Humility and Hospitality
The following video transcript has been lightly edited
Jesus is invited to a dinner by one of the Pharisees, and as he's there, he's watching the other guests posture for where they might sit. You know, this noticing that he does is both sort of the posturing of the people, but also the posturing of the Pharisee. And what he sees is that each party, the guest as well as the host, is trying to just impress other people.
It's all about themselves. And so Jesus tells two parables. One parable is that if you get invited to a wedding banquet, what you should do is not sit in the seat of honor, but rather you should sit somewhere else. Because that way, if you're sitting somewhere else and you actually are the guest of honor, then people will see you be called up to the seat of honor.
Meanwhile to the Pharisee, the story is told, Hey, when you have a party, don't invite other rich people or your family that they can reciprocate, rather invite the blind and invite the poor and invite those who are downtrodden because then you'll experience your reward at the resurrection and both ideas, both to the host and to the guests. The main idea is, hey, don't be someone who's always posturing, but rather enter into authentic relationship and authentic community.
You know, a modern day version for us is, this happens with Instagram. You go to a party and you're excited that you're at this party. You want other people to know you're at the party. So you take a picture about how great this party is so that everybody else can see that you're there. But then a little bit while later, you notice that the host of the party is posting pictures of themselves with these other people and saying, oh, such a great party. So glad I'm with my best friends. And then you feel a little bit less.
In both cases this posting that goes on is about trying to send an image to the world about how important you are or they are. And what Jesus tells us is that this kind of posturing we do disconnects us from the kingdom of God, disconnects us from ourselves, and disconnects us from one another.
And the Kingdom of God works a little bit differently. It's a kingdom of humility and hospitality, and there's three principles that I want to offer up to us today to help us to experience that kingdom of humility and hospitality. Because that's where we're gonna be our authentic selves. We're gonna be connected to one another, to God and even to ourselves.
The first is this idea of resisting the temptation to be about self-promotion. Now all of us do it in different ways. So for some of us, it's about building our resume so that we are known and recognized in a certain way, and for us, that's a source of pride. For others, we maybe sort of dip into approval seeking in which we mutate or bend ourselves so that we can always be agreeable, always give someone else what they want, because what we want is to be affirmed.
Lastly, for some of us, it's just about appearing a certain way, a certain image, and maybe that image is even that you don't care even though what's really important to you is that people believe you don't care. Whatever it is, there's this temptation inside of us to not be authentic, but to rather posture in some sort of way so that we can look good, that we can be affirmed, and that we can be liked.
And Jesus essentially says, Hey, don't do that. That's not healthy for you. It's not healthy for your family and your friends. It's not healthy for the world, but rather focus on being your authentic self. Within your authentic self you're gonna know that you are loved and welcome and connected, and so resist that tendency to posture. And so as you go through your week, I want to challenge you to ask yourself, am I being my authentic self right now or am I posturing in some sort of way?
The second thing that Jesus tells within the story is that those. Who humble themselves will be exalted. And so it's this way of humility. In the ancient world, you would pay people to create a posse. You would put up statues of yourself to show that you were important. The religious leaders of the day would wear long robes and tassels to show that they're a big deal. But Jesus counters that by saying, no, no, the way to the kingdom of God is through humility.
And ultimately, he blazes that path by living his life and dying a criminal's death on the cross. And so Paul says, we're to have the same mindset as Christ who is willing to sacrifice and die on the cross. And so that's what we want to cultivate. We want to cultivate the virtue of humility in ourselves, that's part of who we want to be as people.
Now, I think to cultivate humility, you want to think about it, a sense of self, a sense of others, and a sense of humor. Those three things are really helpful if you're trying to cultivate humility. A sense of self, there's a sense of like who you are in your true self and who you are in your false self.
The false self is the posturing. It's the know it all version. It's the one who's perhaps cynical. The true self is the one who's able to enter in, who laughs, who's able to encourage, who's thoughtful. So understand the difference. Know your true self and your posturing self and try to live into your true self more.
To be humble as CS Lewis says is to not think less of yourself, but it's to think of yourself less, meaning that we have a general sense of others. We're thinking about how our words and our actions impact others. We're thinking about how their experience in the world is as important as ours. And so we're curious and we're interested.
We want to know what they're wrestling with, what their challenge, what they're celebrating. We want to enter in in that authentic way. And so if we wanna cultivate humility, we have to always be growing our sense of others in addition to our sense of ourself.
And then finally, we wanna have a sense of humor. Life is a funny thing. It's broken, it's joyful, but it's also just curious and funny and funny things happen. And our ability to laugh at ourselves and laugh at life is a sense that we are cultivating humility. So let me ask you, which of these three senses do you think you could develop a little bit more?
Your sense of self, your sense of others, or your sense of humor? Because each of those will help you continue to cultivate that sense of humility. And as you cultivate that sense of humility, you'll enter into the kingdom of God, that authentic relationship with God and others, that as human beings, we crave and we desire.
The last part of the parable is a push by Jesus against the Pharisee, and he's saying, Hey, the reason you've invited me to this party is essentially because you're trying to be a big deal yourself and you're trying to challenge me. And so what I want you to do is I want you to invite others not to gain from them but to give to them. I want you to invite others, not so that they benefit you in some way, but rather that you are willing to be someone who loves and cares and serves for them for their benefit. And this is a lesson to us. Hospitality and connection and relationship is not about what we can gain from others, but rather it's a chance for us to enter in and serve others as we see God serve humanity and reflect that back. And enjoy the way that it feels to connect and serve and love and celebrate. And so, if you want this week to be, have an opportunity to enter into the kingdom of God and that sense of peace and presence, my encouragement to you is to be hospitable.
Be hospitable at work, be hospitable at home. Invite other people in, stretch yourself. How might you stretch yourself? What does it look like for you to host and care for and serve others rather than think about the benefit that you can gain from them.
In life we all have different ways in which we posture. Jesus says, Hey, set that down. Rather enter into my kingdom, which is one of humility and hospitality. Which we are authentic selves entering into authentic relationship with God and one another. I hope you're able to do that this week and experience God's kingdom and its richness. Go in peace. Have a great week.
