God's Currency (Luke 14:7-14)

 Life in the first century—much like life today—was largely transactional. What that means is that anytime someone gives you something… they’re expecting something in return. 

You don’t get something for nothing.

In the first century, Caesar gave the people security. He used his army to prevent any rebellion or invasion from disturbing the peace of the land. Caesar also gave to the people by distributing bread, and hosting sporting events: gladiator contests; the famous “bread and circuses” of the Roman Empire.

Caesar didn’t do this out of the kindness of his heart. He didn’t do it because he loved his people. 

He did it, so that he could get something in return.

Caesar made it clear that the people were expected to work hard, and pay hard. In exchange for the peace, the bread and the entertainment they received, they were expected to give back. 

The people owed Caesar a literal debt of gratitude, which they paid through the high taxes they were charged.

They received and now they must give.

It was a transactional relationship. The whole Roman society was governed by transactional relationships.

And if you were to give a shape to all this, it would be a pyramid. Caesar is at the top, and all the poor people who must work to support Caesar’s wealth and power are at the bottom. It was very hard to move up, because the higher up you go, the less space there is. But you still were expected to support those at the top through your labor and the taxes you paid.

***** When Jesus saw how guests arriving at a banquet chose their seats, he realized they were stuck in a transactional mindset. They all agreed to come, because they expected to receive something. And they all wanted that place at the top.

The host wanted to impress his guests, because then they would be in his debt… they would owe him… and he could use that to his advantage.

The guests wanted to impress their host… and each other… because the more impressive one was, the more that person could demand from others. The guest who made the best impression would be able to attract the most distinguished guests to his own banquet, when it was his turn to host.

So the impression one made was important. The better the impression, the higher your status, and the more favors you could expect to come your way. The better the impression, the more others would owe you a debt of gratitude. 

I imagine there were many things that went into making a good impression: The clothing you wore. The greetings you offered…

And, the seat you sat in. The closer you sat to the host, the greater the impression you made. The most honored guests sat right next to the host; the less-honored guests sat farther away. …

Apparently, at this particular banquet, there was some confusion about where the guests should sit. The host should have told them exactly where to sit; but, for whatever reason, he didn’t.

So the guests kind of jostled for their seats. They all chose the highest seat they dared. They all wanted to be as close to the host as possible. They all wanted to be seen as more important, so that they would be able to demand greater favors from those who found them more impressive, more powerful.

As I said, things are much the same today. Our president likes to reward those who flatter him, and punish (or fire) those who don’t. Whatever you think of that, there’s no doubt that that is how things work in this world, especially among those with wealth and power.

*****  Well, as you might expect, in the kingdom of God, things are different. In the kingdom of God, relationships are not transactional. In the kingdom of God, one doesn’t give in order to receive, and one doesn’t give in order to repay a debt. 

In fact, in the kingdom of God, all debts are forgiven. No one owes anyone anything…

Except to love.

***** The apostle Paul says as much in his letter to the Romans. In Romans 13:8, he writes: “Owe no one anything, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.”

The currency of God’s kingdom is love. Every transaction in God’s kingdom is a transaction of love.

If you were to give a shape to all this, it wouldn’t be a pyramid. The shape of the currency in God’s kingdom would be a circle.

So if love had been the motivation behind how the guests chose their seats, how do you think they would have chosen? 

They probably would not have pushed each other out of the way in order to get the best seats for themselves.

Instead, they would have humbled themselves, and sought to honor each other. The kindness they showed to one another would have been grounded in love.

And the hospitality of the host would have been grounded in love as well. He would have offered his food and his hospitality to his guests not because he expected something in return; he would have done it as a gift of love. 

And no one would have been impressed by the seat one was given, or the clothes one wore, or the food that was served. Instead, the only thing that would have impressed them was the love that was shown.

Jesus breaks the pattern of transactional relationships. 

The life that Jesus gives to us, and the love we receive from God, are gifts freely given out of love. 

And the gifts we give back to God, we give out of gratitude. We do not give out of compulsion. We do not give in exchange for anything God has given to us or that we hope to get from God. We give out of gratitude. We give out of love. 

There is no debt of gratitude that we must repay. God will not punish us or withhold love from us if we do not return the favor. God’s love is given freely.

And the love we give must be given freely as well.

