Sermon Tone Analysis

The scene is set, or probably more aptly, the trap was set.

Jesus, the upstart rabbi from the backwater of Galilee had set Jerusalem on fire.

Now the Pharisees, having decided to take him down, are trying to catch him breaking the Sabbath by inviting him to a dinner party and put before him a man with edema, a painful condition whereby the suffering collects excess fluid in the stomach and extremities.

Jesus heals the man on the Sabbath, and then catches them in their attempt, asking them questions they had no answer for.

Now, Jesus turns the tables on them.

Jesus had watched the elite dinner guests make their moves for the honored seats.

Jesus saw some deft moves as certain guests, all elbows, slipped into the honored places on the surrounding couches.

Earlier in his ministry Jesus had ridiculed the Pharisees for their love of place: “Woe to you Pharisees, because you love the most important seats in the synagogues and greetings in the marketplaces” (11:43), but this group was unaware of what he thought, or they simply did not care.

The Pharisees and scribes, despite all their god-talk and religious posturing, were a selfish, self-seeking, ambitious lot.

Selfishness always reduces the importance of others and enlarges the importance of one’s own life.

“I’m the greatest, so where is my seat?” “I’m superior, and this place reflects my worth!”

They assumed that if they did not get the chief seats, the meal, regardless of how good the fare or the fellowship was, would be a bummer.

It was important that they be seen in a worthy place.

R. Kent Hughes, Luke: That You May Know the Truth, Preaching the Word (Wheaton, IL: Crossway Books, 1998), 110–111.

It was into this attitude, this me first thought process that Jesus wanted to speak, and it’s the next place our series on Generosity takes us.

You see, these Pharisees were models of a generousless heart.

They did not reflect God’s love for people, and instead reflected a love for self and position.

In our first week, we talked about how our hearts must be generous, how Generosity begins with hearts that value puts more value in the giver than in the gift, how it values God’s Kingdom over our own kingdoms.

And last week we talked about how Generosity is a sacrificial giving to God’s Kingdom work over our own wealth.

Today, we are going to look how Generosity values giving grace over seeking gain, and how this teaching can revolutionize our way of looking at being generous.

Generous Grace Seeks the Good of Others

There is a startling contrast in this story.

On one hand you have these Pharisees; bumping, pushing, and scheming their way to the place of honor.

On the other, you have Jesus.

When the Pharisees entered the room, they were keenly aware of where the host was seated, where the place of honor was set.

Their eyes were focused on their position.

Their desire was to be honored.

Judaism, like much of the first century world was set in an honor an shame culture.

The Jewish culture was permeated by the idea of honor.

Dr. Mark Powell notes that “According to many cultural anthropologists, the pivotal social value of the biblical world was honor, i.e., the status that one has in the eyes of those whose opinions one considers to be significant.

To some extent, honor was ascribed through factors beyond an individual’s control: age, gender, nationality, race, height, physical health, economic class, and the like all defined the limits of how much honor one could hope to attain.

Within those parameters, however, there were many things that might increase one’s honor (religious piety, courage, virtuous behavior, a congenial or charitable disposition, etc.), and there were many things that might precipitate a loss of honor or even bring its opposite, shame.”

(1)

The Jewish culture was permeated by the idea of honor.

According to many cultural anthropologists, the pivotal social value of the biblical world was honor, i.e., the status that one has in the eyes of those whose opinions one considers to be significant.

To some extent, honor was ascribed through factors beyond an individual’s control: age, gender, nationality, race, height, physical health, economic class, and the like all defined the limits of how much honor one could hope to attain.

Within those parameters, however, there were many things that might increase one’s honor (religious piety, courage, virtuous behavior, a congenial or charitable disposition, etc.), and there were many things that might precipitate a loss of honor or even bring its opposite, shame.

The language of honor and shame is noticeably prominent throughout the nt.

Some voices in the nt seize upon the language to present Christianity as a path to achieving honor and avoiding shame (; ).

