I begin reading. In verse seven, he told a parable to those who were invited when he noticed how they would choose the best places for themselves.
Jesus said, when you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet, don't sit in the place of honor, because a more distinguished person than you may have been invited by your host. The one who invited both of you may come and say to you, give your place to this man. And then in humiliation, you will proceed to take the lowest place. But when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place, so that when the one who invited you comes, he will say to you, friend, move up higher. You then will be honored in the presence of all the other guests.
For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted. May we pray for understanding. Heavenly Father, we thank you for your word. We thank you that we have your spirit to show us what it means. But not only, Father, to understand what it says, but to see how it applies to our life.
And we pray that today you will point out to us individually how we can change our living and change our hearts, that we would demonstrate more the virtue of humility. Give us understanding, give us power to carry through what you ask of us. In your Son's name we pray. Amen. It says earlier in the text that it was on a Sabbath in verse one, when he went in to eat at the house of one of the leading Pharisees.
Leading Pharisees means he was a ruler or a chief, a prince, a magistrate, probably. He was a member of the Sanhedrin, which was the chief ruling body of the Jews. And they were reclining on couches to eat. So I have just a picture of here what that looked like. They did not sit in chairs.
It would be as if you pulled your three bedroom mattresses out and you're lying on those to eat your food. And the tables during this time were set up in what is called a triclinium. So you'd see three tables there. And at each of the tables, because it has that tri in it, three people would sit. And at each of the tables there was a most honored position.
And I have that indicated by the. The little yellow figure that's up there. I guess it's a star. So at this fig, in this figuration, there were three places of honor. That would be the highest seat.
If you were sitting there when the food was brought out and placed in front of you, because the servants could walk down that center, all the food would be closest to who the person in the middle, in the place of honor. And here they're lying with their feet at this end and their head at the table. It kind of gives you a picture of what happened when the woman came to wash Jesus feet with her hair and her tears. She wasn't crawling under the table to do that. She was at his feet, at the end of a couch or what might look like a mattress.
The best place, the first place to recline, the chief place at each table, was where that star is in the middle. What's the situation? Well, in verse seven, it says he told them this parable. And he told them this parable when he noticed how they would choose the best places for themselves. These Pharisees, these religious leaders who were always trying to outdo Jesus and were jealous that he was getting more attention than him.
They were jealous among themselves and they were trying to elevate themselves. And. And they're walking as fast as possible without looking like they're running to try and sit in the best place. And we find here that Jesus is just watching their behavior. They were taking the table positions that they thought were appropriate for them.
It seems that they were all moving to the places at the table that they thought that they really deserved. So that's the situation. That's why Jesus then goes on to share a parable with them. In verse seven, we read, he told a parable to those who were invited when he noticed how they would choose the best places for themselves. And this is the parable.
When you are invited by someone to a wedding banquet. Now he's being a little gentle here because he's talking about another banquet. He's not saying when you were invited here today, but they're going to get the point. Don't sit in the place of honor, because a more distinguished person than you may have been invited by your host. The one who invited both of you may come and say to you, give your place to this man.
And then in humiliation, you will proceed to take the. The lowest place. He's talking about a wedding banquet. When we have those here at the church, we don't lie on mattresses, we sit at tables and chairs. But generally there's.
There's a head table where the bride and the groom and the groomsmen and the bridesmaids and maybe the parents all sit. So imagine you're coming in after a wedding and you have no part in the wedding, and you have the audacity to. To walk up and sit next to the groom at the table. I mean, we wouldn't think of doing that. But Jesus is implying that's what they're doing here.
But imagine how humiliating it would be if the mother of the bride takes a microphone and says, john Smith, why are you sitting at the head table? Please go to the back of the room. I mean, you would be completely humiliated. That's the picture that Jesus is giving here. You know, Jesus is watching over this simple behavior, even in this common thing in their life.
