Take the Lowest Place

7He was telling a parable to those who had been invited, noticing how they were choosing the places of honor, saying to them:

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

9and the one who invited both you and him will come and say to you, ‘Give this man your place,’ and then you will begin with shame to take the last place.

10But when you are invited, go and recline in the lowest place, so that when the one who invited you comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up higher.’ Then there will be honor for you in the presence of all who are reclining with you.

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

12And he was also saying to the one who had invited him, “When you give a luncheon or a dinner, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and it become repayment to you.”

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

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