It’s Sunday morning and the faithful have gathered. We’re reading the biblical text from Luke 14:16-23—a story Jesus told to a group of religious leaders to make a point. It’s about a man putting on a big banquet and inviting guests. The guy kept expanding the invitation list as people turned him down. Since the movers and shakers weren’t showing up, he sent his people out to get the poor, crippled, homeless, prostitutes, gays, and the derelicts. I’m thinking the guy in Jesus’ story must not understand that these people would not be comfortable at a banquet and that he should box up the food and have his people take it to the homeless shelter or an urban rescue mission. He must not be thinking ahead. Once these people know where his banquet hall is they are going to come back again and again. He’ll have to double his custodial staff and his friends will quit coming over if he has these low life folk hanging around.

The speaker this morning makes a great case for graying the line between worship and outreach—“outreach in our worship and worship in our outreach.” One of the ways she lives this out is through her work with pregnant teens. She has personal experience with the call to be uncomfortable.