It tells us that he is interested in all that we do. He watches where we sit. He pays attention to where we walk. He knows when we cry. He knows when we are happy.
Proverbs 5, 21 says, A man's ways are before the Lord's eyes, and he considers all his paths. Our behavior and the common things of life demonstrate what is true in our hearts and what is true of our character. And we must remember that God is always watching us. So we want to talk about humility today. What does it look like?
What does it mean? Let's go to the Old Testament where we find some wisdom about it. And you're going to see here, as we read these proverbs, it sounds very similar to what Jesus says in the text, because what Jesus is saying in the New Testament is the same thing he was saying when in the Old Testament, all of it is the word of God. In Proverbs 25, we read, don't boast about yourself before the king, and don't stand in the place of the great, for it is better for him to say to you, come up here, than to demote you in plain view of a noble. And then another Proverb, in Proverbs 27, it says, Let another praise you and not your own mouth.
Let's look at some definitions. When we're talking about humility, we're talking about humility. We're talking about humbleness. And in Scripture, the idea of meekness, God is also associated, but they're all just a little bit different. We read that humility and humbleness are largely synonyms, both describing the quality of being modest, respectful, and free from arrogance.
They represent the same core concept of read this with me. Not thinking oneself is better than others. Okay? Humility frequently refers to the internal virtue. That's what your character is.
You have a character. You have a heartbent, you have a mindset on humility. Whereas humbleness describes usually the outward behavior that people see that results from the humility on the inside. And we find in Scripture that humility is often associated with meekness, which is defined not as Being weak. But meekness is controlled power and total reliance on God.
The picture is a mighty, strong horse, very powerful. But that horse is allowing total reliance on the person that's riding it to direct the horse so that it uses its power appropriately. That's what meekness is. It's controlled power with total reliance on God. So when we talk about humility, when we talk about meekness, when we talk about being humble, the first thing we want to think about, and Jesus is expressing it here in the text, is humility and others.
Romans 12:3. We read about the correct attitude that we are supposed to have to one another. For by the grace given to me, I tell you, every man among you, not to think of himself more highly than he should think. Instead, think sensibly, as God has distributed a measure of faith to each one. Not thinking more highly than you should think, but thinking sensibly.
It means to have a correct and right attitude of yourself. You're not saying, I'm the best person in the world, but you're also not supposed to grovel in the dirt and say, I'm the worst person, I'm terrible. God wants us to think sensibly about ourself. But when it comes to humility, humility is not thinking highly of yourself. Humility is not thinking lowly of yourself.
Because the person that says, I'm worthless, I can't do anything, nobody likes me. If they're saying that in their head all the time, who are they thinking about? They're thinking about themselves.
Humility is not thinking about yourself at all, you know? The passage here goes on to explain that we are all necessary in the church. It tells how we all have valuable gifts. No one is to be undervalued in the church. We're not stacked like this from best to worse.
We're all on the same plane. Every gift is necessary for the health of the church. And we're supposed to use our gifts not thinking about ourselves, but thinking about others. Philippians 2:2,4. Paul says, do nothing out of selfish ambition or conceit, but in human humility, consider others as more important than yourself.
Now, that doesn't mean that they are more important, but when you face people, that should be your attitude toward them. Everyone should look not to his own interest or to her own interest, but rather we are to be looking out for the interest of others. And if we're all looking out for the interests of everybody else, everybody's interests are going to be met. Same thing happens in marriage. A husband looks out for the interests of his wife.
And the wife looks out for the interests of her husband and all the needs are met. Romans 12:10. Love one another deeply as brothers and sisters and take the lead in honoring one another. When I was in junior high and high school, we had choir tours that we went on. And Mr. Whitmire would tell us, now we need to learn to be servants on the trip, and we need to let others go first and think about them.
So as teenagers, we made a joke about it whenever we got on the bus. We argued about, no, you go first. No, you go first. No, you go first. And it was funny what we were doing, but we were learning something important.
