Jesus is having dinner at the home of a Pharisee, and it’s a little tense. He’s been quite critical of the Pharisees, and they are watching him closely. But he’s also watching them closely. He sees how the guests jockey for the places of honor, and he comments on how to be a guest at a banquet. "When you’re a guest," he says, "go to the lowest place. You can only go up from there, and if you are called up, you’ll be honored." Then he turns to the man who invited him and comments on how to be a host: "When you give a party, don’t invite people so you can be repaid. Invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind, and you will be blessed because they cannot repay you."

At first blush, it looks like Jesus has gone into the business of dispensing advice about etiquette at parties. Sort of like a divine Emily Post. That, of course, is not what he’s about — which is a good thing, because I don’t think Jesus’ volume on etiquette would sell very well. "Throw a party and invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind who cannot repay you"? Oh, yeah, that’s going to be a best seller!

This isn’t about etiquette. It’s about the kingdom of God. One clue is that we’re told that he’s telling them a parable. Parables are about the kingdom. And some of us, and I’m one of them, are glad this isn’t Jesus’ Book of Etiquette because I don’t want to have to invite only the poor and crippled and lame and blind to a party at my house. So, I for one am glad that it’s about the kingdom — which is, as we all know, "out there" somewhere, really just an idealistic and unattainable idea — and not something as close and personal as how I govern my social life.

But in truth, Jesus would have done a lot less meddling with our lives if this were Jesus’ Book of Etiquette. Because what he’s really talking about isn’t how we act as guests at a party, or how we act as hosts of a party; he’s really talking about the etiquette of who we bring to the party — who we bring — when we come alone. This is "Jesus’ Book of Kingdom Etiquette," and kingdom etiquette messes with who we are, and that’s a lot more personal than telling us what to do. And to make it even more meddlesome, Jesus is making it clear that the kingdom of God is not — cannot be — some "out there," idealistic, unattainable idea. It has to be alive and well in our hearts. Emily Post’s etiquette is a lot easier.

The key to all this, of course, is the proverb Jesus puts in the middle of this parable: "For all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted." This isn’t about strategy at a dinner party. If we think it is, we can so easily corrupt it. Imagine a dinner party at which everyone is rushing to take the low seat with ears cocked toward the host, hoping to hear the call to move up.

Jesus is not encouraging us to be "humble, and proud of it." He is calling us to learn how to live our life from the center of our beings. When we live our lives on the surface — for how we look, or how important we are at the speaker’s table, or how great our car is, or how much money we have, or how striking our friends are, or even how impressive our charity work is — when we live our lives on the surface, we are living according to the perceptions of others. We are outer-driven. Jesus calls us to live from the center of our beings outward.

Humility is deceptively simple. It is not abasement any more than it is self-exaltation. Dag Hammarskjold, a former Secretary General of the United Nations and a remarkable Christian witness, said that to be humble is, simply, not to make comparisons. It’s so simple. Not to make comparisons. Now think about that. Think what the world would be like, what your life would be like, if you made no comparisons. When you met someone, you never said, "They’re richer, poorer, smarter, better, worse, of more use to me, of less use to me . . . ." Nothing. If we could never make comparisons, we would be free to see others as God sees them.

Here are two stories that illustrate the kind of kingdom etiquette that comes from living from our centers, not being outer-driven:

A rabbi asked his students, "When is it at dawn that one can tell the light from the darkness?"

One student replied, "When I can tell a goat from a donkey." "No," answered the rabbi.

Another said, "When I can tell a palm tree from a fig." "No," answered the rabbi again.

"Well, then, what is the answer," his students pressed him.

"Only when you look into the face of every man and every woman and see your brother and sister," said the rabbi. "Only then have you seen the light. All else is darkness."

The second story is called, "The Best Place to Pray," from a book by Theophane the Monk:

I asked an old monk, "How do I get over the habit of judging people?"

He answered, "When I was your age, I was wondering where would be the best place to go to pray. Well, I asked Jesus the question. His answer was, "Why don’t you go into the heart of my Father?" So I did. I went into the heart of the Father, and all these years that’s where I’ve prayed. Now I see everyone as my own child. How can I judge anyone?"

These are stories of people practicing kingdom etiquette. No comparisons.

Jesus calls us to practice that kind of kingdom etiquette; don’t look for the place of honor; don’t invite so that you could even possibly get a payback.

And that’s easy to say, and I suspect that we all know at some level that this centered living is the way to God, and meaning, and fulfillment. But it’s not that easy to do, is it? We get it for a bit, then we quit working on it for a while and somebody pushes our button, or pulls our chain, or we’re really tired, or something disappoints us, or something makes us feel insecure, or we feel inferior, or superior, and pretty soon we’re back to our outer-driven lives, aren’t we? It’s easy to slip back into it, isn’t it?

And the truth is, we’ll always have to fight that. But how successful we are at living from the center of our beings depends on what we’ve got at the center of our beings. If that feels like an empty place, well, that’s pretty scary, and it won’t take much for us to try to fill it with things from outside.

So, I’m going to say one very simple thing to you, and I’m going to propose that you reflect on it all week. And when you’re through reflecting on it all week, reflect on it the next week. And keep that up — until you die.

Here is what we all need constantly to hold at the center of our beings. It is the core that can give us the strength, the self-confidence, the self-assured grace and humility to live Jesus’ kingdom etiquette:

God absolutely, unequivocally, unhesitatingly, loves, loves, loves, loves you — without comparing you to anyone.

The Rev. James H. Pritchett, Jr. St. John’s Episcopal Church, College Park, GA