Reserved for the Wedding Party

I was honored to perform the wedding ceremony of two friends last Friday. This was wedding number four, but the first on a golf course! It was exciting to see some of my friends who I don't get to see very much. The ceremony was simple (at the request of the bride and groom) and everything went according to plan. It seemed to me that everyone who was there was invited. I didn't notice any "wedding crashers."

When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: "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. If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, 'Give this man your seat.' Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. 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 your fellow guests. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."
Then Jesus said to his host, "When you give a luncheon or dinner, do not invite your friends, your brothers or relatives, or your rich neighbors; if you do, they may invite you back and so you will be repaid. But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed. Although they cannot repay you, you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous."

Invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. In other words, invite someone who never gets an invitation. What do your dinners look like? Are they full of the "distinguished?"

The kingdom just might be full of the uninvited.