"Is This Your Seat?" (Luke 14:1-14)

"Is This Your Seat?" (Luke 14:1-14)
Pastor Cameron Jungels
Eastside Baptist Church
Sunday AM, February 28, 2021

Luke 14:1-14, NIV

14 One Sabbath, when Jesus went to eat in the house of a prominent Pharisee, he was being carefully watched. ² There in front of him was a man suffering from abnormal swelling of his body. ³ Jesus asked the Pharisees and experts in the law, “Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath or not?” ⁴ But they remained silent. So taking hold of the man, he healed him and sent him on his way.

⁵ Then he asked them, “If one of you has a child^[a] or an ox that falls into a well on the Sabbath day, will you not immediately pull it out?” ⁶ And they had nothing to say.

⁷ When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: ⁸ “When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. ⁹ If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this person your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. ¹⁰ But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all the other guests. ¹¹ For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.”

¹² Then Jesus said to his host, “When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or sisters, your relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. ¹³ But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, ¹⁴ and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

Proverbs 25:6-7, NIV

⁶ Do not exalt yourself in the king’s presence,
    and do not claim a place among his great men;
⁷ it is better for him to say to you, “Come up here,”
    than for him to humiliate you before his nobles.

Luke 13:30, NIV

³⁰ Indeed there are those who are last who will be first, and first who will be last.”

Main Idea: Humble yourself before God, because God invites the poor and needy to his table.