Who’s at Your Party

Today on Summit Life with J.D.

Greer. Jesus left everything to come to earth to rescue you. And because of that, you have a seat at God's table. How could somebody who recognizes that they're present at God's party entirely because of a gift of grace that cost Him everything and cost us nothing, how could they continue to pursue a life of self-interest and selfishness?

It is utterly inconceivable. Welcome to a new week of Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of Pastor J.D. Greer. I'm your host, Molly Bitovitch. Now, it may seem far-fetched to some of us, but have you ever been outside a VIP event like an awards show or a political event and wondered how those people get an invitation? Well, today on Summit Life, Pastor J.D. dives back into our teaching series in the Gospel of Luke to share with us God's idea of an A-list event. As he teaches from a message called Who's It Your Party?, he reveals more about God's kingdom perspective and what the invitation list really looks like. No need to check the mail.

Your invite is right here. So grab your Bible and let's join Pastor J.D. in the book of Luke. You got your Bible, I want you to open it to Luke chapter 14.

Let me just remind you the context in case you weren't here or just to bring everybody up to speed. Jesus is at a party. And while He's at this party, He uses that opportunity to teach everybody that is present at the party that the kingdom of God is like a party. Well, while Jesus is at this party, He looks around at the party and He notices a couple of things. The first thing that He notices is how everybody is angling to choose the best places to sit at the party, the seats of honor, the places that are closest to the important people or the one that's closest to the host. And Jesus said, you know, when you guys come to a party, don't take the high place, because then if the host sees you in the high place and doesn't think you belong there and sends you back to the low place, well, that's going to be pretty embarrassing. Well, on the other hand, Jesus said, if you choose the low place to sit in a place that's not a place of honor and then He calls you up to the place of honor, He said, that's honoring.

And He said, that's how you ought to live. Now, I told you at first, that just sounds like good social advice. And I don't want to ignore that because for many of you, that is social advice that you need to hear.

But it's not just good social advice. It's also the path of salvation because the truth is that none of us deserve the high place at God's table. We don't even deserve to be at the table. But the gospel is that Jesus, who did deserve the high place, took the low place for us. He took our place on the cross, suffering the penalty for our sin. He took the low place, taking the role of the outcast. And because He did that, He offers us His place at God's table in exchange. But you see, in order to get that, you have to acknowledge that you deserve the low place.

You have to go to the low place and say, this is where I deserve to be. And you have to receive God's offer as a gift, as a gift. Say the word gift. Gift.

Say it again like you heard what I said. Say gift. Gift.

Gift is something that most people don't get about Christianity because there is something instinctive in us that feels like that we have to earn our acceptance. It's like the way of life. We are constantly trying to demonstrate to ourselves and to others that we're worthy of acceptance. We're always trying to show them that there is something about us that makes us distinctive, something that sets us above others, something that makes us worthy. We're successful. We're talented. We're good parents.

We're good people. If you're rich, you feel like the fact that you've made a lot of money shows that you are a worthy person and worthy to be accepted. If you're not rich, you look down on rich people. You're like, well, they're a bunch of snobs. They're stingy. I may not be rich, but I'm a good person.

I'm a good mom or dad. I've explained before that it's like life for us is one big survivor episode where we're always trying to convince everybody else that we're not the ones that ought to be thrown off the island. And then we end up approaching a God that way too, like God is going to accept us at His table based on our worthiness to be there. But God's acceptance is only given as a gift and it has to be received that way by grace.

The truth is that all of us are so guilty in our sin. We are the lame, the blind, the poor, and the crippled before God that none of us could ever earn a place before God. So God has to give it to us as grace. Jesus says that if you choose the posture of trying to earn your place before God, you'll be rejected. But if you acknowledge that you deserve to be rejected, but that Jesus was rejected for you, then you will be received up into the high place. You see in Christianity, and this is the part everybody stumbles over, in Christianity, the way up is the way down.

It doesn't work that way anywhere else in our world. But with God, the way up is the way down. If you exalt yourself before God, you will be rejected.

But if you, like 1 Peter says, humble yourself under the mighty hand of God, He will exalt you. Second thing that Jesus noticed at the party was He noticed at the party that the Pharisee throwing this party had invited all of his rich friends to be at the party. Now, Jesus was not himself rich, but He was pretty well known.

He did some really cool party tricks, which made Him a popular guy to have there. So this rich guy had invited all his rich friends in Jesus, and that's where you begin in chapter 14, verse 12. When Jesus saw that, He said to the one who invited Him, when you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or your rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, you should invite the poor, you should invite the crippled, the lame, and the blind, and then you will be blessed because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just. By the way, Jesus showed absolutely no evidence of caring whether He ever was invited back to a party at somebody's house twice. In fact, there's no evidence in the Bible He ever did get invited to a party twice because the man was not afraid to speak his mind, okay?

