Jesus, Friend of Sinners 7th June 2026

This week pastor Mike kicked off our new sermon series; There's room at the table. He did so by looking at Luke 7:31-35. 

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

And uh you you'll find in in the Bible that there are many titles that are given to Jesus. Uh we've got the Son of God, the Son of David, uh King of Kings, Lord of Lords, the Lamb of God, the Good Shepherd, uh, the Bread of Life. There are many, many titles that are given. And one of the most striking uh titles that's given to him is actually given uh by his critics, by the religious police, by the Pharisees and those who think they've got life sorted. Uh, and we're going to read about that in a in a second. Uh and that description from his critic is this he's a friend of publicans and sinners. He he's he's a friend of the social outcast, the social misfits. Uh, they intended it as an accusation against them. And yet when you read through the stories, Christ accepted that really as a declaration of his mission, what he was here to uh to do. Uh and Jesus was constantly meeting people around the table, constantly having a meal with them, or uh whether that was just a normal meal or a wedding or uh a special invited guest or or something like that in their homes. And he shared meals with disciples, with tax collectors, with with sinners, and he even shared meals with the religious hypocrites, the Pharisees, who thought they had everything sorted and had kept all of the laws. And if you read in Luke's gospel, somebody once said that you can almost see if you if you trace Jesus' path through Luke's gospel, he's either going to a meal or he's coming back from a meal. That's not accidental. Uh, I believe that is absolutely on uh purpose. And I think the table becomes a great picture uh of the gospel, the good news of Jesus and what he is here uh to do and what he can do in our lives and what's on offer uh around that table. And my job this this morning is really just to give a sort of an introduction to some of the stories that will uh will follow over the next little while. Uh and there is something something deeply human, even in our culture, even in our age, there's something deeply human about the way that we uh see food and and and use food. I've got a friend. Uh for me, if I'm on Moan and I've got to grab lunch, uh I'm not wanting a debate with people. Uh it's refueling, that's all it is for me. But at the same time, you know, I like to go for dinner with folk or have dinner for uh with people uh where you can get to know them uh a little bit better and whatever. But we eat with people that we trust, we eat with people that we approve of, we want to be in their uh their company by and large, and to share a table is to share something of yourself with others, and so we guard it uh carefully uh very, very often. And the religious leaders of Jesus they knew that, they they they understood that instinctively, uh, that that was what it was, and for them that the table was a kind of a moral statement that if you're invited as a guest to my dinner, then I approve of you. I I I think you're at the same level of me or above or whatever. You're righteous, you've got a right to be there, you're accepted by me, and you're okay to be there. You ate with the right, you did not eat with sinners, you did not eat with publicans and tax collectors, you did not eat with social misfits and outcasts, full stop, end of story. That was just the way that it was for the religious folk there. And then Jesus arrives, and Jesus being Jesus, he sits down at all the wrong tables, and the religious police, the Pharisees, there are the hypocrites, they're not happy about that one bit. And I'm just gonna read a little bit from Luke chapter 7, where Jesus speaks to the crowd, and he's speaking to the crowd, and he's a little bit frustrated, so he is, but he's not frustrated with the sinners, he's frustrated with the Pharisees, the ones who would go and spend 30 minutes, an hour praying in the temple. The guys who would make a procession to temples that people could see them, they had the biggest Bibles under their arms. They were the ones that would say, you know, we've kept all of the laws, you know, hundreds of food laws on itself. Forget about laws about work, forget about laws about going to the temple, what you did at the temple, all of that. But they prided as well and they thought to themselves, if I can keep all these 7,000 laws or whatever it would be, then I'll be accepted to God. I can climb my way up to God. And they are there. This is what Jesus says to them. To what then shall it verse 31 to 35, to what then shall I compare the people of this generation and what are they like? They're like petulant children sitting in the marketplace and saying to one another, We played the flute for you and you didn't dance. We sang a dirge, but you didn't weep. For John the Baptist has come eating no bread and drinking no wine, and you say he is a demon. The Son of Man has come eating and drinking, and you say, Look at him, a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners. Yet wisdom is justified