I shared with you earlier Jesus’ parable of the Messianic Banquet, also known as the Great Banquet, the Wedding Banquet, or the Great Dinner. Though this parable was likely told in many different ways among the early followers of Jesus, and was likely written down in many different versions in many books now lost to antiquity, by my count there are three versions that have survived into our time, one in the Christian New Testament Book of Luke, one in its sibling, Matthew, and one in the non-biblical, gnostic Gospel of Thomas.
In short, the master of the house—context suggests a person of great wealth and status—intends to throw a banquet. He sends his servants—sometimes translated into English as slaves—to invite his friends who are also people of wealth and status. The friends decline the invitation. They all have reasonable excuses. In Luke the master becomes angry and says to his servants, “Go out at once into the streets and lanes of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.” They do this, and there is still room at the table, so the master then says “Go out into the roads and lanes”—sometimes translated as ‘highways and byways’ or ‘highways and hedgerows’—“and compel people to come in, so that my house may be filled.”
In Mathew the master of the house is also the king. His friends kill the servants who bring the invitations. The king then sends soldiers who kill the “murderers” and burn the city. He then says to the servants, “The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.” The text continues, “Those servants went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad, so the wedding hall was filled with guests.”
In the Gospel of Thomas we don’t learn how the master feels about those who decline the original invitation. He simply says to the servants, “Go out on the streets and bring back whomever you find to have dinner.”
If nothing else, this is a story about invitation. Who is invited to the banquet table? What is at stake in the invitation? When I first learned that our ministry theme for September is invitation, I immediately thought of this story. I first encountered it as a child. I have a vague memory of hearing and discussing it—and absolutely not getting it—in a Sunday School class at my grandparents’ church in Hanover, Pennsylvania. In seminary, in the mid-1990s, I audited a class on Jesus with the theologian and scholar of religion Harvey Cox. His description of this story has never left me. I want to share from my notebook from that class to give you Cox’s take on what Jesus was doing when he told this parable.
Those of you who are familiar with the parables know that Jesus was trying to explain to his followers what the kingdom of God is like. That’s purpose of the parables. The kingdom of God is like a mustard seed. The kingdom of God is like leaven that a woman took and hid in three measures of flour. The kingdom of God is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. The kingdom of God is like a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. Each of Jesus’ parables, in some way, subverts the dominant social, cultural and religious ideas and practices of his day, meaning, the rules that apply in society do not apply in the Kingdom of God. As in almost any society, ancient or otherwise, there were unwritten rules, social conventions, religious restrictions regarding who could associate with whom, and in the case of this parable in particular, who could eat with whom. As in almost any society, ancient or otherwise, there were powerful stigmas attached to certain groups of people, making them perennial outsiders. This would have included poor people, those deemed unrighteous, sinners, people with disabilities—the crippled, the blind, the lame—lepers, people perceived to be demon-possessed in some way—today we might say people with mental illness—menstruating women, and generally any woman who was not under the control of a man, and who might therefore be referred to as a prostitute, a sex worker, a whore, etc. Tax collectors are often added to the list.
To provide cultural and religious context, Cox referred to passages in the Dead Sea scrolls, which were unearthed in the mid-twentieth century, and which provide scholars with a host of insights into the society in which Jesus lived. The texts belonged specifically to a somewhat isolated Jewish sect known as the Essenes, though their beliefs and practices likely would have overlapped with those of other Jewish groups in the region. The scrolls refer to a Messianic Banquet, a great feast at the end of time, at which all the righteous of Israel will sit before the Messiah. Absent from that feast, according to Cox, are the crippled, the blind, the lame, the deaf, the poor, etc. These outsiders do not get a seat at the Messianic Table.
Cox claimed that Jesus and his followers would have been familiar with stories of the Messianic Banquet. And they would have been familiar with the basic rules about who could eat with whom. Many of Jesus’ followers would have been among those who were typically excluded. In hearing Jesus tell the parable, they would have expected the man of status and wealth to invite his friends of status and wealth to his banquet. But Jesus, in typical fashion, begins with this familiar image and then flips it on its head. Those who typically get the invite are not coming. But does the man cancel the banquet? No! Go out to the streets and bring in whoever you find. Bring in the blind, the crippled, the lame. Bring in the poor. Bring in the sex workers. Bring in the aliens and the immigrants. Bring in the tax collectors. He is saying “no” to hierarchy, “no” to systems of rank, “no” to exclusion based on arbitrary characteristics. He is saying “yes” to a different kind of society, clearly a more welcoming and inclusive society that doesn’t get hung up on tests of righteousness and purity, or tests of wealth and status; a more compassionate society, a more loving society. Cox says this was a truly radical, truly subversive vision. Pretty much everyone gets an invitation to the Messianic Table.
