical word for “leper” doesn't only mean people with a certain dreaded skin disease, but it means anyone who fell within a whole group of conditions which society considered dangerous and they were treated as outlaws and outcasts, dubbed “unclean,” and were to be avoided like the plague.  Society employed maximum security methods to isolate them from the "clean" and decent people. The gospel clearly portrays Jesus, not only as one who interacted with lepers, but as one who interacted personally by touching them.

Remember Simon the Zealot, a member of the local liberation movement of those days, perhaps a first century version of a terrorist?   Jesus chose him as one of his disciples!  In our day I wonder if Simon could get security clearance to enter the country, let alone be chosen to serve on the church council.

There was the woman on death row, the one caught in adultery that the Pharisees were about to stone to death. There was the Samaritan woman with five former husbands.  There was Peter who sliced off the official’s ear.  There was Zaccheus, the sawed-off little shyster who was in the business of extracting as much as he could get out of people.  

And then this morning we are slapped in the face with Jesus’ guest list for our next party, "…invite the beggars and the crippled, the lame, and the blind" (Luke 14:13).  Now, our society does have legislation about the rights of the disabled, but beggars are suspect. It may be acceptable to send a donation to a charitable organization, but the first and the most observed of the commandments for survival in the city is never to open the door to a beggar, and if you encounter a beggar on the street, never make eye contact. 

Please don't misunderstand me. I have no intention of boycotting the security systems companies, and I certainly don't want to imply that Jesus promoted mugging, cheating, adultery, or crime. He sent the lepers to the priest to show that they had been made "clean."  After Jesus’ audit, Zaccheus changed his investment practis; the woman caught in adultery received the imperative to “not repeat her sin,” and it is strongly implied that the woman at the well turned over a whole new leaf.  

I believe Christians are people who find themselves in the middle of a horrendous conflict – a conflict that Jesus created.  Christians are people who stand and live between two worlds: the kingdom of the world and the kingdom of God; the kingdom of the world based on the value of compensatory reward (that is you should get what you have earned and hence deserve); and the kingdom of God which is based on the “value” of grace (you get, as a gift, what you don’t deserve).  

When we look closely at the totality of Jesus’ life we see that one distinct characteristic of his life was to pursue a certain nearness to marginal people, like "the hungry, the thirsty, the naked, and the imprisoned" that he talked about in Matthew 25. (25:31-46).  While it is possible to serve those in such circumstances by long-distance measures, the way a society treats its marginal people seems to be a major concern of the kingdom of God.

A great deal of what got Jesus into trouble with the power elite and the decent people was his stance and attitude towards those that society had labeled as rejects, outcasts, undesirable and dangerous. His stance toward the marginal was radical, not only because he demanded a personal conversion in their lives (I mean who would object to that?), but also because he requires a conversion of us, the self-declared good and decent people.  Jesus modeled the cultivation of a new relationship between the dangerous and the decent.  That was simply too much for the righteous and the powerful to bear, hence a media campaign was launched against Jesus with a two word sound bite that really caught on: “Crucify him.”    But that didn’t stop Jesus!  It only empowered him; for he went on die for the sins of everyone, the decent and the dangerous, hence leveling the playing field giving everyone what they don’t deserve: the forgiveness of sins; the lavish and madly foolish grace of God. 

How are we to live faithfully between these two worlds: the kingdom of the world and the kingdom of God?  What are we to do?  Who are we to be?  I believe we get a very helpful clue and beginning point from today’s reading from Hebrews when the writer says, “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers.”  An attitude of hospitality is a place to begin.  I must say two things about it:

First, hospitality is not synonymous with friendly.  It may include being friendly, but it means so much more.  Hospitality goes way beyond friendly.  Hospitality, in the biblical sense literally means, “to make room for.”  It is easy to be friendly but not “make room for” another.  Friendly is mostly about who I am on the outside.  Hospitality is more about who I am on the inside. “Making room for another begins with making room in my heart, creating space for the other in my soul.  Friendly is a value of the kingdom of the world; hospitality is a value of the kingdom of God. Jesus was way more than friendly.  Jesus mentored hospitality to the radical point of making room for you and me by dying for our sins “while we were yet sinners.”  That’s hospitality taken to the enth degree!

Second, strangers are not merely people we do not know who look like us, think like us, believe like us, and behave like us. The root of the word strangers is “strange.”  Strangers are the strange; that is those who do not look like us, do not think like us, do not believe like us, do not behave like us and are perhaps unlike us in most ways.  Right now the world is grossly deficient in hospitality and desperately needs a major infusion of it.  Friendliness cannot save anyone, but the hospitality of Christ, as demonstrated in his life and death, can save the world.  And who is better equipped than Christians?  Who ought to be the ones most especially empowered to provide an infusion of hospitality into the veins of the world but Christians who claim to follow the Lord of hospitality, Jesus Christ.  But tragically, Christians all too often slip into a posture contrary to hospitality in pettiness, condescension, and judgmentalism; building bigger barriers rather than better bridges.  Too often we surrender to the values of the kingdom of the world, rather than take up the cross of the kingdom of God.  

These passages this morning are an invitation for us to struggle with our guest lists; about just exactly who we are willing to make room for in our hearts and lives; about who we are willing to speak a good word for, maybe even advocate for, about who we are willing to invite to sit at our tables literally and figuretively.  

I can only pray that since Jesus especially included those that the good and decent folks had pretty much written off that our guest lists might at least get a little bigger.  

For sure we live between two worlds.  God knows that it is not easy and we don’t do too well most of the time.  After all it resulted in Jesus being nailed to a cross.  And God also knows that most of the time we surrender to the kingdom of the world. 

But Christ has already done it for us, that is through his life and death invited and included the whole broken world on his guest list.  In Christ God has made room for the strange and the stranger; the marginal and minimal; those languishing in prisons, those hidden away in nursing homes, Alzheimer’s facilities and mental institutions; those confined to their homes; those who need wheels, canes and crutches to get around; those who sit or stand by the interstate exits holding a sign that tells their despairing stories hoping someone will help; those with developmental disabilities; those who carry society sanctioned stigmas of certain diseases, or low economic and social status, or sexual orientation; or the poorest of the poor, or aliens of all kinds and sizes, or those who just don’t fit in for a million possible reasons.   

God’s banquet table is big enough for all and the real grace of it is there is even a place for you and me.    The final question is, “How big is your banquet table? How inclusive is your guest-list?”