If love is not given freely, then it really isn’t love at all, is it? If someone captures you and locks you in a cell and tells you “You must love me or else!” Well, you might pretend to love them, in order to escape punishment, but that’s not really love. 

Love is always given freely. Love can only be given freely.

Jesus obviously can’t make these guests treat each other with love. He can’t make them take the lower seats, because love doesn’t work that way. 

Love never tries to exert control over another.

***** As Paul says in 1 Corinthians 13: “love is patient, love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. Love does not insist on its own way.” 

This is a familiar passage to many. But I think we’ve oversentimentalized it. 

And I think we should spend more time meditating on it, and pondering what it means, and how our own love can be like the love Paul talks about; the love of Christ.

Because (I’ll say it again) love is the currency of God’s kingdom.

***** Let’s talk about another Bible story you may be familiar with. 

Zacchaeus.

Zacchaeus was a wee little man, a wee little man was he… he climbed right up a sycamore tree, for the Lord he wanted to see…

(Who knows how the rest goes?)

The story of Zacchaeus appears in Luke 19. As the song explains, Zacchaeus climbed up a sycamore tree to see Jesus, who was passing through town.

What the song doesn’t explain is that Zacchaeus had spent his whole life trying to climb to the top of the social pyramid. In fact, I think him climbing that sycamore tree might be symbolic of how he tried to climb to the top of the social pyramid.

Zacchaeus even turned his back on his own people by becoming a tax collector, one who took wealth from the people, kept some for himself, and sent the rest of it on up that pyramid to Caesar, hoping it would pull him up as it went.

But at some point Zacchaeus became dissatisfied with the transactional nature of life. It didn’t bring him the happiness he longed for. So when Jesus came along, saw him in that tree, and said: “Zacchaeus! Come down from that tree!”

…what Zacchaeus heard was: “Stop trying to climb to the top. You won’t find what you are looking for there.”

So Zacchaeus came down out of the tree; and he and Jesus went to Zacchaeus’ house. And Zacchaeus was so impressed by the idea that love is the currency that matters, that he decided then and there to give half his possessions to the poor, and that if he had defrauded anyone of anything (which, surely, he had, because that’s what first century tax collectors did), that he would pay it back four times.

He was done with the transactional economy. He was done with trying to move up the pyramid. He embraced the kingdom where the only currency that matters is love. He embraced the kingdom that is shaped like a circle, not a pyramid.

*****  At that banquet, Jesus said to the host: “instead of inviting those who you expect to pay you back—those from whom you can demand favors, those who might be able to help you move up the pyramid—what you should do is invite those who cannot repay you: the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. 

Then Jesus told the host and the guests a story. The story he tells is the next chapter in our devotional, and since I’m preaching on the scriptures from our devotional, I should save it for next week… but I realized that I’m going to be one week short if I don’t combine two of the chapters. So I’m doing it today. 

Which means if your small group is using the devotional book, I might now be a week ahead of you, starting next week. But this way I’ll end on Easter Sunday.

So Jesus tells a story to all these banquet guests, and in that story, someone is hosting a great dinner, and he invites people who he thinks will be good guests to have; friends, relatives, rich neighbors, and those from whom he might be able to demand a favor. Because that’s just how it was done.

But all those would-be guests made excuses. Apparently, they didn’t see what was in it for them. Maybe they didn’t see how attending that banquet could improve their own status or help them move up the social pyramid.

So they all made excuses as to why they couldn’t attend.

So then the invitations were sent out to the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame; those who could not repay the host for his hospitality.

And that is what banquets in God’s kingdom are like.

God invites us into worship, and invites us to take our place at the table. At the table, we receive the gifts of God: life and love in abundance. 

We are poor, in that nothing we have could ever repay God for what God has given to us. Which is OK, because what God gives, God gives freely. There are no strings attached to God’s love.

And yet, as we come to the Lord’s Table, we do make an offering: of ourselves, our lives, and our resources. We bring what we can.

We do not do this out of guilt or obligation. We do not owe any sort of debt that must be repaid.

But we offer up to God what we have out of gratitude and love.

Because love is the currency of the kingdom of God. Radical, self-giving, affirming, welcoming love. Love that lifts others up. 

The only debt we owe is the love we show one another.