by all her children. It's a small passage, but it crackles of energy in the abuse that's been thrown at them. And what Jesus says is he paints a picture of children playing in the marketplace or the town square, the the garden, the park, wherever it is, petulant, impossible to please children, demanding that everyone dances for their tune. And what Jesus says is he compares himself to John the Baptist and he says, Listen, John the Baptist came, and John the Baptist was he uh he ate wild locusts, he ate locusts in wild honey. He came dressed in hair, so he had camel hair, and he stayed out in isolation in the desert, and he would come into the town, and he it would be a he'd be a prophet when it was turn or burn and a calling for repentance of the people and so on. Uh, not the type of guy you might want to invite to your 21st birthday party or something like that. And then Jesus says, But I'm not like that. I've come differently. I'm not here in isolation, I'm here to participate in people's lives, and he he draws the comparison between the two of them, and he says, Listen, you weren't happy with that, and you're not happy with this. Nothing is ever right for you, he says, Because the real issue isn't about the music, the real issue is the fact that your hearts are hard, and you just want to complain about everything, and it doesn't matter what happens. The real issue for the for the Pharisees was that God's grace was showing up in ways and in places that the Pharisees didn't approve of. That's the real issue, and Jesus gets to that, and there's two styles that he has there John's style and his style, but there's one grace that's in that. You know, the Pharisees extended their purity laws to the temple of the temple to the dinner table as well, meaning that who you ate with said everything about what they thought your standing before God was like. When Jesus sat down with people around a table, he was making this huge declaration, you're not beyond the reach of God. When he accepted a dinner invitation, he said, You belong here, you belong around this table. You know, there are various things that you can just read through in scripture about Jesus being at dinner with somebody, and you just think it's a story of him being at dinner with somebody, and you get to the end of the story. We almost read it like a storybook, so we are. But for this morning, just for the short time that I have, I want to talk about what I think to me the table, being around the table with Jesus, being around welcome to God's table, what it what it means for all of us who are there. Number one is simply this the table reveals or speaks to me about a God who comes near. See, the Pharisees, the Pharisees spent their time trying to keep all the laws, keep all the laws, and if we can do it, we can climb the ladder and somehow we'll get to God. But here we see, we talked the kids the other week there, his name is Emmanuel. We teach it at Christmas very often. God with us. We see a God who comes near, a God who wants to be your best friend, a God who wants to be your mentor, a God who says, Listen, I want to spend time with you. I want you to spend time with me. The religious leaders expected a Messiah who would be distant, who would be above it all, who would be a king or a governor or some description or forever, who would remain distant from ordinary people. But when you read about the meals that Jesus went to, Jesus entered people's homes. He sat at tables, he shared meals, he spent time with people. And then it says that the Son of Man has come, eating and drinking with publicans and sinners, to be invited around the table in Bible days, and figuratively, spiritually speaking today, to be invited to sit around the table with Jesus. It speaks of the wonder of his incarnation that he is not a distant God, he's a God who came near, he's a God who enters your world, he's a God who sits alongside you, he's a God who walked where we walk, he's a God who felt what we feel, who feels what we feel. You know, something that I I think is impossible to understand doctrinally, theologically, unless you're God Himself. Is that Jesus Christ came to earth and was fully God and was fully man. I I cannot get my head round that fully, and I will not, nobody will get their head round that fully. If you do get your head round that fully, you're God, so yeah. But what I understand is this Jesus knew what it was like as holy man to be betrayed. Jesus knew what it was like as holy man to feel alone. Jesus knew what it was like holy man to suffer grief, bereavement and loss and disappointment. Why is that important to me? Because I have a God that draws near, who sits at the other side of the table to me. When I struggle with betrayal, when I struggle with bereavement, when I struggle with, you can put whatever word you want in there yourself. He came to earth, he is one who draws near, and he knows the pain and the heartache and the heartbreak that we go through. One of the reasons that he came, holy man and holy God, fully man and fully God. He shared life with humanity. So Christianity is not the story of us trying to climb up to