Luke 14

¹ One Sabbath, when he went to eat at the house of one of the leading Pharisees, they were watching him closely.

² And there in front of him was a man suffering from abnormal swelling.

³ Jesus asked the experts in the law and Pharisees, "Is it lawful to heal on the Sabbath, or not?"

⁴ But they remained silent. So he took hold of the man, healed him, and sent him away.

⁵ Then he said to them, "If your son or your ox falls into a well on the Sabbath day, won't you immediately pull him out?"

⁶ And they could not reply to these things.

⁷ Then he told a parable to those who had been invited, when he noticed how they were choosing the places of honor. He said to them,

⁸ "When you are invited by someone to a wedding feast, do not recline in the place of honor, in case someone more distinguished than you has been invited.

⁹ Then the one who invited both of you will come and say to you, 'Give your place to this person,' and then in shame you will begin to take the lowest place.

¹⁰ But when you are invited, go and recline in the lowest place, so that when your host comes he may say to you, 'Friend, move up higher.' Then you will be honored in the presence of all who are at the table with you.

¹¹ For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted."

¹² He also said to the one who had invited him, "When you give a lunch or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, so that they may invite you back and you would be repaid.

¹³ But when you give a banquet, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind.

¹⁴ And you will be blessed, because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous."

¹⁵ When one of those reclining at the table with him heard these things, he said to him, "Blessed is the one who will eat bread in the kingdom of God!"

¹⁶ But he said to him, "A certain man was giving a great banquet and invited many.

¹⁷ At the time of the banquet, he sent his servant to tell those who had been invited, 'Come, because everything is now ready.'

¹⁸ But they all alike began to make excuses. The first said to him, 'I have bought a field, and I need to go out and see it. I ask you to excuse me.'

¹⁹ Another said, 'I have bought five yoke of oxen, and I am going to try them out. I ask you to excuse me.'

²⁰ Another said, 'I have married a wife, and for that reason I cannot come.'

²¹ The servant came back and reported these things to his master. Then the master of the house became angry and said to his servant, 'Go out quickly into the streets and lanes of the city, and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind, and the lame.'

²² The servant said, 'Sir, what you ordered has been done, and there is still room.'

²³ The master said to the servant, 'Go out into the roads and hedgerows and compel them to come in, so that my house may be filled.

²⁴ For I tell you, none of those men who were invited will taste my banquet.'"

²⁵ Large crowds were traveling with him, and he turned and said to them,

²⁶ "If anyone comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother, wife and children, brothers and sisters — yes, even his own life — he cannot be my disciple.

²⁷ Whoever does not carry his own cross and come after me cannot be my disciple.

²⁸ For which of you, wanting to build a tower, does not first sit down and calculate the cost, to see if he has enough to complete it?

²⁹ Otherwise, after he has laid the foundation and is not able to finish, all who see it will begin to mock him,

³⁰ saying, 'This man began to build and was not able to finish!'

³¹ Or what king, going out to engage another king in battle, will not first sit down and consider whether he is able with ten thousand to oppose the one coming against him with twenty thousand?

³² If not, while the other is still far away, he sends a delegation and asks for terms of peace.

³³ In the same way, any of you who does not give up all his own possessions cannot be my disciple.

³⁴ "Salt is good, but if salt has lost its taste, with what will it be seasoned?

³⁵ It is fit neither for the soil nor for the manure pile. They throw it out. The one who has ears to hear, let him hear."