Saint Luke's Lutheran Church

Our lessons for today speak about humility and hospitality - two things people have always struggled with, for they are both difficult to master and to practice. The fact that Jesus deals with them in our Gospel reading shows that they are important issues and that there is some connection between the two. When Jesus attended a banquet and saw how the guests scrambled for the places of honor, he told them a parable to show them that “everyone who makes himself great will be humbled and everyone who humbles himself will be made great.”

The summer Olympics held in Athens this year has had its own stories of pride and humility. Maurice Greene, a sprinter on the US team, is not a humble person. Prior to running for his second gold medal in the 100 meters, he told reporters, “This is going to be the year where all you say that Maurice Greene, he is the greatest sprinter of all time." In spite this self-confidence, Maurice Greene ended up third in the finals of the men’s 100 meter race. Then there is Michael Phelps, one of the truly great swimmers of all time. Having won five gold and 2 bronze medals already, Phelps gave his place in the medley relay to teammate Ian Crocker, whom he had beaten in the men’s butterfly by 4/100th of a second. He did it so that Crocker would have a chance at winning a gold medal of his own.

A guy like Phelps is easier for most people to like and admire than a guy like Greene. Most of us resent those who are too proud and too boastful. That is why, from little on, most of us have learned to temper our pride - or at least to cover it up. Yet how many athletes sitting on the bench don’t think they are better than someone out there on the field? How many employees don’t think that they could teach their boss a thing or two about how to do business? How many citizens don’t think that they could run the government better than those who are in office?

On the other hand, there are those people who put themselves down rather than puffing themselves up, people who really believe that they are not as good as others, who think that their ideas and opinions are not worthy anything, who believe that they deserve less rather than more. These are not really humble people, but rather people who have a low self-esteem. There is an important difference.

Because people resent those who puff themselves up and pity or take advantage of those who put themselves down, people are told that they need to learn how to work the system in a way that they will avoid shame and acquire honor. The world’s solution for those who are too proud is to teach them how to hide their pride and feint humility. And the world’s solution for those who have a low sense of self-worth is to build up their pride and to give them assertiveness training.

Jesus offers an entirely different solution. At first, it may seem that Jesus is teaching us the ways of the world -- how to work the system -- when he says that when you are invited to dinner you should take a lower seat so that the host will invite you to a more prominent place at the table. But throughout the Gospels, Jesus makes it clear that in the Kingdom of God things are different than they are in the world. In the Kingdom of God, the greatest are not those who are served, but those who serve. In the Kingdom of God, the first shall be last and the last first.

So when Jesus says that those who exalt themselves will be humbled and those who humble themselves will be exalted, he is talking about true humility - not a fake humility, not a manipulative humility, but a true humility. Those who are truly humble are more concerned about how the feels of others than their own; they are more concerned about how others are treated than how they themselves are treated. The truly humble person is more interested in giving honor than gaining it - more interested in lifting up the lowly than in avoiding shame.

Such humility does not come easily, but it is possible for those who are the children of God. If we are children of God, then we are royalty, sons and daughters of a heavenly King, and there is nothing that we can do to make ourselves more important than that. There is no greater honor than having a place at Lord’s table and a room in the Father’s house. Since we are loved by God, we really don’t need to worry about our self-esteem or self-worth. Self-esteem comes from knowing that you are loved, and God has loved us with an everlasting love. Our sense of self worth comes from looking at the cross. Jesus gave his life for us. He suffered and died so that we might be free from sin and death. That tells us what we are worth in the eyes of God. Yet there is no pride in being a child of God - for our place in God’s heart and in God’s kingdom is not something that we gained for ourselves - it is a gift, given completely out of God’s love and not on our own merits.

After talking about humility, Jesus immediately takes up the subject of hospitality. In the ancient world, in a society where there were not rest areas along the road or motels at major intersections or emergency road service available by phone, hospitality - including hospitality toward strangers - was an important social norm. The travelers and nomads who traversed the desserts and wildernesses of that world relied upon the hospitality of strangers for food and water and safety. This kind of hospitality is not as important or as valued today as it was in Biblical times. Hospitality may no longer be as important today as a social value, but it is still as important for the mission of the church today as it was 2,000 years ago. If we are going to make disciples of all nations, we have to be hospitable - we have to welcome others with warmth, kindness, and generosity.

Jesus calls us to be hospitable to the people who need our hospitality, not to the people who will be able to repay our hospitality. The people who really need our hospitality today are those who do not know Jesus or who are not part of a Christian community. This includes the guests who come here for worship or attend some other event at St. Luke’s. It also includes those people we encounter at school, at work, in the marketplace, at the campground, on the airplane.

On my sabbatical this summer, Sandy and I had a chance to visit a number of congregations the size of St. Luke’s and larger. These congregations were recommended to me by the Synod staff as congregations that we doing good ministry, and doing it well. Every one of them considered itself to be a friendly place - and most of them worked encouraging and teaching their members how to welcome guests. But in every one of these congregations, no one expect the staff or the official greeters welcomed us. And that included one congregation we attended on their Friendship Sunday, when the pastor made a point of asking the members to welcome their guests that very morning.

That got me to thinking about how hospitable St. Luke’s is. Actually, I get mixed reviews from our guests. Some come away saying that we are an extremely friendly congregation. Some, however, had the same experience that Sandy and I had this summer. Jesus calls us to be hospitable - especially to strangers and guests. Now, hospitality means more than being friendly. Friendliness says, “Good morning. Welcome to St. Luke’s.” Hospitality says, “Good morning. My name is Frank” and then invites the stranger into my life. Hospitality says, “Let’s do something together.”

My family and I experienced that kind of hospitality at a little Episcopal church in Swakopmund, Namibia, a little resort town on the Atlantic coast of southern Africa. After worship, a couple from that congregation invited us into their home, where we spent an hour or more having refreshments and conversations. They were not just friendly, they were hospitable.

What can we do to make St. Luke’s a more hospitable place? Well first of all we can wear our name tags. Everyone who is wearing a nametag, raise your hand. I knew we had room to improve. It is important to wear a nametag, not only because it helps us get to know each other better, not only because it helps us identify our guests, but perhaps the most important reason for wearing a nametag is its symbolic value. Nametags send a message - a message that says this is a place where we want you to know us by name. Nametags are a good place to begin, but there is more, much more.

Some of us could come to church early so that we are ready to welcome our guests. You wouldn’t invite someone to your home for dinner at 6:30 and then show up at 6:25 or 6:35. Hospitality here might mean that we sit with a guest instead of with our friends so that we can help them with the order of service and the practice of Holy Communion. It would mean that we learn the names of those who visit here and exchange phone numbers so that we can contact them during the week. It might mean that we invite them to have a cup of coffee, or attend a Sunday School class. It would mean that for the first three minutes after worship, we deliberately and intentionally do not huddle with the people we know, but seek out those we do not know and introduce ourselves.

These are things that every one of you can do. If you leave it to the pastors and the official greeters and ushers, then it really doesn’t make much of an impact. Today Jesus invites us to be both humble and hospitable - so that all may feel welcomed in God’s house. Amen.