Unattached (Luke 14:25-33)

So much of the Bible is so inspiring for so many people. Many people have favorite verses, and sometimes those verses are framed or tatted or printed on greeting cards. Verses like Philippians 4:13: “I can do all things through Christ.” 

Or, Jeremiah 29:11: “I know the plans I have for you, says the Lord; plans for your welfare and not for harm, to give you a future with hope.” 

Or, Isaiah 40:31: “Those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength, they shall mount up with wings like eagles…”

Or, Matthew 19:26: “With God all things are possible.”

And yeah, sometimes these verses don’t mean what we think they mean, once you put them in their context, but they’re still good.

Some verses, however, are not as universally admired as these…

When I was in seminary, I was particularly fond of Ecclesiastes 12:12, which says: “Too much study will wear you out.” I thought that would be a good verse to frame and hang up in the classroom, but I doubt my professors would have appreciated it the same way I did.

These days, I’ve taken a liking to Leviticus 13:40: “A man who has lost his hair and is bald is clean.” And clean, in this context, means approved, worthy…

Then there’s Luke 14: 28, which says: “...first sit down and estimate the cost, and see whether or not you have enough.” I think every Chipotle should frame that verse and post it next to their guacamole.. Because it’s like, what? Four bucks for guac?

But this verse isn’t talking about guac. In context, it’s about something even more challenging; it’s about the cost of following Jesus. Consider what that’s going to cost you. 

“Wait, there’s a cost to following Jesus? There’s a price to pay?”

Yes, there is. 

And our passage mentions what some of those costs are, or can be.

And I gotta tell you, this is difficult, and I don’t really like this scripture…

It’s OK to say that, by the way; it’s OK to say you don’t like a particular scripture. There are a number of scriptures that I really don’t like, and this is one of them; and I was tempted to look for something else to preach on today. 

But then I decided that, while it’s OK to not like certain scriptures, it’s NOT OK to just ignore them. So instead of ignoring this scripture, I decided to instead wrestle with this scripture, and share with you my journey.

The costs mentioned in this scripture are that you:

• Be willing to hate your family

• Carry the cross

• Give up all your possessions.

Since I’m not ignoring these teachings, my next temptation is to say that Jesus didn’t really mean for us to take these things literally.

 But I know I gotta be careful, because too many have given in to the temptation of saying, “Well, Jesus didn’t really mean that literally” anytime a teaching appears that they just don’t like.

“Treat immigrants the same as citizens.” Don’t take that literally.

“Preach good news to the poor, and free the oppressed…” Don’t take that literally.

“Forgive debts…” Don’t take that literally.

People take literally what they want to take literally, and dilute or explain away or ignore the teachings they don’t want to take literally. 

But a lot of these commands, Jesus really did want us to take literally.

However, Jesus also frequently used metaphors to get his meaning across, and told parables that use exaggerated, hyperbolic language. We’re not supposed to take everything Jesus said literally. 

So how do we know what Jesus’ actual intentions were in today’s scripture?

One thing we can do is compare this teaching to other teachings Jesus gave. The command to hate one’s own family, if taken literally, does seem to contradict nearly everything else Jesus said, so that is an indication that, perhaps, he was speaking in hyperbole. 

After all, it was Jesus who commanded his followers to love their enemies. It doesn’t make sense that he would command his followers to love their enemies, but hate their own family.

We can also compare what Jesus says here in Luke to what he says in Matthew. Many of the stories and teachings in Luke are repeated in Matthew, because Luke and Matthew both used some of the same sources when writing their gospels. So if the same story is presented, but something in that story is different, that’s something to pay attention to.

In Matthew, Jesus gives the same teaching, except that he doesn’t use the word hate. In Matthew 10: 37-39, Jesus says: “Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me; and whoever does not take up the cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Those who find their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.”

And scholars generally agree that how it appears in Matthew is more likely to represent what Jesus meant. 

So now I’m feeling a little more confident that Jesus didn’t really mean we should hate. 

Nevertheless, this is still a difficult teaching.

Yes, we should love our family… but Jesus is saying that our love for God and our commitment to the way Jesus taught should be our number one priority. Like it says in Matthew’s gospel, we are called to love Jesus most of all. And loving Jesus doesn’t just mean speaking his name with your lips. Loving Jesus is not a one-time recitation of a one-sentence prayer. Loving Jesus means committing your whole self and your whole life to the way he taught.

