The Gospel Case Against Plan Cancellations

A reflection for Tuesday of the thirty-first week in ordinary time

Find today’s readings here.

‘Go to the highways and hedgerows
and getting people to come in so my house can be filled.
For I tell you, none of the invited men will taste my dinner.” (Luke 14:23-24)

Today’s gospel message: Host a dinner party for a bunch of complete strangers.

Well, maybe that’s not quite it. But in the day’s reading from Luke’s Gospel, Jesus tells a parable about a man who planned a dinner party and invited a large guest list. When it’s time for the party, his guests drop like flies. (Their excuses are almost comedy. One man says he just got married and that’s why he can’t come; others have just bought fields or oxen and have to go check out their new purchases.)

But since the table is set and the meal is ready, the host (angrily) decides that it should not go to waste. He asks his servant to find a new class of guests: “the poor and the lame, the blind and the lame.” Even after the server has gathered this group, there is still more room at the table. The host then becomes even less demanding; he welcomes all who can find his servant on the “highways and hedgerows.”

But the message of the parable is not as simple as: “All are welcome in the Kingdom of God” – although that is of course true. Now as he fills his table, the host remembers the many who rejected him. “I tell you, none of the invited men will taste my dinner.”

Making excuses or canceling plans can be tempting, even too easy. When it comes to our relationships with God, we often have the right intentions, but we also have a laundry list of reasons why the time for prayer and reflection or the time for taking the action God asks of us falls by the wayside left.

As we imagine ourselves in today’s Gospel reading, we may be just like those original guests. Has God invited us to be in his company, and have we found a reason to say no? Our reason is probably not the Gospel one, the immediate need to evaluate the five yoke of oxen we just purchased. It’s probably a chronic modern refrain: too busy, too tired, too distracted. But today’s Gospel challenges us to ask what we might be missing if we postpone God’s invitation until next time.

On a related note, today is a very important day in the United States; we cast our votes for our next president. It’s a good time to think about what God might be inviting us to do—not just at the voting booth, but also in the aftermath of this election, as we grapple with its results. Is God inviting us to sit with Him, to endure this aftermath in His company? If so, we better not say no.