“But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you, for you will be paid at the resurrection of the righteous.” Luke 14:13-14
Sometimes the only way to fight idea is with another idea. In his very first sermon in Nazareth, and then again at this banquet hosted by the religious elite, Jesus was offering up a new idea: like it or not, God belongs to other people too. He was up against an ideology as old as the first human inklings of the divine: the logic that God would never consort with those the “devoted” consider unworthy. Yet over and over, lovingly, stubbornly, Jesus countered this logic by eating with sinners and preaching sermons about heavenly banquets at which outcasts sit in the honored places.
The idea that the Islamic faith is a mortal danger either to the West or to Christianity is hardly a new one, but it has certainly enjoying renewed favor in recent weeks near Ground Zero and far beyond. One church in Gainesville Florida has decided that the proper Christian duty with respect to Islam is a large-scale burning of copies of the Qu’ran. Fortunately, across town, Rev. Larry Reimer and the United Church of Gainesville and several other communities of faith in that city have decided to apply a little of their own banquet logic. Rather than join in burning the Qu’ran, they are going to begin reading it. Now there’s an idea!
Banquet logic is effective because it is so disarming. It abides by the apostle Paul’s warning that our real enemies are not flesh and blood, but the “powers and principalities” which usurp our spiritual judgment, especially in times of fear. It knows that when we invite our “enemy” to the table, or even into our houses of worship, we are not dishonoring Jesus or defiling God’s vision. We are simply doing what Jesus did.
Prayer: Dear God, as you have done for me so many times, help me learn what it means set a table of welcome and mercy for others, even when – especially when – I think they are my enemies. Amen.
