READINGS FROM HOLY SCRIPTURE:
Micah 7:18-20
1 Peter 5:6-11
- St. Luke 15:1-10
Grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our
Savior. (Titus 1:4)
Who speaks to you today, saying:
The real object that Jesus is searching for in His parables today is His Image. The world believes the image of God is found in human kindness and humanitarian beauty. As if, humans are divine and contain the divine and there is no other divine. The Image of God is not found, it is given. Jesus is the Image of God and He has come to restore His Image in Word and Sacrament and that is the “problem”.
On the surface, “receiving sinners and eating with them” is an easy Bible passage to interpret. We have the “bad guys” saying bad things about their neighbor and therefore will be punished. Jesus, the great philanthropist, always takes the side of the oppressed and down-trodden, so you too should fight for social justice. Jesus demands it.
On the other hand, Jesus has come for sinners, especially those wearied and heavily burdened with their sins. These usually tend to be those whom society looks down on and would rather not associate with and yet we see that Jesus does. You cannot tell which sinners will be received and which will not.
Jesus is the Great Teacher and so you should hear those words and feel guilty about how often you do not help the people that others look down on. But Jesus is also more than just another social justice warrior or teacher of morality. He is God. He is the Crucified and Risen Savior. He is the Alpha and the Omega. Simply eating with sinners, or lending them a hand, does not get the job done.
Our answer lies in the grumbling of the Pharisees and the scribes. Funny enough, the grumbling of Israel is made infamous by the books of Moses. More specifically, it is the Exodus from Egypt that set the Hebrew people to murmur greatly like a constant buzzing of negativity against Moses and, therefore, against God. And the grumbling was always about the same thing, as you will see, though it had different targets.
One of the first Sunday School lessons you learn is the wandering in the desert, where all the Hebrews grumble against God and Moses. From Exodus: “And the people grumbled against Moses, saying, ‘What shall we drink?’” (Ex 15:24) and “what shall we eat?” You should’ve just killed us by the Egyptian meat pots (Ex 16:3). “Why is the Lord bringing us into the land of Canaan (sinners) to die by the sword?” (Num 14:3).
Do you notice what the grumbling is about? It’s not about having a nice bed to sleep in or indoor plumbing available in the desert. Its about sinners and its about eating and drinking with them. First, its about staying with Egypt: they were sinners, yeah, but they had all the food. Second, its about themselves: Egyptian sinners had food, we chosen and righteous do not.
And who do they complain to? Not God, He’s too scary. He’ll kill us just by speaking to us. They complain to Moses and Aaron, who are only men. But too bad for them, grumbling against Moses and A-A-Ron is the same as grumbling against God. So much so that St. Paul recalls in 1 Corinthians 10, “nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer” (v.10), referencing Numbers 11.
Thus the first issue here is sin, not some good old boys club beating down the common people. It is the lack of the Image of God and a lack of recognizing the Image of God. We heard the indignation of the Jews last week when one said to Jesus, “Blessed is he who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!” (Luke 14:15). Those that eat and drink with God are to be blessed, worthy, not rabble and cut-throats.
Repent. Sin against God is not just disobedience. Disobedience is down the line. Sin is not listening to God when He tells you what He’s saying and what He’s doing. “Why should a living man grumble about the punishment of his sins?” (Lam 3:39). He shouldn’t, he is guilty, after all. But its not fair to him, seeing as how he is the pinnacle of creation, and that’s why he grumbles.
Why can’t you just excuse the sin and love the sinner and that be the end of it, God? Grumble grumble. Why are people crazy these days? They’re all so entitled. Grumble grumble.
I wasn’t like that when I was young. This is not what I’m used to at church. This is not how it was back in my day. Grumble grumble grumble.
You grumble against God day in and day out, but you make sure to stay away from the big sins. Instead, your focus is on your normal, day-to-day life. So what will God do in the face of all this grumbling? Is He going to change the way He does things? Is He going to get with the times? Is He going to make things more attractive to a new generation that doesn’t understand all His Church mumbo-jumbo? Is He going to bow to your grumbling?
Well, in a way, yes. Jesus is God giving in to your grumbling.
If there’s grumbling in the Old Testament about eating and drinking and grumbling in the New Testament about eating and drinking, what do you suppose we have to grumble about today?
