Hospitality: An Expression of Love
We do have someone here who handles hospitality for the Center. She welcomes visitors to The Father Peyton Center and ensures they feel genuinely cared for and welcome. She is charged with arranging hospitality meals and sending invitations weeks in advance so people can indicate whether they will attend. When those meals are finally served, we all agree that they demonstrate great attentiveness and wholehearted care in their preparation. We can say that her hospitality reflects no other nature than love.
In today’s Gospel, Jesus is at a dinner with the Pharisees and the experts, who are always at loggerheads with Him because of their stubbornness and refusal to accept Him as sent from God, let alone His teachings.
Responding to God's Invitation
He offers the parable of the great banquet (which symbolizes the love He has for those invited) to show that God’s invitation to salvation is open and urgent, and that people should never let worldly busyness, material possessions, or personal status cause them to reject it. The king in the parable sent out invitations well in advance to his subjects so they would have plenty of time to prepare for the banquet. This was a sign that he truly loved his subjects and wanted to honor them. The initial invitees missed out because they prioritized trivial and self-absorbed pursuits, such as inspecting newly purchased land, trying out oxen, or attending to family obligations.
The parable, in a sense, warns us that everyday distractions can blind us to the grace God offers us. Those who would have been expected to respond to Jesus’ invitation—the religious leaders and experts—declined it. That is why Jesus opened the doors to the marginalized, the poor, the crippled, the blind, and outsiders.
- We might ask ourselves: What takes precedence in our lives over God’s claim?
- Do we allow our work to totally absorb us and keep us from thinking about God? Do we let our goods and possessions come before God?
- What excuses do we use, and what do they reveal about how much or how little Jesus means to us?
- Through Jesus, God extends His grace to us and His love to all. Even though God’s gracious initiative toward us is powerful and enduring, it requires our openness, willingness, and responsiveness for God’s desire for our lives to be realized.
- Like the people first invited in the parable, we can allow ourselves to become so absorbed by the possessions and affairs of this life that we treat God’s invitation lightly. Merely having an invitation or assuming we have a reserved spot, like the religious elites of Jesus’ day who thought they had a guaranteed place in the Messianic Kingdom, does not save us. Rather, a genuine response requires active prioritization and a humble heart.
November is a good month to hear God’s invitation to His banquet of life afresh and to respond to that invitation with a willing and generous heart.