God, it's a story of God coming down to man, and that table reminds us that God's desire is relationship, that he is with us, he desires us to be at the table around him. The second thing that I see about the table is that at the table he serves grace for the unworthy. He serves grace for the unworthy. If you look back in Luke chapter 5, you'll see the story where he calls Levi the tax collector, Matthew is his name. Tax collectors were despised in those days, even probably more so in those days than they are today. They were usually Jewish and they worked for Rome. So they were seen as traitors. And what they would do is they would tax you, whatever the Romans said, it's a 30% tax rate, they would tax you 50%, and they would give their 30% to the Romans, so they would be, and they would keep 20% themselves. They were despised, they were they were considered traitors, they they enriched themselves through corruption and total corruption. And you can imagine, you know, what people thought of them back in back in the day. And yet Jesus stops by Matthew at his tax collecting booth and calls them and says, Leave what you're doing and follow me. And Matthew rises up, the story tells us, and follows Jesus. And he goes and Matthew puts on a banquet. And I tell you, if you read through the invite list for that banquet, it is full of Matthew's own kind, it is full of tax collectors, it is full of sinners, women of ill repute, as the Bible may call them, outcasts, social misfits, people that respectable religion would avoid at all costs, that the Pharisees would avoid at all costs. And Jesus, the Son of God, is sitting right in the middle. Why? Because grace, God's grace, seeks the undeserving and the unworthy. God's grace finds the undeserving and the unworthy. The Pharisees asked them, why do you eat and drink with these publicans and sinners? Listen to Jesus' answer. Those that are well don't need a doctor, but those that are sick do. That table becomes the table of salvation. Nobody at Levi's table, nobody at Matthew's table, the party that he's got going on at the banquet, nobody deserved to be there. And that is exactly why they were invited. Because they didn't deserve to be there. Can I say with God's grace for our salvation? We don't deserve to be there. But it's the very reason you're invited. It's the very reason that you're invited. Every believer has a testimony that begins with grace. What's the wee the wee saying, isn't it? Every sinner, every saint is a past and every sinner has a future. Absolutely. We were invited when we didn't deserve the invitation. When we deserve judgment, we were invited to the table of grace. The table of Christ is not filled with deserving people, it is filled with forgiven people. And that's what makes the difference. And that table of grace is there for the unworthy, the undeserving. And it goes beyond that. Not only is it there for the undeserving or the unworthy, it is also there for the broken. That meal, that table, that invitations for those that are broken. If you read earlier on in Luke chapter 7, Jesus is invited to the house of Simon the Pharisee, a guy who kept all the laws and kept all the rules and forever. And I don't know the purpose of that meal, whether it was for an argument or a discussion over who was right, who was wrong, or whatever. But regardless, during that meal, a woman, the Bible calls her a sinful woman, comes in and kneels at Jesus' feet and weeps and weeps. So much so that her tears hit Jesus' feet. She breaks a bottle of ointment and she anoints his feet and she wipes it with her hair. You just read that story. By nobody's imagination was that woman allowed to be there at all. At all. Even what she used to anoint Jesus' feet had different connotations. And you're saying to yourself, Simon the Pharisee had every right to be furious. Who let her in? How did she get in? Whatever. She washes Christ's feet with her tears, she anoints his feet with ointment, with perfume. Simon is offended. Jesus, on the other hand, is moved with compassion. He sees Simon sees her past. Jesus sees her faith. Simon sees her sin. And Jesus sees her repentance. Simon sees her shame, but Jesus sees her potential. You know, at the table. Jesus demonstrate demonstrates that his grace sees beyond what people have been and reaches toward what they may have come. You know, I've demonstrated it from this platform before. I'm not won't do it again today, so forgive me, but I'll describe it anyway. At that table, you'd have sort of lain on the ground more or less, and you'd have lain on your left arm, and you would have eaten with your your right arm. And Jesus would be facing Simon the Pharisee lying down. And if you can imagine me lying down here, this woman comes in and she kneels, hunched over Jesus' feet. And if you read on in that story, there's a verse and it says this, turning to the woman, Jesus asks Simon, do you see this woman? The automatic reaction is yes. But when you think about it, if Jesus is lying, I'm just gonna do it anyway, if Jesus is lying down like so, and Simon's there, and the woman is hunched over it there, it says, Jesus turned to