The Pleasure of Your Company

The Pleasure of Your Company--January 16, 2018

"Then Jesus said to him, “Someone gave a great dinner and invited many. At the time for the dinner he sent his slave to say to those who had been invited, ‘Come; for everything is ready now.’ But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, ‘I have bought a piece of land, and I must go out and see it; please accept my regrets.’ Another said, ‘I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out; please accept my regrets.’ Another said, ‘I have just been married, and therefore I cannot come.’ So the slave returned and reported this to his master. Then the owner of the house became angry and said to his slave, ‘Go out at once into the streets and lanes of the town and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.’ And the slave said, ‘Sir, what you ordered has been done, and there is still room.” Then the master said to the slave, ‘Go out into the roads and lanes, and compel people to come in, so that my house may be filled. For I tell you, none of those who were invited will taste my dinner.’”  [Luke 14:16-24]

In the end--and, please, know that I mean this in the most wonderful way--in the end, it's not about you.  The call, that is.  It's not about you.

Or perhaps, I should say it this way: it's not about "you" in terms of your qualifications or assets or "what you have to offer".  It's not what you bring that matters... it's just your presence.

This is one of those times in the Christian faith where the bad news is the good news in the end.  For us when we are stuck in the illusion that Jesus calls us to come to the party on some kind of merit-based system, it will sound like bad news to realize that Jesus didn't invite you because of your resume, skill set, or raw talent.  It will mean giving up the false premise that our place at God's table depends on our ability or social position, or what we think we have to offer that God "needs." And once that happens, we'll realize that our well-curated lists of accomplishments were worthless currency.  That has a way of deflating our egos, which is never a fun thing.

But at the same time, this is deeply good news, too.  It is freeing, it is assuring, it is reliable--because it doesn't depend on what we bring to the picture.  When Jesus calls us to the party, it's not because he needs some ability that we bring--like I'm the only one in the history of the universe who can put up streamers or blow up balloons--but because Jesus is determined that the party go on, despite the efforts of the self-appointed "big deals" and "important people" to try and poop it by not attending.  For the sake of the party, the hall will be filled.  For the sake of the joy of the celebration, everybody is drawn in.  For the sake of having a good ol' time and because it is a terrible shame to waste a good dinner, the host of the party has his staff bring in anybodies and everybodies and the nobodies that the world overlooked.  

See, somewhere along the way, I suspect most of us got this all confused.  Maybe every last one of us besides Jesus.  Somehow we get it in our heads that we got to where we are by our skill set or our raw talent or our own supposed greatness. Somehow we convince ourselves that MY place at the table is because I must have some ability, some innate je-ne-sais-quoi that makes ME vital to God's enterprise.  And of course once I have taught myself to believe that lie, well, I get all bent out of shape if I think of someone else being included out of mercy, or sheer hospitality, or divine delight.  I'll get in a big huff if "they" are allowed to come to the party without being one of the "acceptable" people, the "talented" people, or the "well-connected" people who can offer something back to the host.  I'll cry out that it's unfair... that it's not right... that it flies in the face of justice and righteousness and all that is good to let "those people" come to the table for free.... all because I cannot recognize that I am only at the party myself because the host graciously drew me in.  It's like that line of Frederick Buechner's as he defines what "grace" is all about:  "The grace of God means something like: Here is your life. You might never have been, but you are because the party wouldn't have been complete without you."

Ah, that's closer to the mark.  You and I are here because the party would not have been complete without us.  We find ourselves at God's great big dinner table, along with the rest of the poor and the crippled, the blind and the lame (and, as Matthew adds in a parallel version of a story like this, "the good AND the bad"), not because there's nobody else who knows how to eat shrimp like me or can dance the Funky Chicken like I can, but because the sheer joy of the party requires people to celebrate, and so the call goes out far and wide.  It isn't about me--at least in the self-centered sense that my resume  got me in the door.  It's not about my ability, or for that matter about my neediness, because I am not just here to be God's pity project, either. 

You'll note that the host of the party doesn't invite the poor and the lame in order to make himself feel better, or to look good in a photo-op, or to get leverage over them, or to buy off their favor.  It's not that God "needs" someone to patronize in order to be God, and so God makes a world full of miserable wretches just to have objects of pity to show off to.  It's not about me, either way, in that sense.  It's in a sense, all about Jesus, the center of the party--and because it is all about Jesus, in a secondary sense, it can be all about us, the anybodies and nobodies who are all welcomed to the party regardless of what we bring with us.

While I'm not a terribly formal guy when it comes to fancy parties and etiquette, there's something I really like about the old-fashioned way they word dinner invitations or wedding announcements.  You know how it goes:  "The pleasure of your company is requested..."  That's it.  It's not that I get to the party because I was better than the person next in line.  It's not that I get to the party because I'm better, or have more usable skills, or am better looking (definitely not that), or because I am more influential, or come from a more respectable neighborhood, or because my family was richer, or because of where I was born.  It's not about me, in any of those senses.  It is, rather, that we all find ourselves drawn into the party, "compelled," in the words of Jesus' parable, by Jesus' call, simply because Jesus himself "requests the pleasure of our company."

And once we are clear about that, I can all of a sudden stop being such a preposterously bone-headed crank making a fuss about why "those people" are allowed in to the party without anything I think is worthy of offering, because I'll realize that I am only at the big table myself because of God's joyful grace.  All of a sudden, I'll see that the ONLY people here at the party are the "poor" and the "crippled" and the "lame" and the "blind" and all the rest of the huddled masses, as the old poem goes.  There ain't nobody but us anybodies at the party.  And what makes us worthy to be here at Jesus' feast is not what we think makes us great.  It is Jesus' own joyful will to celebrate, and to include us in the celebrating, because the party wouldn't be complete without us.

Jesus has requested simply "the pleasure of our company," from every last one of us, from the nameless faces from far away to the face I see in the mirror.

Lord Jesus, as you call our name to come to your party, grant us the grace to get over ourselves and simply to hear your joyful invitation to be in your presence with nothing but our own presence.