He just called it like he saw it. When you have a party, don't invite people who can pay you back, invite people who can't pay you back. Then you'll be blessed and you'll have reward in heaven. Now, a few observations. First of all, what Jesus was instructing here was economic suicide, because in those days, a party was your primary business forum. That is where rich people got to know each other. And what would happen is when you invited your rich friends to your party, they would in turn invite you to their party. So when you invited them to your party, you had a self-interest because you knew they would turn around and invite you back.

To invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind meant that you were inviting people who could never pay you back, people who could not reciprocate. This is how we live still, is it not? I mean, I know we're removed from this context, but isn't this still the way of life?

Most of us, generally speaking, invest in people who can benefit us. It's not like we're trying to take from others or to steal from them, but generally speaking, we make decisions, we form relationships, we pursue life in a way that benefits us in return. Jesus says you should not live that way for a few reasons. Number one, you do not want to live by the law of reciprocity. You do not want to live by the law of reciprocity before God. When it comes to God's party, what did you deserve?

You deserve to be rejected. Why were you accepted at God's table? Because Jesus left everything to come to earth to rescue you. He turned his back on his interests and gave them up for you, and because of that, you have a seat at God's table.

What Jesus is doing in this parable is attacking the entire idea of reciprocity, which so undergirds how we think and how we operate. Again, this is how most of us live. Most of us feel like we get what we deserve and we give others what they deserve.

I mean, Veronica and I live that way, my wife and I. When somebody invites us out for dinner, what is the first thing that you think after they've invited you out for dinner and paid for you? You're like, well, we got to invite them out for dinner now and pay for them.

When somebody invites you or somebody gives you a gift, the first thing you think is, well, I got to get them a gift because I've got to pay them back. But you can't do that with God. The most fundamental tenet of the gospel is that you and I owed a debt we could never pay. So God had to give us his grace entirely as a gift, a gift that cost him everything, but one that we just received freely.

And he did that for us gladly. And see, if you understand that, if you understand that, that should shatter the whole idea that we would invest our lives primarily in those who could pay us back. God poured himself out for us when there was nothing we could do in return. How would it be possible that you and I would actually understand that and still continue to live our lives and leverage our talents and spend our money and use our stuff and throw parties in a way that primarily just benefit ourselves? How could somebody who recognizes that they're present at God's party entirely because of a gift of grace that cost him everything and cost us nothing, how could they continue to pursue a life of self-interest and selfishness?

It is utterly inconceivable. Jesus told one parable that I think kind of encapsulates that. It really is one of my favorite all-time parables. I know I reference it a lot, but it's not like I'm telling the same story twice. This is Jesus' story.

And so you need to hear it more than once. It's the story of the man that was forgiven of 10,000 talents. Now, nobody knows exactly how much a talent is, but we think it's about $75. So you take 10,000 talents, you're looking at almost just a little bit less than a million dollars. That's how much this one guy owes another. Some of you guys got credit card debt and you got a credit card debt of a million dollars. All right, so you get this massive credit card debt. This guy in those days, you know, you couldn't declare bankruptcy.

They hadn't invented that yet. If you owed somebody else money and you couldn't pay back, you went to something they called debtor's prison, which was basically enslaved labor that you did for somebody until you paid off your debt. And when you died, if you hadn't paid off your debt, then your kids would become their slaves. And then if they hadn't paid it off by the time they died, then their kids, this is how whole generations of families got enslaved to another family.

It's indentured servanthood. Well, this guy who owes this other guy money, the day comes for it to be paid and he doesn't have it. He goes in front of this guy and he says, sir, I don't have your money. And this guy says, well, what do you mean you don't have my money?

This is the day that it's due. The guy says, please, sir, one more month, give me one more month and I promise you, I will get you every single penny that I owe you. Now, this guy is looking at him saying, no, you know, that's not how the money system works. You can't pay me, you're going to jail, right? And you're going to become my slave. All of a sudden, this guy drops to his knees and he begins to plead and he can say, no, sir, please don't, don't make me a slave. Don't make my children slaves.

My family don't, I don't want to see my kids grow up as slaves. All of a sudden, this man looking at this other man, he feels something in his gut that Jesus called splogma. Splogma, we translate it as compassion, but I think splogma is a much better word because it means coming from the gut. Can you feel it when you say it? Splogma, right? Splogma, he felt splogma, which meant from his gut, this feeling came up of tenderness and compassion.

Maybe he thought about his kids, who knows? But his lip begins to quiver and he gets a tear in his eye. And he looks at this man and says the absolutely unexpected. He says, he says, I'll tell you what, you owe me a dime. Every single penny you owe me, gone. I've paid it back.

