When you hold a banquet, invite the poor

When you hold a banquet, invite the poor.

When the time came for Chuck and Linda to celebrate their fortieth wedding anniversary, they decided to do things a little differently.   Instead of the usual big party, they invited their family and friends to the Catholic Charities soup kitchen in their city.   They had arranged for all their guests to join them in preparing and serving hot lunches to the homeless and needy in the area.   Rather than asking for anniversary gifts, they asked for coats, hats, and gloves for the people they would be feeding.   “God has given everything to us, and we can never repay him,” Linda told a friend.   “So why not try to do the same for other people?”

This story shows us what it might look like to live out Jesus’ words in today’s Scripture (Luke 14:13).   It’s not a stretch to say that Jesus was probably speaking literally here.   Over and over in the Gospels, we see him telling us to show a special love for the poor and needy, the victimized and the marginalized.

We may not be able to do something quite so radical as Chuck and Linda did, but we can follow their example in small ways.   They took an event that they were already organizing and turned the focus on people in need.   So think about something you are already doing.   What is already on your schedule that you could adjust to include people who cannot repay you?

Maybe you host a regular dinner for your extended family once a month.   Think about spending a little time before the meal praying for the people who have nothing or less to eat.   Ask the Lord to send someone to care for them—or maybe even to send you!   Or maybe make more than enough for dinner, and take the extra to a neighbor who is recovering from surgery or is homebound.   Rather than going out to dinner one evening, you could take the money you would have spent and make bagged lunches to hand out to the poor.   Look closely, and you’re sure to find opportunities.

The key is what Linda explained to her friend:  by offering his life on the cross and pouring out his Spirit, Jesus has been extremely generous with us.   He has blessed us in ways we could never repay.   Now he asks us to go and do likewise.

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