When Jesus gives us the parables of the Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin to answer that question, we hear of an invitation sent out to friends and neighbors. An invitation to a joyful celebration. An invitation to rejoice in eating and drinking. For the Prodigal Father declares, later on in St. Luke chapter 15, “And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to celebrate” (v.23-24).
In the presence of the Lord there is eternal celebration. And celebrations always include a feast. We even have an old saying, “nothing brings people together like food”. How do we know the Lord is present among us today?
As our meal prayer from Psalm 145 states, “You open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing” (v.16) and that open hand is punctured. A puncture that spilled the Life Blood of God, which is so valuable it can even stave off death.
Jesus says, “my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink” (John 6:55). He has also prophesied that when we eat and drink, we see God (Ex 24:11). Eat and drink what?
Now we know. But how can an almighty and holy God justify receiving sinners and eating and drinking with them?
God declares sinners righteous for Christ’s sake; that is, our sins have been imputed or charged to Christ, the Savior, and Christ’s righteousness has been imputed or credited to us (LSCE, 166). In other words, “he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21).
How can this man receive sinners and eat with them? Because He has traversed life and death to find His dead-in-sin sheep to bring them to life again. “you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live” (Ez 37:13-14). I will set up one shepherd over you and he shall feed you: he shall feed you and be your shepherd (Ez 34:23).
Jesus, receiving sinners and eating with them, is Jesus receiving you and eating with you. Jesus gives in to your grumbling and gives you what you need, that is union with Him. The grumbling about His Way and His means is the temptation to prevent them from happening in our own lives. In sin we grumble. In the forgiveness of sins we celebrate.
We grumble because we sinfully believe that we will not have a place in the Kingdom, but we just misunderstand the Image of God. It is not something we produce within ourselves neither is it something we chase after like the holy grail, to find in someone’s heart.
The Image of God and the Meal of God are all given and instituted without our prayer. They go on, regardless of how we act or what we believe. God calls out to His neighbors with His Gospel, inviting them to share in His joy. The joy of the restoration of sinners.
Who speaks to you today, saying:
“And the Pharisees and the scribes grumbled, saying,
’This man receives sinners and eats with them.’”
The real object that Jesus is searching for in His parables today is His Image. The world believes the image of God is found in human kindness and humanitarian beauty. As if, humans are divine and contain the divine and there is no other divine. The Image of God is not found, it is given. Jesus is the Image of God and He has come to restore His Image in Word and Sacrament and that is the “problem”.
On the surface, “receiving sinners and eating with them” is an easy Bible passage to interpret. We have the “bad guys” saying bad things about their neighbor and therefore will be punished. Jesus, the great philanthropist, always takes the side of the oppressed and down-trodden, so you too should fight for social justice. Jesus demands it.
On the other hand, Jesus has come for sinners, especially those wearied and heavily burdened with their sins. These usually tend to be those whom society looks down on and would rather not associate with and yet we see that Jesus does. You cannot tell which sinners will be received and which will not.
Jesus is the Great Teacher and so you should hear those words and feel guilty about how often you do not help the people that others look down on. But Jesus is also more than just another social justice warrior or teacher of morality. He is God. He is the Crucified and Risen Savior. He is the Alpha and the Omega. Simply eating with sinners, or lending them a hand, does not get the job done.
Our answer lies in the grumbling of the Pharisees and the scribes. Funny enough, the grumbling of Israel is made infamous by the books of Moses. More specifically, it is the Exodus from Egypt that set the Hebrew people to murmur greatly like a constant buzzing of negativity against Moses and, therefore, against God. And the grumbling was always about the same thing, as you will see, though it had different targets.
One of the first Sunday School lessons you learn is the wandering in the desert, where all the Hebrews grumble against God and Moses. From Exodus: “And the people grumbled against Moses, saying, ‘What shall we drink?’” (Ex 15:24) and “what shall we eat?” You should’ve just killed us by the Egyptian meat pots (Ex 16:3). “Why is the Lord bringing us into the land of Canaan (sinners) to die by the sword?” (Num 14:3).
Do you notice what the grumbling is about? It’s not about having a nice bed to sleep in or indoor plumbing available in the desert. Its about sinners and its about eating and drinking with them. First, its about staying with Egypt: they were sinners, yeah, but they had all the food. Second, its about themselves: Egyptian sinners had food, we chosen and righteous do not.