Other voices seek to overturn the conventional wisdom regarding how those values are applied, claiming that it is more honorable to behave like a slave than to lord over others as a person of power and privilege (; cf. ).

And some nt documents repudiate the fixation with honor altogether, calling on readers to develop a new value system defined by Christ, who did not seek honor or fame or glory but bore the shame of the cross ().

Mark Allan Powell, “Honor and Shame,” ed.

Mark Allan Powell, The HarperCollins Bible Dictionary (Revised and Updated) (New York: HarperCollins, 2011), 388–389.

This idea of honor and shame was palpable.

And it separated the community.

So, when Jesus entered the room it was only natural for the Jews to seek the places of honor, because to not be there would lessen their social status among those in attendance.

But on the other hand is Jesus.

He didn’t seek honor.

In fact, he often accepted dishonor.

Earlier in his ministry, Jesus is at another dinner party and is annointed by a woman who kisses his feet, and dries his feet with her tears.

Jesus comments that he didn’t receive the customary niceties from his host of a kiss of greeting, oil for his head and water for his dirty feet.

No, Jesus wasn’t focused on honor, instead he was focused on the one who was sick.

He was focused on others.

And so he heals the man of his edema despite the fact it was the Sabbath.

Why?

Because Generous Grace seeks the Good of others, not the position of self.

This is Jesus to a “T”.

The language of honor and shame is noticeably prominent throughout the nt.

Some voices in the nt seize upon the language to present Christianity as a path to achieving honor and avoiding shame (; ).

Other voices seek to overturn the conventional wisdom regarding how those values are applied, claiming that it is more honorable to behave like a slave than to lord over others as a person of power and privilege (; cf. ).

And some nt documents repudiate the fixation with honor altogether, calling on readers to develop a new value system defined by Christ, who did not seek honor or fame or glory but bore the shame of the cross ().

This is Jesus.

To heal the man would mean a loss of position in the eyes of the guests in attendance.

To see the man and heal him would be to condescend himself.

This man was obviously a sinner for God to have cursed him like this, and here is Jesus on the Sabbath healing him!?!

But Jesus didn’t care.

He loved him and he healed him

You see, Christian Generosity means that we do not seek our own honor, but instead we seek the good of others.

This is Kingdom work.

It’s selfless, not selfish.

It’s focused not on our little k kingdoms, but on God’s big K Kingdom and those who live in it.

Christian generosity is gracious regardless of what that graciousness means to our position.

It’s willing to sacrifice position for the good of someone else.

Generous Grace means I’m willing to sacrifice my position for the the good of someone else.

Generous Grace Seek the Approval of God

The problem with these men doesn’t end in their attempts to be elevated among their peers, it goes deeper.

You see, these men were more concerned with what the others thought of them than what God thought of them.

These were “godly”.

They were “religious”.

As it stands, most of them would have been seen as upstanding and important and moral people.

They kept the Sabbath, and kept Kosher food rules.

They Followed all of the rules, but it wasn’t because they loved God.

They did it because of how people saw them, not how God saw them.

They were prideful, not humble and that pride was dangerous.

How dangerous.

Well, listen to Jesus’ words to the Pharisees later in his ministry in

,

You see, pride in self, and self-centeredness is deadly, but it is also damnable.

Damnation is not a word that we use today very often, except in a swear.

But here, Jesus is saying this, “Pride damns people.

It condemns the prideful to hell by its pride, and it condemns those around them to hell by leading them away from the kingdom.”

When we seek to honor others and to get their approval, this is not gracious.

And I think this is a sin of American Christianity that we have to understand clearly.

Pride is not only deadly for our souls because it keeps us from seeing our sin and our faults and our failures and properly deal with them at the cross.

Pride damns others to hell because it makes them think that they are ok.

That’s why in verse 15 he says this:

Luke

But Jesus wasn’t prideful, he was humble and he called them to seek God’s honoring them over man’s.

Look at the text.

Luke 14:

Notice this, because this is key.

Christianity doesn’t seek to be honored by men, but rather seeks to be honored by and to bring honor to God and his Kingdom.