God wants us to think of others. We go Back to the two greatest commandments in Mark 12. The first one is to love the Lord your God. But the second one is to love your neighbor as yourself. However you would think for yourself, you are now to think of others.
Let's look at two examples in the Bible of people that were humble. In numbers 12 3, we have a statement that is never said about anybody else in Scripture. Moses was a very humble man. How much so? More so than anyone.
Not in Jerusalem or Israel, but where? On the entire face of the earth. Now, if any man had a right to exalt himself, it was Moses. He'd been raised in Pharaoh's palace to possibly be the next in line to the throne. God spoke to him face to face.
He was used by God to perform ten miraculous judgments upon Egypt. He led the entire nation of Israel to freedom. He spent 40 days on the mountain with God, receiving the law directly from God. And he gave us the first five books of the Bible. If any person could have been arrogant and put themselves first, it could have been Moses.
But Scripture says he was humble, more so than any one of the face of the earth. And the only one that excelled Moses humbleness was Jesus. And he said about himself in Matthew 11:29, take my yoke upon you and learn from me, because I am lowly and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. Just think of that. God Almighty came down to live among us.
Jesus demonstrated the true humility of putting everyone else first.
What happened to us? Where did we come up with pride and self importance and arrogance and superiority and vainness? We go back to Isaiah, chapter 14, and we read a prophecy here that we believe is a dual prophecy about the king of Babylon and of Lucifer. Lucifer was the bright shining star in heaven, one of the highest ranked angels as far as we know.
But he gave up humility he was not humble. And this is what we read. Shining morning star, how you have fallen from the heavens, you destroyer of nations. You have been cut down to the ground. Why was it that he was cast down?
Why is he no longer an angel serving the Lord? It's because he said to himself, I will ascend to the heavens. I will set my throne above the stars of God. I'm going to be greater than all the angels. I will sit on the mount of the God's assembly in the remotest parts of the north.
And he goes beyond that. He says, I will ascend above the highest clouds and I will make myself like the most High. Pride, self importance, arrogance, superiority and vainness are all the opposite of the way God asks us to live. They were in the heart of Satan. And because of our sinfulness, that has been passed on to us.
And it's what the whole world is continually saying. Don't be humble, don't have humility. Instead, these other things are more important. Proverbs 16, verses 18, 19. A familiar verse that many of you know.
Pride comes before destruction and an arrogant spirit before a fall. Pride and arrogance are the opposite of humility. Better to be lowly of spirit with the humble than to provide plunder with the proud.
That was we talked about humility and others. But now let's look at what's even more important. That's humility and God, our relationship to him. Let's go to Luke, chapter 18, verses nine through 14. And Jesus gives us a parable here about two men.
They're juxtaposed. One is truly humble, has humility in their heart, and the other one is everything that is opposite. The interesting thing is the one that has no humility is the religious leader that should understand the Scriptures. It's the tax collector that's hated, that's seen as sinful, that is the one that truly has a right relationship with God. He told us also this parable to some who trusted in themselves that they were righteous and looked down on everyone else.
The key is the Pharisees thought that they were righteous. Righteous because of what they were doing. They did not understand that righteousness only comes through faith in Jesus Christ. Two men went up to the temple to pray. One a Pharisee and the other a tax collector.
The Pharisee was standing and praying like this about himself. God, I thank you that I'm not like other people. He's probably praying out loud enough for everybody there to hear him. And then he describes this tax collector that he's standing Next to greedy, unrighteous adulterers, or even like this tax collector, I fast twice a week and I give a tenth of everything I get. In other words, I'm righteous because of what I do.
That is not humility toward God, but the tax collector. Not at the highest place, not at the place of honor. He was standing far off. He would not even raise his eyes to heaven. But he kept striking his chest and saying, God, have mercy on me.
I'm a sinner. Jesus said, I tell you, this one went down to his house, justified, rather than the other, the Pharisee who did not. Because everyone who exalts himself will be humbled. But the one who humbles himself, the one who lives in humility, will be exalted. This concept of humility in God goes back to the Old Testament.
