Advent 2. December 14. Luke 14.

http://bible.oremus.org/?passage=Luke+14 (Click the link to continue the story)

Who gets invited to be guests at dinner parties?  When you host, how do you invite?  I have served two congregations that hosted community meals to feed hungry neighbors.  Those experiences have been windows into Jesus' kingdom or the kingdom of God.  Neighbors and strangers eat together; food is prepared and shared generously.  Mostly, people from low income or poor households attend.  Sometimes the servers eat with the guests.  That is when stories are told, tears are shed, prayers are requested and spoken, and people who often invisible in our consumer culture are seen and heard. 
Another place where I have experienced the Jesus table is at dinner church: a gathering of disciples around a meal for worship, prayer, breaking of bread, story, and song.  Dinner church is an emerging expression of church in the U.S.  It is a space of connection and relationship-building, in which we meet our neighbors, tell stories, pray, sing, and eat.  We always sing a spiritual called "The welcome table" that reminds us that all are welcome at the table of grace and that there are some who have been excluded, uninvited, or denied welcome by the Church.  We have heard Jesus' story from Luke 14 and believe that the table is a place of sacred encounter, in which both God and neighbor become present to one another in life-changing ways.
Where there is food and fellowship there is healing and hope.  All we need is a table, some empty seats, open hearts, and the humility to invite those neighbors who do not get invited because they can't pay their way.  We see the table and the food we share as a free gift.  There are no good excuses for rejecting a gift.  Who does that?  Who says "no thanks" to a free gift that everyone needs?  Jesus noticed that there were people who excused and absented themselves from the community.  They were too busy acquiring people, animals, land---consumers acquiring property.  Like his, our culture is acquisitive and consumer-driven.  We likely live in the most acquisitive and consumerist economy ever known  on earth.  How often our things, our possessions, our property become barriers to relationships.
It is at the table and the meal that good relationships are formed, strengthened, and sustained.
Who could you invite to eat with you this week?  What would make that a sacred experience?