When Jesus talks about loving him more than our own family, or when he says we cannot follow him unless we hate our own family, I think he’s saying that our love for others should not be limited to just those who are part of our own family. Your love must extend beyond your own family. It must include the neighbor.

Because God’s family of which you are a part includes all of humanity. So it’s not that you are called to literally hate your own family; it’s that you are to recognize that God’s love isn’t limited to just them. Family, tribe, nation are all important. But ultimately, our love and our commitment is to extend to every person. 

Lisa Sharon Harper talks about how, in Genesis, God created the world, and pronounced it good; and God created humans, who were created in the image of God; and then God pronounced it all very good.

 And the very goodness of creation exists in how all the elements of creation relate to one another. The very goodness of creation exists in the connections that bind us together as one.

And “sin,” she says, is not “missing the mark,” as some of us have been taught. That idea of missing the mark, and falling short of perfection, is a Greek idea that came into Christianity after Jesus. What sin actually is, is failing to honor the goodness of those relationships; sin is failing to honor the connections we have with one another and with all of creation.

Which means that anytime we place ourselves or our family or our tribe in a higher position than others, or a higher position than creation itself, we sin, because we have distorted the inherently good relationships that exist between all parts of creation.

What Jesus demands is that our love be whole, complete, for all people, and for creation itself. Love for family is good, but it should not in any way prevent you from acting in love toward everyone else.

And the way of love often requires sacrifice.

A parent makes a lot of sacrifices for their child. MLK made great sacrifices for his country.  Jesus made great sacrifice for humanity.

Love requires sacrifice.

That’s what it means to carry one’s cross. And this is not the first time in Luke’s gospel that Jesus says this. Earlier, in chapter nine, Jesus also says that his followers need to carry the cross. But there, in chapter nine, Jesus says that followers must carry their cross “daily.” 

A literal crucifixion, or a literal sacrifice, can only happen once, because a person only has one life to give. But to carry one’s cross daily means to live a life of sacrificial love day after day after day.

I don’t know about you, but some days, I’m just living for myself; like I said, this is a difficult teaching.

And because it is difficult, we are commanded to take a sabbath rest. 

Sabbath rest is not selfish. It is necessary. It’s a day to just be. It’s a day to recognize that your worth isn’t based on what you accomplish in life; rather, your worth is based solely on the fact that you are, that you exist, that God created you and formed you and gave you the breath of life.

A sabbath rest also reminds you that when you put in a good effort, and still fall short, God’s grace is there to hold you.

And about that last command, to give up all your possessions: I find nothing in scripture that lets me think Jesus didn’t mean exactly what he says here. Everything I’ve read makes me think Jesus really did mean just what he said when he said give up your possessions. 

Jesus knows that we often give higher priority to our possessions and our wealth than we do to the people around us. We become more attached to our wealth and our possessions. We love our possessions and our wealth more than we love our neighbor, and more than we love God.

Our wealth and our possessions become our idols, the false gods we serve and worship. Which is why we are called to give them up.

Now I know we’re not going to actually do that in a physical sense - we’re not going to give away our homes, all our clothes, and everything else…

But what we can do is change our way of thinking, so that we understand that everything we have and everything we use is a gift to us, and that ultimately, it all belongs to God. We do not own the land; it belongs to God. We do not own all the things we bought; they belong to God. We do not even own our own lives; our lives belong to God.

That is a radically different way of thinking than we’re used to. And we may still have our possessions, but in our minds, we have started letting go of them. We have begun to detach ourselves from the idea that these things are ours to own, to possess, to cling to.

It all belongs to God.

To really understand that idea, and incorporate it into our living… well, on the one hand, it’s all very good news. You belong to God! God cherishes you! And nothing about you, and nothing you can do, can change that. That. Is. Good. News.

But this is also a great challenge. It’s a whole different way of living and thinking, and that makes it scary. Everything belongs to God. 

Taken seriously, it completely changes everything about how we live. Everything. It calls on us to live a new life, to follow a new path. The path of Jesus. The path of sacrifice. The path of love.