the woman and said to Simon, can you see this woman? The answer is probably no. Why? Because Jesus was in the way. When you become a Christian, when the old devil says he's a bad, he messed up, he did this, he's lived his life like that. When when the old devil is like Simon the Pharisee, and sees all the wrong and the mess up in the sinful life, and Jesus says, stands in front of you, so to speak, your bodyguard, and says, Can you see him now? See, God sees us through the filter of Jesus Christ. When you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Savior, the table is there for the broken. And yeah, you can bring your sin, your shame, your regrets, you can whatever it is. And at the table, Jesus says, Listen, many people carry guilt, many people carry regrets, many people carry scars, but the gospel is good news because Jesus welcomes those others reject, and that woman leaves forgiven of her sins. Pay close attention to this though. As good as that is, that the broken woman, the sinful woman, finds wholeness, healing, and forgiveness and moves on with her life. The religious one, Simon the Pharisee, remains unchanged. Why is that a warning to me? You know, it's possible to sit close to Jesus and miss it all. It's possible to sit close to Christ and miss what it's all about. Can I say it this way? It's possible to come to church every Sunday and miss what it's really about. It may it be for us. None of us are ever in that position. May it be. For those who we love, our friends and our family, when they sit close to us, that they understand what it's truly about, that it's God's grace that's there. Time is rattling on very, very quickly this morning. Let me just give you two very quick ones and then I'll finish. In Luke chapter 19, you see that at that table, there's a table there that God's grace transforms and changes people. For those of you that are fairly new to church, I I often say to you, when you feel as though I'm not doing well as a Christian, or I say, look back on your life over the compare yourself now to where you were six months ago. Compare yourself now to where you were a year ago, and you'll understand how far you've come and how well God's grace has transformed you and changed you, the way you think, the way you behave, and all of that sort of stuff. In Luke 19, you know, from Sunday school all the way up, a wealthy tax collector, a dishonest man, a social outcast, a guy who's short and hiding up a sycamore tree, just waiting to get a glimpse of Jesus for whatever reason, and Jesus stops at the sycamore tree. And what does he say? Zacchaeus, come down. I'm coming to your house for my dinner. Come down, I'm coming to your house for tea. What an astonishing statement. And I find it astonishing because of this. Jesus on this occasion invites himself to Zacchaeus' house. He's not been invited, he invites himself to Zacchaeus' house, to Zacchaeus' table. You can imagine what the crowd were going on about, what the crowd were murmuring all about, and whatever. But salvation enters that house, and before the meal is over, Zacchaeus is transformed. Zacchaeus says, Do you know something? See whatever I've stolen, I'll repay back. I'll change my ways and anything I've stolen, I'll pay back four times and whatever. Why is that important to me? The order of that. I think it's because of this. Jesus doesn't say, get your life together and then come follow me. Once you've sorted everything out, then you can maybe think of committing yourself to my ways. It's the exact opposite. What Jesus says, what God says, is just come and we'll sort out the mess. Come and we'll sort out the mess. So if you take those two together, the sinful woman at Simon the Pharisee's house, and that what Jesus says is listen, bring your baggage. Bring your shame, bring your regret, bring the titles that the world has put on you. A sinful woman, a tax collector, bring all that rubbish. Just come. And you'll be transformed. You'll realize what the penny will drop. You'll realize there's a better way to live your life. You won't get it right, maybe all at the time. There'll be scars, there'll be wounds that have to heal and all of that. But just come and we'll deal with all of that. Grace comes first, transformation follows. You know, religion says behave and then you belong. Jesus says, you belong. Together we'll work out how we should behave properly. Jesus says, belong and I'll change your life. You know, Jesus' attendance, Jesus' presence at hospitality, in Simon the Pharisee's house or in Zacchaeus' house or Matthew's house or forever. His presence there isn't an approval of sin, but it's the means by which sinners are changed and sinners are transformed. Let me finish with one final one, just as I wrap this up in Joshua, Pastor Joshua lead us into communion or forever. The story is told in Scripture of two disciples walking back from Jerusalem to Emmaus after the crucifixion. And as they're walking along there, they're disheartened or discouraged. They've given all their hopes and dreams to this man Jesus Christ. But they have watched his lifeless body be taken off a cross and put in a tomb. Their