When I wrote the blurb for this service I asked what this parable says to us, Unitarian Universalists, here in this beautiful meeting house, tucked away in a calm, woodsy Connecticut suburb, just shy of two thousand years from the time Jesus supposedly shared it with his followers. I have a few thoughts.
We know Jesus uses the Great Banquet as a metaphor for the Kingdom of God, but it’s not just a metaphor. He and his disciples also lived this way. They weren’t waiting for the kingdom to arrive. This, for them, was how to live here and now. And they were criticized for it. “Look, he eats with sinners and tax collectors.” I’m mindful that many Unitarian Universalists and many liberal Christians say some version of these words: “the idea of Christ—Jesus as the risen savior—doesn’t have any meaning for me. I’m not a believer in that sense. But I agree he was a great teacher and prophet, an excellent moral guide. I try to follow his teachings. I think that’s what matters.” Does that sound familiar to you? I’ve said words to that effect many times over the years. But I also know I don’t eat like this. It’s almost as if there’s some unwritten rule, deep in our societal structure prevents us from eating like this.
Some of us on the Social Justice / Anti-Oppression Committee have been helping out a local undocumented immigrant family whose breadwinner, until this past week, was detained by Immigrations and Customs Enforcement. We’ve been delivering food and diapers once a week to the mom who’s been home with three children under five and a teenager. They need this support, and we’ll keep doing it for a little while longer; but it dawned on me in preparing for this service, “why haven’t we eaten with them?” Why did that thought not occur to me? What unwritten rule prevented that thought from breaking into my consciousness?
There are certainly many venues in our larger society where large groups of diverse people who don’t know each other come together and eat: fairs, malls food courts, restaurants, sporting events, etc. But the unwritten rules still operate in these venues. It’s rare that people are encouraged in such settings to eat with someone they don’t know, especially someone who is radically different from them and learn something about them, while also sharing about themselves. Breaking into conversation with someone you don’t know at the table next to you is as likely to be deemed rude as it is to be welcomed. There needs to be invitation. But can you imagine a mall staff person yelling to everyone sitting in the food court to get up and meet someone new. Eat with that person. Get to know something about them. Let them get to know something about you. It’s almost impossible to imagine.
Our congregation used to organize events with Bethel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Bloomfield. I still remember one of the first times we had a meal together. People were sitting with people they knew. We very naturally failed to cross lines of church membership, which were also racial lines. Rev. Dr. Johnson, who was Bethel’s pastor at the time said, at the top of his lungs, “No, no, no. Everybody rise, find someone from a church you don’t belong to, and eat with them.” We did, and a great relationship evolved out of those meals. But it wasn’t instinctual. We had to be invited.
We have our own version of a Messianic Table here at UUSE and within Unitarian Universalism. At our messianic table we celebrate freedom of spirit, conscience and belief; the free and responsible search for truth and meaning; the pursuit of justice and equity, living in right relationship with the earth, interdependence, democratic processes, religious pluralism, and a love that, once expressed, is never lost. All this is worth sharing with others. But as long as I’ve been a Unitarian Universalist, I’ve heard it said—and I think it’s largely true—that we’re uncomfortable sharing our faith. We often say we don’t like to proselytize.
There are many reasons why it matters that we become more comfortable with inviting people—friends and strangers—to explore Unitarian Universalism, and many ways to do it. But there’s one group of people I feel I would be remiss if I did not name as I close out this sermon. I’m thinking about what sociologists and social workers, and even the United States Surgeon General are referring to as the epidemic of loneliness. Throughout and since the coronavirus pandemic, though even before it, loneliness has been on the rise, particularly among elders, though certainly not limited to elders. I commend to you Vivek Murthy’s 2023 Surgeon General’s report, Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation. I also commend to you the website of the Connecticut Collaborative to End Loneliness. It is clear to me that faith communities are uniquely situated to address this epidemic. Part of our Messianic Table is a caring, connected community, which is exactly what people of all ages need to help overcome the negative health outcomes associated with loneliness.
Do you know someone who is lonely? Invite them to come to worship with you?
Is there someone in your social orbit who may be struggling? Invite them to come to worship with you.
Knowing there are lonely people; knowing there are all sorts of people who may be hungering for a table like ours, why not make the invitation? As we kick off our 2024-2025 congregational year, what better time to make the invitation? Why not go out into the streets and bring in whoever you may find? Why not go out to the highways and the byways and make the invitation? Make it with pride. Make it with confidence. Make it with spirit! Make it with the knowledge that not everyone will respond, but there are many who are waiting. Make the invitation.
Amen and blessed be.
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