Place of Honor (Luke 14:1, 7-14)

 Grandma Eileen was a devout Catholic her entire life. Her faith helped inspire my own faith when I was growing up. After I became a pastor, she was so happy to attend a worship service that I was leading.

The first time - I don’t even think I had been ordained yet; I was welcoming people to the communion table, serving communion. (I think this might have been at mine and Ginger’s wedding, actually, which included communion.) Grandma came forward, but she wasn’t quite sure what to do. Things are done a little differently in Catholic churches. 

She came forward, and when she reached the front of the line, she whispered, “What do I do?” And I whispered back the instructions on how to take a piece of bread and dip it in the cup.

Ever since then, and throughout my ministry, I’ve looked for ways to help people who might be new or unfamiliar with the way worship is done - ways to help them feel comfortable and experience worship. I know we in the church haven’t always been clear about these things.

 At the church where I grew up, we didn’t print out the words to the Lord’s Prayer, we didn’t tell people when to stand, and we didn’t tell people how to take communion. Back then, we just figured everyone knew, or should have known.

I think the same was true here, and in many other congregations.

We weren’t very hospitable then, were we?

We’ve gotten way better at that over the years; but every now and then I discover a moment when we could have been more hospitable, more welcoming, and more helpful to visitors and guests worshiping with us for the first time. Because it’s nice to know what to expect, and what is expected of you.

It’s helpful to know the rules of etiquette one is expected to follow. 

In college, I took a food etiquette class - it was just a one-night class, just for fun, offered by some group on campus. I remember that, when figuring out which fork to use, you start from the outside and work your way in. I remember that the salt and pepper should always be passed together. And I remember that well-trained servers will always serve you from the left, and remove from the right.

And sometimes I still roll my eyes at servers who don’t follow this rule - they serve from the right, or remove your plate from the left! What uncultured, untrained servers! … Nevermind that I’m at a Denny’s…

Have you ever wondered what it would be like to dine with royalty? To dine (for example)  with the queen of England?

Rules for dining with the Queen are extensive.  You must be dressed a certain way. You must sit in your assigned seat - a whole team of people have carefully created a seating chart that all guests must follow… You must fold your napkin a certain way. You must not start eating before the Queen starts eating. 

When you eat, you hold the knife in your right hand and your fork in your left, and instead of stabbing your food with your fork, you use the knife to slide food onto the fork, then keep the food balanced on the fork while bringing it to your mouth. Don’t rush, because the food will end up on your lap; but don’t go too slowly, either, because when the Queen is done eating, so are you - even if there’s still food on your plate. (The Queen is very gracious about this - sometimes she’ll push that last bite of food around on her plate for while, to give everyone else a chance to finish their meal.)

Anyway, there’s a lot more rules about dining with the queen, but I want to talk, now, about dining etiquette during Jesus’ time… What should a person expect, and how should a person behave, during a formal banquet in the first century?

Some of you may remember that, a few years ago, I talked about these formal banquets. They took place in a room called a triclinium, because in that room were three couches arranged around a table. 

Rather than sitting upright like we do today, guests reclined on their left side, and used their right hand and arm to eat. Their feet were pointed away from the table behind them. 

It doesn’t seem to be the most convenient or comfortable position for eating if you ask me, but then, I’ve never really tried it. Maybe pillows and cushions made it easier.

Unlike meals with the Queen, it doesn’t seem that seating charts were always created in advance. As guests arrived, the host would help them find the appropriate seat, but if the host was distracted, or if several guests arrived at once, it could be that guests were left to figure out for themselves where they should sit. 

The thing is, these banquets were all about impressing other people. The banquet was an opportunity to improve your social standing by showing how powerful or influential you were. The host chose his guests because they were people whom the host wanted to impress; and the guests accepted the invitation because they wanted to impress other guests, to be seen at this gathering of influential people - and because to decline the invitation would be an insult to the host.

The seats closest to the host were where the more prominent guests would sit, and the seats further away were where the less prominent guests would sit. Just sitting next to the host would allow others to see your influence, and the high esteem in which you were held. To be seated in the farthest seat from the host meant you just barely made the cutoff.