In one of the oldest books of the Bible, in the Book of Job, we have Bildad describing our standing before God. He's telling us what our attitude should be. See how he describes us here? How can a human be justified before God? The answer is, we can't do it ourselves.
How can one be born of a woman, be pure? And the answer is, we can't do it ourself. If even the moon does not shine and the stars are not pure in his sight, how much less a human who is a. What does it say? A maggot, a son, a man who is a worm.
He's talking about each and every one of us. We are maggots. We are worms. Now go home and tell that to your wife. Today, your husband.
You're a maggot and a worm. That's not to be our attitude toward one another. That is our attitude of saying, God, you are so much greater than us. We are as maggots and worms. The culture of the world says to think more of yourselves.
It says, have it your way. Love yourself more than others. Whatever you think to do is best is what is best. You don't need to worry about anybody else. You're here just for yourself.
And in the sight of God. We are to be the opposite. We are to see ourselves as. As the lowest of the low, crawling as close to the ground as possible in his presence. Isaiah 40:1.
For I am the Lord your God, who holds your right hand, who says to you, do not fear. I will help you. Do not fear, you worm. Jacob, you men of Israel, I will help you. This is the Lord's declaration.
Your Redeemer is the Holy One of Israel. God got even very specific with his own people. The Israelites, he said, you're worms too. But you know, even though you're a worm, I'm here to help you and I am going to redeem you. God told his people Israel, even though they were his chosen people, they were still worms.
And as if it hasn't been placed in our mind enough what our position should be in the presence of God, we read in Psalm 22, the Psalmist says, I am a worm and not a man. Scorned by mankind and despised by people. Everyone who sees me mocks me. They sneer and shake their heads. He relies on the Lord, Let him save him.
Let the Lord rescue him, since he takes pleasure in him. Now, in one sense, on the first level, the psalmist is talking about himself, that he sees himself as being a worm, scorned by mankind and despised by people. But this is also what we believe, a prophetic picture of what Jesus would come and be. One day people are going to mock him. They are going to sneer him.
They're going to shake their heads and on the cross said, if he could save others, let him save Himself. Now, what's the point here is that Jesus also became a what? A worm. And the extent to which Jesus took on human flesh and became a worm to save us from our wretchedness should always move us to a deep emotion of appreciation. We should live humbly, even more so in his presence.
For if He, God Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, made Himself a worm, what are we in comparison? But the wonderful thing is that he loves us. We the lowest, we the most sinful, we the most selfish. That he would lower Himself to live in flesh, to be like us. Jesus is the perfect example of humility.
He is the perfect example of extreme love in what he did. We go to Romans chapter 5 and we just get further information about why it is so awesome that Jesus did this for us. In Romans 5, we read, for while we were still helpless, at the right time, Christ died for the ungodly. For rarely will someone die for a just person. Though for a good person, perhaps someone might even dare to die.
But God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. How much more then, since we have now been justified by his blood, will we be saved through him from wrath. For if, while we were enemies, we were reconciled to God through the death of His Son, then how much more, having been reconciled, praise the Lord? Will we be saved by his life? See what I've underlined there.
We were helpless. We couldn't save ourselves. We were ungodly, godly, we were sinful, we were deserving of wrath, and we were not even seeking God. We weren't even wanting to be his friend. And while we were enemies, that's when Jesus came and lived among us as a lowly worm to give his life for us.
Matthew 11:28 30 we see that it is because of Jesus lowly and humble heart. We can come to him and we can find rest.
Come to me, all of you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, because I am lowly and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light. The invitation is to everybody come to Jesus. And he's talking about being weary and burdened.
That's weary and burdened with the sin in this world that brings disease and disaster and death and wars and hardships and troubles, all these things that wear us out. Jesus says if we just come to him, that he promises us rest. And it's because he's lowly and humble in heart that he offers the invitation to us. And with that we have the guarantee. He says, and certainly you will find rest for your souls.