dream is gone. All hope has gone. And they're walking back to their hometown, home village of Emmaus. And alongside them appears Jesus himself. And they have a debate. He asks them, Why are you so depressed? Why are you so discouraged? Why are you so down? And they're like, Are you the only guy on the planet that hasn't heard what's happened? And they get to their house and Jesus goes to move on. And as Jesus goes to move on, they say, Listen, stay with us. It's kind of getting dark. This isn't safe for you. Just stay with us, have a meal with us, eat with us, or whatever. They're there, they're discouraged, they're confused, they're brokenhearted. Jesus walks beside them, yet they do not recognize him. They urge him to stay. And then he sits at the table. And he does what we're going to do in a minute or two. He breaks bread. And at that point, they've seen it done that way before. At that point, their eyes are opened and they realize exactly who it is. They recognize the risen Christ. How beautiful. The one who is known in the breaking of bread is the very one who's breaking bread with you, revealing himself in that time. They encountered the living Christ. You know, Jesus takes the bread, he takes the wine, and he reveals the price of our salvation. Grace is free to us, but it was costly for him. He paid the price. But that invitation still stands today because Calvary happened, because the resurrection, because the tomb is still empty, and we can come freely because Christ paid fully. You see, let me take you back to the beginning. The Pharisees accused him of being a friend of publicans and sinners. Thank God they were right. And thank God Jesus saw that as a declaration of his mission. Jesus met people at tables. Matthew discovered grace at the table for the unworthy. The sinful woman discovered forgiveness, healing from her brokenness at the table. Zacchaeus discovered salvation and transformation. Those disciples discovered there isn't Christ at the table. Let me say this as I close. The picture of being invited around the table of God's grace, the table of Jesus Christ, and we'll deal with specific stories in the weeks that lie ahead. If I use the term the word you singular, it reveals the heart of God for you. And it reveals a God who welcomes you. It reveals a God who forgives you. Listen to this. It reveals a God who restores. Who restores those things, those mess-ups in your life that you think I'll never get through that, I'll never go over that, I'll never in your own strength, maybe not. But he is a God who can restore. The Bible says he can restore the years that the locust and the canker worm have eaten. The crops and the harvest that are that apparently have gone and will never grow again. He says he's a God who restores. Don't refuse your seat at the table because you think you're too bad. Because things can't be made right. That's what the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ is all about. He's a God who restores, he's a God who invites you to sit at that table, and that invitation remains open today. So let me ask you this: Do you know you've got a seat at the table? If you don't, let me take you back to the cross. Two thieves on either side, two criminals on either side, one just lambasted Jesus. The other realized it was an invitation. And the other realized that he needed to accept that invitation then, there and then. So he turns to Jesus and he says, Lord, remember me when you come into your kingdom. Lord, remember me, Lord, I want a seat at the table. It's a great prayer. Short. But in saying Lord, he gave Jesus his place as the head of the table, so to speak. Lord, would you remember me? Would you come into your kingdom? Lord, I want a seat at the table, I want a seat at the feast, the marriage feast of life. Lord, Lord, will you remember me? And if you do not know that you've got a seat at the table, at God's table, if you do not know that when you breathe your last, your passport is stamped, and you are absolutely guaranteed that on your way to heaven, to sit with God, with Christ forever and eternity. If you don't know that, that's what's on offer. Jesus says there's a seat at the table. And the way you accept that, and it's hard because it's free. You're like, I need to do this, I need to do that, I need to do the next thing. I tell you, grace is free. It costs Christ everything, grace is free, and it's not get your life sorted and then come. It's just come. The thief on the cross had nowhere to go. He'd no counsellor to go to, he'd no place to go to, but he could go and right the wrongs he'd ever made and forever. What did Jesus say to him? Today you've got a seat at the table. Today you'll be with me in paradise. A little prayer, that's all it takes. And in a moment or two, I'm going to give you that opportunity for silently within your heart, and you can say, Do you know, I want to make sure that my seat is reserved at that table. Because it allows me to breathe my last known that will spend eternity in heaven. But it also means I can do life with a mentor, with a friend that will stay closer than a brother, who has walked in my