And who do they complain to? Not God, He’s too scary. He’ll kill us just by speaking to us. They complain to Moses and Aaron, who are only men. But too bad for them, grumbling against Moses and A-A-Ron is the same as grumbling against God. So much so that St. Paul recalls in 1 Corinthians 10, “nor grumble, as some of them did and were destroyed by the Destroyer” (v.10), referencing Numbers 11.
Thus the first issue here is sin, not some good old boys club beating down the common people. It is the lack of the Image of God and a lack of recognizing the Image of God. We heard the indignation of the Jews last week when one said to Jesus, “Blessed is he who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!” (Luke 14:15). Those that eat and drink with God are to be blessed, worthy, not rabble and cut-throats.
Repent. Sin against God is not just disobedience. Disobedience is down the line. Sin is not listening to God when He tells you what He’s saying and what He’s doing. “Why should a living man grumble about the punishment of his sins?” (Lam 3:39). He shouldn’t, he is guilty, after all. But its not fair to him, seeing as how he is the pinnacle of creation, and that’s why he grumbles.
Why can’t you just excuse the sin and love the sinner and that be the end of it, God? Grumble grumble. Why are people crazy these days? They’re all so entitled. Grumble grumble.
I wasn’t like that when I was young. This is not what I’m used to at church. This is not how it was back in my day. Grumble grumble grumble.
You grumble against God day in and day out, but you make sure to stay away from the big sins. Instead, your focus is on your normal, day-to-day life. So what will God do in the face of all this grumbling? Is He going to change the way He does things? Is He going to get with the times? Is He going to make things more attractive to a new generation that doesn’t understand all His Church mumbo-jumbo? Is He going to bow to your grumbling?
Well, in a way, yes. Jesus is God giving in to your grumbling.
If there’s grumbling in the Old Testament about eating and drinking and grumbling in the New Testament about eating and drinking, what do you suppose we have to grumble about today?
When Jesus gives us the parables of the Lost Sheep and the Lost Coin to answer that question, we hear of an invitation sent out to friends and neighbors. An invitation to a joyful celebration. An invitation to rejoice in eating and drinking. For the Prodigal Father declares, later on in St. Luke chapter 15, “And bring the fattened calf and kill it, and let us eat and celebrate. For this my son was dead, and is alive again; he was lost, and is found.’ And they began to celebrate” (v.23-24).
In the presence of the Lord there is eternal celebration. And celebrations always include a feast. We even have an old saying, “nothing brings people together like food”. How do we know the Lord is present among us today?
As our meal prayer from Psalm 145 states, “You open your hand and satisfy the desire of every living thing” (v.16) and that open hand is punctured. A puncture that spilled the Life Blood of God, which is so valuable it can even stave off death.
Jesus says, “my flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink” (John 6:55). He has also prophesied that when we eat and drink, we see God (Ex 24:11). Eat and drink what?
Now we know. But how can an almighty and holy God justify receiving sinners and eating and drinking with them?
God declares sinners righteous for Christ’s sake; that is, our sins have been imputed or charged to Christ, the Savior, and Christ’s righteousness has been imputed or credited to us (LSCE, 166). In other words, “he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Cor 5:21).
How can this man receive sinners and eat with them? Because He has traversed life and death to find His dead-in-sin sheep to bring them to life again. “you shall know that I am the Lord, when I open your graves, and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my Spirit within you, and you shall live” (Ez 37:13-14). I will set up one shepherd over you and he shall feed you: he shall feed you and be your shepherd (Ez 34:23).
Jesus, receiving sinners and eating with them, is Jesus receiving you and eating with you. Jesus gives in to your grumbling and gives you what you need, that is union with Him. The grumbling about His Way and His means is the temptation to prevent them from happening in our own lives. In sin we grumble. In the forgiveness of sins we celebrate.
We grumble because we sinfully believe that we will not have a place in the Kingdom, but we just misunderstand the Image of God. It is not something we produce within ourselves neither is it something we chase after like the holy grail, to find in someone’s heart.
The Image of God and the Meal of God are all given and instituted without our prayer. They go on, regardless of how we act or what we believe. God calls out to His neighbors with His Gospel, inviting them to share in His joy. The joy of the restoration of sinners.
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