A modern equivalent might be how a lot of people try to make a name for themselves on social media. They all want to be the next big star on YouTube or TikTok. And in addition to posting content, they’ll connect with other influencers, in the hopes that it’ll help expand their own audience. “If you like my content, I’ll like your content.” Like for like. Follow for follow. All in an effort to increase one’s own influence, to grow one’s own audience, and possibly profit off of that. Everyone wants to be the top influencer.

In today’s scripture, we heard about a banquet that Jesus attended. At this particular banquet, there was some uncertainty about who should sit where. I imagine that the guests arrived, and at first they cast their eyes at their fellow guests, trying to gauge where they fit in comparison… and then one person, the most daring, the most audacious, the most brazen of them all, walked to the head of the table and claimed his spot… and then the others all started jostling for their seats, maybe not daring to take the top seat, but certainly not wanting to be left at the farthest seat…

And Jesus just watched. Or, maybe - it doesn’t say so in the story, but I think that maybe - Jesus walked straight to the farthest spot, the seat no one else wanted, and took his seat. Maybe even before all the other seats were taken. Maybe while all the other guests were still arguing, nudging, and shoving one another to try and get the better positions.

But as soon as he moved to that lowest spot, they all noticed. Because they were all watching him. They had been watching him for some time. I think one of the reasons Jesus was invited to this banquet was so they could continue watching him closely, keep their eye on him.

So they noticed when he sat at that lowest spot. And it made them uncomfortable, because it was so unexpected - and, they suspected, he did it to shame them.

Then Jesus said to them: “Don’t sit in the highest place, the place of honor, because someone more important than you may have been invited, and your host will have to ask you to move to a lower spot. Instead, sit in the lowest spot, and then your friend will honor you by moving you up to a higher spot.”

This was not a new teaching. The other guests had heard this before, and maybe had even taught it themselves. 

In the book of Proverbs, written centuries before Jesus’ time, there is a verse that says “Do not put yourself forward in the king's presence or stand in the place of the great; for it is better to be told, ‘Come up here,’ than to be put lower in the presence of a noble.” [25:6-7] 

So this is a teaching that the other guests should have known. It probably was one that they did know, but chose to ignore… 

…Just like all the teachings people today know, but choose to ignore. We ignore them because they are inconvenient, because they get in the way of our desire for greatness, our desire for wealth, our desire to be looked upon favorably by others.

This week, when it was announced that many student loans would be forgiven, a number of politicians who pride themselves on their Christian faith criticized the announcement, arguing that those debts should not be forgiven. Yet Jesus spoke often of the “year of the Lord’s favor,” when all debts would be forgiven, and Jesus taught his disciples to pray, “forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors,” and many of those who criticized the decision to forgive student debts actually recite that prayer every time they go to worship. 

But to actually put into practice what their faith teaches and what they themselves recite when they pray the Lord’s Prayer - that is too inconvenient. It gets in the way of their own ambition. And they conveniently ignore or forget or dismiss that teaching.

There are other ways we ignore or dismiss teachings that we know we should be following…

Last week several people I follow on social media shared this comic: Jesus is telling a crowd of people to be kind to everyone. A voice from the crowd cries out: “Wait - even Gary?” Another voice shouts out: “Yeah, Gary’s the worst.” 

Jesus replies: “Look, we’ve been through this… yes, be kind to Gary as well.”

Then another voice from the crowd yells out, “Ha! Suck it, losers!” 

And Jesus puts his hand to his head and says, “Not now, Gary…”

I laughed at that - I still think it’s funny - because I recognize the truth, that it is hard to be kind to people like Gary, and I’m always looking for a way, an excuse to not be kind to Gary. I’m always looking for a way to make myself look better than Gary. I’m always looking for justification as to why my life is better, or why I’m more worthy, than Gary.

And, yes, I would not hesitate to grab the higher seat before Gary, because, he’s Gary, and he belongs in a lower seat.

It’s so easy to make these kinds of justifications, right?

Who is your “Gary?” Who do you - consciously or subconsciously - place in the lower seat?

There is a definite hierarchy to society, even here in the United States. If the entire country were to be invited to a great banquet, there would be a definite order regarding who sits higher and who sits lower. We all think we deserve a higher seat than Gary.

As followers of Jesus, we are called to subvert that order. We’re called to turn it upside down. We are called to sit with those who have been placed at the lower end of things.

Because that’s where Jesus is - and it’s where he expects us to be as well.