I have cleansed your debt entirely. Now nobody can believe this, right? I mean, everybody in the courtroom is watching this.

No, I mean, cause you don't become a moneylender by being a softie, right? That's why they don't call them, you know, lone puppies or lone bunnies. What do you call them? Lone sharks. That's right. And if you don't pay them, they send some guy named Bruno with a stick to break your kneecaps.

That's how you become a lone shark. So everybody's like, what is going on? And, and this guy's forgiven and he stands up and for the first time in his life, he feels as light as air. I mean, his first time in his life, he doesn't know any money and he feels like he could fly.

And so he walks outside and he's just as light as air. And he's walking across the street thinking about this money that he's been forgiven of. And across the street comes a buddy of his who owes him $3 that he borrowed from him the week before for dinner. He says, give me my $3. God says, man, I don't have your $3. It's been a really rough week.

Next week, I'll get it to you. No, you give me my $3 now. God says, well, I don't have it. He says, well, then you're going to prison. And he goes over and he grabs his neck and drags him and throws him into prison for $3. As Jesus is telling the story, you can hear the whole audience going, are you kidding me?

Nobody who had ever been forgiven of $750,000 would throw somebody else in prison for $3. And Jesus's point was, exactly. So if you don't live a life of generosity, if you don't live a life that is spent pouring itself out for others, if you don't have a life that is characterized by forgiveness and one that is characterized by grace and one that's characterized by leveraging your life for the poor, the lame, and the blind, it must be because you have no concept of what the gospel actually is and what Jesus did for you. You're listening to Summit Life with Pastor J.D.

Greer. As we work our way through our teaching series in the gospel of Luke called Kingdom Come, I wanted to let you know about our exclusive new resource written by Pastor J.D. that we designed to coincide with this series. With your gift of $35 or more to this ministry, we'll send you Kingdom Come 20 Devotions from Luke. We wrote this devotional book specifically to help our listeners experience the rich gospel truth of the book of Luke in a whole new way. And also because it would make a fantastic discipleship resource to give a friend or a family member. Read and reflect on the lessons God's word teaches us from the life of Jesus. It's a great way to start each day for sure.

To give now and reserve your copy, call us at 866-335-5220, or you can visit us online at jdgreer.com. Now let's get back to today's teaching here on Summit Life. Once again, here's Pastor J.D. The first reason Jesus said that you don't want to do this is you don't want to live by the law of reciprocity. Second reason Jesus says we should invite the people to our parties who can't pay us back is that he gives you reward in heaven.

Did you see this, verse 14? If you live this way, you will be blessed because they cannot repay you, for you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just. Jesus' life on earth was not one of luxury. He never owned a house.

He certainly never owned a second one. He lived poor as a servant, and he poured his life out for us to the point of giving away his very lifeblood so that we could be saved. He did that not because he enjoyed poverty, not because he enjoyed pain, not because he even enjoyed living simply.

He did that because, listen, he set his focus on eternity. He was willing to be impoverished here so he could be enriched there. And part of his riches there would be the fact that we would be able to enjoy those riches with him. So he expanded the circle of his joy, key phrase. He expanded the circle of his joy beyond himself so that it now included us, and he was willing to be impoverished here so that he could have riches in heaven with us. And then he tells us to live that way. What we sacrifice down here will be abundantly repaid at the resurrection of the just.

Personally, I think that one of the things that keeps most people from being generous is really believing this, really taking into account this promise or actually taking it seriously at least. I mean, first of all, most of us have the image of heaven as, you know, sitting on a white cloud in a robe sipping a tasteless margarita without alcohol and strumming a harp. That's the image that we have of heaven. But heaven is always described in terms, get this, of the resurrection. When Jesus was resurrected, he was kind of our picture of what the resurrection would be like. It was the same body. They recognized him, but it was perfected, right? A couple things that we see from his resurrected body. First of all, he ate fish.

You know the reason that he did that? He was trying to show us that in the resurrection the same things we've learned to enjoy here are the things we will enjoy there. And I don't sit on a cloud right now and strum a harp.

That means I'm probably not gonna be doing that up there either, right? The same things that we enjoyed here, we enjoy to a much greater degree there. He was, listen, more alive, not less alive in the resurrection. The other thing that we know is that he walked through walls, which means that not only did he have the same body that he had, it was supercharged. Well, when this world is resurrected, it's gonna be like that. The new creation has similarities to the old creation. It's just so much more, right? So it's the resurrection.

Second, winter will be repaid. So what we do here lays up treasures for us up there when we're more alive. Get this, most of us save for retirement, right? The idea of retirement is that you sacrifice a little now to prepare then. But here's the dilemma with retirement, okay?