shoes, who knows loneliness, who knows betrayal, who knows success, who knows disappointment, who knows all of those things, who knows everything. And he wants to sit day in and day out, have a friendship with me, have a fellowship with me, but I can shoot the breeze with him and say, you know, in prayer, God, I'm struggling with this. I'm struggling to understand this, and around that table, he'll drop little hints as to how I should maybe act or behave or whatever it would be. He carries you through this life and he'll carry you through the doors of death of this life into the next life. If you don't know that, and I mean I absolutely know that, I'm going to pray a little prayer that you just say in your heart, and that puts the seal on it. God hears that and he says, You're welcome. Your place is reserved. If you are at the table already, and you know you've got a place at that table, reflect upon it and thank God for his grace and his goodness and his mercy that you're at that table. Maybe think afresh what it means to you, but here's my challenge for you invite as many as you can, as many as you're able to take a seat at the table with you. That's what the Great Commission is. Go and make disciples. Go and preach the gospel, make disciples baptize. Really, what they're saying is listen, you get a seat at the table, you know what it's worth. You know what a place at the table is worth. Invite as many as you can. I can imagine if I said to you, and it's not to be flippant at all. Whoever your hero is in life, whether it's some sports star, whether it's some pop star, rock star, or whatever it would be, or that sort of stuff. And I said, Listen, we're going to go to a dinner. There's the cheap seats up at the back, there's the full price ones down at the front. You get the best view in the house, and you get to the after party where you get to meet the celebrity or whoever it is. There's three tickets, who do you want to bring with you? You wouldn't be slow in knowing who you want to bring with you. And I would suggest in this situation, if you've got a seat at the table, you've got the best seat in the house, in this house and the house hereafter. Can I challenge you and encourage you today to make it a fresh a calling in your life that you'll invite everybody you possibly can to accept a seat at the table? It will change our life forever. Let's just pray. Father, as we are just about to break bread and to drink from the cup, and just remember what it costs you to invite us to the table. That table of grace, that table where you welcome us, you forgive us, you restore as you invite us. But I just ask for those who have never reserved their place in your kingdom, they've never accepted you as your savior, made you Lord of their life, or just like that thief on the cross, that just now in in their hearts, just silently, they would pray something like the thief prayed, say, Lord, I trust you. And I'm willing to place my trust in you, and I bring my brokenness to the table, knowing that I will be welcomed. And I thank you that you have paid the price for me to be welcomed. I ask that from this day forward I enjoy the friendship of the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords every single day of my life around the table. I'm gonna breathe my last. It has only really begun. But I spend eternity in fellowship and friendship around the table in heaven. And Father, I pray for those of us who made that commitment many, many years ago. Help us to understand this is not a table for two, but we are to send out the message far and wide, come for all things are now ready, and invite others to the beauty and the benefit of sitting at a table with the Lord God Almighty. These things we pray in Jesus' precious name. Amen. Just that little prayer that just says, Listen, God, I want my table and my seat reserved at the table. If you've never prayed that and you prayed that today, it's a simple prayer. The journey thereafter, sometimes you need a little bit of help on. And that's really the job of us as pastors here to help you on that spiritual journey. So if you prayed that for your first time, or listen, even if you prayed it, uh you've prayed some of that before, but you prayed it again just to recommit that that commitment to God and for others. Just before you leave, come and see myself for Pastor Josh or Pastor Bethany or whoever brought you or that's sort of dragged them along, and just sort of say, listen, it gives me an opportunity this week just to pray for you. Uh just in my quiet time in my prayers and whatever. There's a couple of you be Daily Bread New Christians book and that sort of booklet that just sets out things and easier probably than the the the length of time it takes me to uh to do or whatever. Uh but if you uh if you've got a seat at the table when it comes to communion, you can participate in the breaking of the bread as Pastor Joshua lead us through uh just now. Uh and I know there's two songs yet to sing. There's When I Survey and there's Glorious Day, Living He Love Me, Dying, He Saved Me. You can sing that afresh with a different perspective on your life.