Jesus, the ultimate example of humility, living a humble life, and invites us to come to him and promises rest. I want to take us back now to Psalm 62, verses 1 through 8, remembering that humility, humbleness and meekness are all related. And again, meekness isn't weakness. It's about this controlled power that has total reliance on God. Just like Jesus had all the power of the Godhead.
But he in his flesh waited until God told him say this. And he waited for God to tell him do this. He was meek in how he behaved. And the psalmist shows us this proper attitude when he says, I am at rest in God alone. He has that rest that Jesus promises.
Because the psalmist says, my salvation doesn't come from me. My salvation comes from Him. Him. He talking about, God alone is my rock and my salvation. He alone is my stronghold, and because of that I will never be shaken.
I don't have to build my own fortress. I don't have to be my own strength.
He speaks the truth, but he only speaks the truth. But in verse 5 now he talks to himself. Because we need to remind ourselves daily of these things. The psalmist is telling himself, rest in God alone. My soul for my hope comes from him.
He alone is my rock and my salvation my stronghold. I will not Be shaken. My salvation and glory depend not on myself, but on God. My strong refuge. My refuge is in God.
The psalmist truly has humility in his heart and recognition that all that he has that is important is not because of him or anyone else. It is in God. And he's telling himself, I must speak this truth to me over and over. But then the psalmist turns, and now he speaks to everyone else. The testimony isn't only to himself, but it's to those that he's speaking to.
He says, trust in him at all times. You people pour out your hearts before him. God is our refuge. It's basically the message of the gospel. We remind ourselves that we are saved because of what Jesus Christ did for us in the cross.
And now we need to tell other people, you trust in him also. All people. Humility, humbleness, meekness is what the psalmist is expressing here.
So you may ask the question, how do I develop the virtue of humility? How do I quit thinking about myself? Well, the key is think about others. Think about God, his kingdom and his will. Mary has a large blue vase at our house.
It's so tall, there's nothing in it. So as the weeks and the months and the years go by, what ends up inside that vase? A lot of dust. And there's a lot of dust in that vase because it's empty. But if we were to fill that vase all the way up with something, it would be so heavy we couldn't move it.
But then the dust wouldn't get in it anymore. That's what you have to do in your life. You don't go around saying, I'm not going to think about myself. I'm not going to think about myself. I'm not going to think about myself.
Because the whole time you're doing that, you're thinking about who you're thinking about yourself. So in order for that dust not to collect in there, those thoughts about self, fill yourself up with thoughts about others. Fill yourself up with thoughts about God, his kingdom and his will. And if you continually think that way about others in God, you won't have room to think about yourself. The best way to keep dust from filling up a container is to keep it filled with something else.
You know, the man in the parable should have been thinking about the other guests. He should have looked around and recognized who the most distinguished person was and helped that person to the highest seat. He should have considered his host and to whom the host would give the highest seat and act accordingly. Now, getting down to just Basic tactics. How do you do this?
I'll just give you a couple examples.
When you come to church on Sunday, don't walk in thinking, to whom do I want to talk today? Because you're thinking about your interest and what you want. You should be thinking, who needs me to talk to them? It's especially apropos when we have guests and visitors. You can walk in, oh, I want to talk to so and so.
They're my best friend and it's been two hours since I talked to them. You know, we just texted, but I got to go talk to them right now. Look around and say, who needs me to talk to them? So that you're thinking about others. It's as simple as when we go through a buffet line, don't be thinking, well, what do I want to eat on the table today?
You're thinking about yourself. You should be thinking, who's here today that might need my help getting what they want from the buffet all day long. We should not get up thinking, what do I want to do in the next moment or in the next hour at the next event? We need to be thinking, what does God want me to do in the next minute, in the next hour, at the next event? We think of the Lord's Prayer.
Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. After we praise him, the very next thing says, what? Thy kingdom come, thy will be done. That's living in humility, asking God what benefits your kingdom, what is your will for me? And then after you do that in the Lord's Prayer, we come down to confessing our sins and, and asking for our needs and those for others.
Honoring God, wanting to do what he wants is true humility.
We go back to the text now in verse 10 and we read that there's a great reward for humility. Jesus said, but when you are invited, go and sit in the lowest place so that when the one who invited you comes, he will say to you, friend, move up higher. You then will be honored in the presence of all the other guests. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and the one who humbles himself will be exalted. Going back to the wedding over here in our multi purpose room.
Imagine you come in and you sit down. You're not a member of the family, you're not a member of the wedding party. And so you sit way back here and the bride's mother stands up with a microphone and says, george Smith, come up and sit next to the groom because you are honored today.
That's what Jesus is saying here. Put yourself down so that you'll be rewarded. But he's not just talking about this world. This is a kingdom principle. Throughout scripture we have this idea of the coming wedding feast of the church with Jesus Christ when we're all going to sit at the table with him.
And when we think about it this way, it's telling us that we need to live according to the kingdom principles of God, of being humble instead of exalting yourself for verse 11 gives us the promise everyone who exalts himself will be humbled and the one who humbles himself will be exalted. The reward for humility in this life is that God will exalt you now. It defies the world's motivations. It's counter to advertisement. It's counter to what we learn in school.
It's even counter to what many parents teach their kids, that everything is all about you and just do what you want to do and you've got to have the best. God says that we need to not think about ourselves, but to be humble towards others. So when you come to our time of invitation today we're going to be singing a song while you're standing. You need to ask God, how can I be more humble? How do I develop more humility in my life, not so that I can get a reward in heaven someday, but that I can live like Jesus Christ and attract people to Him.
We're going to have a prayer team member standing at the rear. If you just want someone to pray with you as we're singing, just walk to the back. They can also share with you about how to have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ so that you know for certain that you are entering his rest from all the problems of this world and that you have an eternal relationship with Him. Will you stand as I pray?
Heavenly Father, we thank you that Jesus became a lowly worm. He lived among us with all the difficulties and problems that we have, in poverty, in ridicule all his life. And even when he was willing to give himself up, Father, they still spat in his face and beat him. Help us to realize our place in this world and have a deeper and greater appreciation for you that we might be humble in your sight and that, Father, that that might turn into true humility and being humble and meekness to others. We ask that you show us our need and we ask that you empower us by your spirit to live the way that you have asked us to.
It's in your Son's name that we pray. Amen.
Jesus is mine he's been my fourth man in the fire Time after time Born of his spirit, washed in his blood and what he did for me on Calvary More than enough I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail he will never fail Trust in God, my Savior alive who will never fail he will never fail Perfect submission.
Finally offer of tomorrow has over my steps so this is my story this is my song I'm praising my risen king and Savior all the day long I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail he will never fail I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never fail he will never fail.
I sought the Lord and he heard and he answered I sought the Lord and He heard and he answered I sought the Lord and He heard and he answered that's why I trust him that's why I trust him if I sought the Lord and He heard and he answered I sought the Lord and He heard and he answered I sought the Lord and He heard and he answered that's why I trust him that's why I trust in God, my Savior the one will never fail he will never fail I trust in God, my Savior the one who will never. Fail.
He will never fail I trust in God.
We end our time with a benediction. If you are sticking around for our baptisms, that's taking place in the multi purpose room. We'll get that rolling as soon as everybody can get changed and get ready. That'll take place in the multi purpose room right after service. Our Scripture benediction to close our time together this morning comes from Titus 3, 14 and 15.
Let our people learn to devote themselves to good works for pressing needs so they will not be unfruitful. All those who are with me send your greetings. Greet those who love us in the faith. Grace be with all of you. May God's grace be with you as you go.