I'm gonna try to say this sensitively but clearly, right? And that is you save and you save and you save, but by the time you finally get to retirement, you're not really able to enjoy it as much as you could have when you were saving for it. I mean, when I think about owning a beach home and not having to go to work, I don't picture myself hobbling down the sand with a walker, you know, getting sand all up in my depends.

That's not how I see a vacation at the beach. And so the dilemma of retirement is we save for retirement when we're less able to enjoy it. Because in retirement, in some ways, we're less alive, not more alive. Now, listen, you guys that are retired, do not send me a note saying, I love my retirement, playing golf all the time and, you know, gum and applesauce.

I just, I love that. You know, don't, I don't, I understand, okay? The point is you spend your life investing for luxury during a time that only lasts for a few years, which in many ways are not even your best years.

And that's fine. Listen, you ought to plan for retirement. But what I really want to invest in, see, is my eternal retirement. Because then I'm going to have a supercharged superhero body that can walk through walls.

And then I'm really going to be able to enjoy it. You will be repaid at the resurrection of the just. Do you actually believe that? Do you actually believe that? Because if you did, your money would follow. Randy Alcorn in a book called The Treasure Principle, we use a lot around here, has said that the bald truth about your money is that when you die, you can't take any of it with you, but you can send it on to heaven ahead of you. But you do that here by investing it in God's kingdom now. Do you really believe that you will be repaid? Because if so, your life would be characterized as a party that you throw for people who can't pay you back. Now, here's what I want to do with this and the time we have left.

I want to do two things with it. The first thing is I want to ask you a general question about your lives. And that is, if we chose the metaphor of a party to depict your life, who would the guest be?

That's what I want to ask you. Because Jesus' main point in this parable or this story is not trying to give you rules about your next birthday party. His point is that you begin to think about your life and think about who it is being lived for. Then the second thing I want to do is I want to apply this to a part of the Christian life which I think has all but been forgotten. All right, here's number one. If your life were depicted as a party, who would be the invited guest?

You understand what I'm doing? We pick a metaphor for your life and it's going to be a party. If we chose that metaphor, in that metaphor, who would the invited guest be?

Who would your, the party of your life, who would it be thrown for? Is it primarily for people who could benefit you or is it for people who can't necessarily pay you back, people for whom you pour out your life like Jesus poured his out for you? And Jesus said that following him means that you looked at your life in many ways like he looked at his. You see, the truth is that we still live in a world where there are 6,500 what we call unreached people groups. An unreached people group is a group of 10,000 people or more that are united by a common language who have no viable witness to the gospel in their culture. What that means is that barring some supernatural act of God none of us can explain, there is no chance that they will hear the gospel before they die. If you were to line all those people up in a single file line, they would circle the earth 25 times. Can you imagine seeing a line of people as long as the circumference of the earth 25 people wide, trampling hopelessly toward hell?

If that is true, then what does that mean about how you ought to be thinking about your life? God has a plan to make your life count for eternity. It's time to put your yes on the table and let God put it on the map. You're listening to Summit Life, the Bible teaching ministry of Pastor JD Greer. I hope you've been enjoying this teaching series in the Gospel of Luke called Kingdom Come. A little while ago I sat down with Pastor JD to hear a little more about what this series is all about. So in this series, Kingdom Come, we're basically just walking through the Gospel of Luke, which is a gospel that in many ways is written for skeptics.

He has in his mind, he has Greek and Roman scholars that he is wanting to give the eyewitness evidence of who Jesus was and what he taught. And so the Gospel of Luke explains how the power of God, that the kingdom that God was wanting to bring, it begins in the restoration of a relationship with the Father, and then you experiencing the power of the Holy Spirit, bringing healing into your relationships and your community and situations of injustice all around you. To go along with this series, we have a small book called Kingdom Come that has 20 devotions that'll take you deeper into the Gospel of Luke, not only to get more out of the Book of Luke, but also how to better apply it to your life and your situation. And we'd love for you to reserve your copy right now. Just go to jdgreer.com and you can reserve your copy today. We'd love to send you a copy of Kingdom Come 20 devotions from Luke today with your gift of $35 or more to this ministry. This set of devotionals is a great way to dive even deeper into Luke's account of Jesus's life and ministry.

And yes, it's a great tool to give to someone you're discipling or sharing the Gospel with. To donate, just give us a call at 866-335-5220. That's 866-335-5220.

Or you can always give online anytime at jdgreer.com. I'm Molly Benovitch. Be sure to listen tomorrow to hear more about the invitation to God's coming kingdom. That's Tuesday on Summit Life with J.D. Greer. Today's program was produced and sponsored by J.D. Greer Ministries.