Romans 14.1-12 & Matthew 18.21-35
Last week I was invited to visit one of our local secondary schools to broaden the narrative of lucrative career aspirations within the Sixth Form by starting a conversation about vocation and calling instead. I had been invited to join the head for lunch in the canteen beforehand but an unexpected development demanded their attention at the last moment, and so I walked alone into a vast dining hall packed to the rafters, filled with a cacophony of voices all competing for attention. I collected my food and paused uncertain where to place myself amidst this frenzy of activity, when a large group of teenagers nearby called out to me: ‘Come and sit here – there’s plenty of room’ – and they squeezed together on their bench to let me in.
And there I rejoiced in a perfect example of what this morning’s readings are all about. Hospitality.
Noticing someone who is new, or uncertain, or different, and squeezing up to make room for them – to welcome them.
Hospitality of course is in our DNA here at Durham Cathedral. It is in many ways why we exist, founded as we are as a place of welcome and hospitality for pilgrims journeying to the shrine of St Cuthbert, and later to the tomb of the Venerable Bede. It was so from the year 995 when the Community of St Cuthbert arrived, it was so in the days of the White Church, it was so when these walls hallowed the life of the monastery and the Benedictine call to welcome each stranger ‘as if they were Christ himself’, it was so a few days ago when we opened the new Cuthbert Centre of Pilgrimage an Prayer within the Chapel of the Holy Cross – a space to welcome today’s pilgrims, to offer hospitality.
And this morning’s readings take us deeply into reflection on what it means to offer hospitality. They remind us that although it may seem to be at one level a practical gesture, there is more to it than that – for true hospitality is of the heart.
In our first reading St Paul was writing to the Romans to remind them of this. Divisions were emerging over those whose consciences bound them to strict dietary laws, and those who understood their freedom in Christ to mean they could eat anything. It might not sound that significant to us today, but at the time it was huge – a cultural division that led to people treating each other rather badly indeed – with judgement, with contempt. And Paul reminds them that they are called not to quarrel over different opinions, but to welcome each other despite them – to receive the other into their heart, to make room for them – and not just so they could convince them to change their mind, but because Christ had already welcomed them just as they are and therefore so should they.
Unity for Paul was not built on uniformity, it was built on Christ – and in Christ we all find a place of belonging. Room must be made for the person who votes differently to us, who practices different traditions to us, who is just … different.
And the Gospel reading gives a similar insight.
In it Peter approaches Jesus with what he thinks is a very generous offer: ‘Lord, how often will my brother sin against me and I forgive him? As many as seven times?’ In the culture of the day, forgiving someone three times was considered noble. Peter doubles it and adds one for good measure. He wants a boundary. He wants to know exactly when he is allowed to close the door of his heart and say, ‘No more room’. But Jesus of course casts these boundaries aside. ‘I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.’ In other words, stop counting. True hospitality does not keep score.
To illustrate this Jesus tells the parable of the unmerciful servant. A servant owes the king ten thousand talents – an astronomical, unpayable debt. It represents billions in today’s money. It is a debt of absolute bankruptcy. When the servant begs for patience, the king does something astounding – he doesn’t just grant an extension, he cancels the entire debt. He makes room for this bankrupt man to live in freedom.
But that same servant does not go out and do likewise. Instead he goes out and finds a fellow servant who owes him a hundred denarii – about a hundred days wages. A real debt, absolutely, but microscopic compared to what had just been forgiven. And instead of showing mercy and making room for the man in the way that room had just been made for him, he chokes him, demands payment, and throws him into prison. And when the king hears of this he delivers the unmerciful servant to the jailers. He had not shown divine hospitality to another even though he had received it tenfold himself.
It’s a parable that resonates very keenly with us today – because we all find in our differing ways that judgement or lack of forgiveness or assumptions about another can shrink our hearts, lock our doors, communicate to someone that ‘There is no room for you’re here’.
And yet we are called to make sure that the challenges and bruises of life do not lead us down that path. We are to be those who show divine hospitality, who make room – and why? Because God has already done so for us, and he does it again and again and again.
When you deeply understand that you have been forgiven ten thousand talents, you lose the ability to choke someone over a hundred denarii. When you realise that God has welcomed you despite your foibles, you lose the right to reject others over their differences.
Biblical hospitality is the Gospel made visible. It is the physical manifestation of God’s grace.
We seek to embody it here together as Cathedral. This morning we are reminded to try and do the same with our hearts. To notice, to welcome, to make room.
Because Christ has already made room for us.
Amen.