Practicing Grace
August 28, 2022 + Lectionary 22 + Pr. Michelle Sevig
Place cards on the tables would have been helpful. I appreciate it when I attend a wedding and there are place cards with names that tell me where to sit. It’s easier than trying to find a table on my own, or the challenge of saving seats for others I actually want to sit next to.
In today’s Gospel reading, Jesus is at a dinner party and there are no place cards on the tables. The Pharisees are “watching him closely,” perhaps to catch him doing something wrong on the sabbath. But Jesus is noticing things too, watching guests scramble for the best seats, the seats of honor and status. He tells them a parable with the strong message to sit in the lowest place, so that they may be lifted up. And then he adds, “When you throw a party, don’t just invite your friends and relatives and rich people. Invite the poor and the outcast –people you don’t know, people you usually avoid, people who can never return the favor.”
Jesus gives a new vision for life in the kin-dom of God and critiques the social and political practices of that time, when the culture was built on relationships that would allow some who have honor and status to climb the ladder, while others to remain stuck at the bottom living in shame. As preacher Amy Starr Redwine says in her sermon, “Jesus admonishes those present to try something unusual, even radical. Instead of playing by the rules of privilege and status and honor, they should go outside the circle of influence and include people who can never return the favor, who could never – at least by cultural standards – adequately express their gratitude.”
This story, this parable that Jesus tells, is as timely this week as it was thousands of years ago. Every week, sometime daily, we’re reminded that our political and social order begs for a radical restructuring of Gospel proportions. Jesus calls us to do more than exchange favors with those who have an equal footing in society, or who can pay us back or invite us back.
Instead, Jesus calls us to transform whatever metaphorical tables we are included in and be part of the radical restructuring that is inclusive of everyone, regardless of status, power or privilege. Jesus calls us to see the world differently and welcome all of God’s people to the party. That means we seek justice that allows everyone access to affordable education. We work to restructure a system, so that health care doesn’t land people in bankruptcy. We find ways for everyone, not just a privileged few, to receive a living wage and meaningful work. And we stand with those who demand affordable housing, so that the few with money are no longer able to scramble for the best places for themselves, while longtime residents get pushed out of their home neighborhood. That’s the kind of radical restructuring of gospel portions that Jesus calls us to participate in as his dinner guests–radical Christian hospitality that doesn’t count who’s worthy or deserving of any invitation to living fully in God’s grace.
In an editorial in The Christian Century, editor Peter Marty wrote, “Living a life aligned with Jesus is extremely difficult. We practice and practice, trying to get even a few basics right. It’s mostly unglamorous work, as unglamorous as brushing teeth at the bookends of the day… I’m thoroughly convinced that nothing resembling expertise exists in the Christian life. How can you become an expert at receiving the totally undeserved mercy of God on a daily basis? There’s a reason we speak meaningfully of practicing the faith. It’s all practice.”
Tables aren’t just the place where we gather with the people we love and give thanks to God – which we often call saying “grace.” Tables are where we get to practice receiving and giving God’s grace. God has invited us to be a part of an incredible banquet – a metaphor for God’s community – the place where all of God’s people come together. And Jesus calls us to do more than just show up and say thank you for the invitation. Jesus calls us to live our gratitude to God by reaching out to those who cannot return the favor and sharing the good news that they are invited into this community of practice as well.
Jesus suggests the people we need to reach out to are those who are ignored or overlooked. In our time who might that be?
the person of color who is profiled and wrongly arrested and imprisoned;
the transgender person terrified of how government policies will impact their life;
the people who hold political views so different from yours that it becomes all too easy to see them as less than;
It might even mean offering grace and forgiveness to someone in your life who doesn’t deserve it and who wouldn’t do the same for you.
According to Jesus there is always more room at God’s table and no one, not one single person, is to be left out of this feast. Inviting other people to join us at God’s table means we must be willing to transform the pyramid of power and privilege into a table where everything is served family style, passed around from one person to the next in a continual dance of receiving and giving, of accepting God’s gracious gift and paying it forward.
We practice this dance weekly at the Eucharistic feast where there are no place cards, no best seats, no vying for who gets honored or welcomed the most. Refreshed, renewed, forgiven and freed by this meal we are sent into the world to practice the radically inclusive, table transforming love with the whole world. Thanks be to God! Amen.
