Monday in the 31st Week of Ordinary Time, October 31, 2022

Luke 14, 12-14

On a sabbath Jesus went to dine at the home of one of the leading Pharisees. He said to the host who invited him, “When you hold a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or sisters or your relatives or your wealthy neighbors, in case they may invite you back and you have repayment. Rather, when you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”

“On a sabbath Jesus went to dine at the home of one of the leading Pharisees.”  It is not clear from the text in what city the action in today’s Gospel Reading took place.  The first verse of the reading is actually the first verse of the chapter.  The dinner has already taken an eventful turn, for a man with dropsy (edema) came to it and the Lord challenged the Pharisees st dinner with him whether it was lawful to heal on the Sabbath.  Presumably the afflicted man was a friend of the host and no one answered.  The Lord then healed him and sent him on his way.  The Lord also taught the host and the guests about seeking the lower seat rather than a higher one, a practical lesson as well as a spiritual one.  Now the Lord gets to the matter of the feast and the guests.

“When you hold a lunch or a dinner.”  The Greek words here mean a midday or mid afternoon meal, respectively.  “Do not invite your friends or your brothers or sisters or your relatives or your wealthy neighbors, in case they may invite you back and you have repayment.”  The Lord is speaking of a formal dinner or banquet here, with plentiful food and drink.  Invitations with an eye to social obligation would have been sent out beforehand.  That is, if the host invites his sister, her husband must come along too.  And if the host is an important figure in the town or synagogue, then figures of importance must also be invited.  They, in turn, would reciprocate later with dinners of their own.  The purpose of the dinner, apart from its occasion, involved maintaining social or civic relationships.  The Lord is set to overthrow this.

“Rather, when you hold a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind; blessed indeed will you be because of their inability to repay you.”  The Lord is saying that the purpose of a dinner or any public or social action is service.  It is service to God and service to him through service to one’s fellow humans.  For the believer, all is service, even as every act the Lord performed came out of his service to his Father and to us.  It is performed gratuitously too, simply out of love for God and one’s brothers and sisters.  Thus, Jesus encourages the feeding of those incapable of reciprocating.  This is the love of Jesus Christ, which flows out to us without stint and without demand that it be returned.

“For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.”  Imitating the love of Jesus, most perfectly shown to us through his Death on the Cross, will gain us heaven.  We might wonder how to acquire this love, which requires us to look at our actions as free service.  It is acquired first of all by prayer, and by spending time before the crucifix and the tabernacle.  We place ourselves at the Lord’s disposal there and he molds and shapes us through grace into living models of himself.  We also do this, at least at first, consciously, reminding ourselves of what we are doing and who we are doing it for.  In time, through practice, we will become accustomed to loving and serving in this way so that we can truly say, with our Lord, that our left hand does not know what our right hand is doing.