the good news is… all are invited
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There is Still Room | Lauren Wright Pittman
Digital drawing with collage
ARTIST STATEMENT
This image is meant to be viewed from the center, moving outward. The host sets a table,¹ with arms stretched wide in welcome. Surrounding this initial invitation, the first invitees form a ring of rejection around the host—arms crossed, closed off, and distracted by their material wealth and status. One surveys their vast vineyard, another counts their livestock, and the third navigates the economics of joining two households.
Trees, rooted in the central scene of the guestless table,² break through the ring of rejection. The next layer includes four figures—with the host’s same open-armed posture—extending welcome to people in neighborhoods, markets, and communal spaces. In the parable, the initial invitation is cast more broadly; everyone is welcome despite any status or condition that might typically isolate them from community. The invited reject, but the rejected are embraced. In the art, the welcoming branches of the tree bear good fruit.³ The invitation continues to grow and flourish despite all the worldly barriers that would keep us apart and isolated. In the final ring, a crowd is gathered around an even larger table, one that still has open seats.⁴
It can be easy to focus on what feels negative in this text, but in order for the invitation to truly be an invitation, it cannot be coercive. There must always be the option to decline the invitation, and even that is good news. Still, the deeper good news is this: the host never stops inviting, and when all is said and done, there is still room at the table.
Written by Rev. Lauren Wright Pittman
LOOK
Look closely at all the people in the outermost ring of the image. What do you notice about the empty seats?
1 The center of the table holds Communion elements, which serve as a nod to the storyteller of the parable and an allusion to Christ’s ever-expanding welcome.
2 I placed a photograph of soil as the ground upon which the central table sits. This crumbly dirt texture represents how this open invitation is fertile ground for the good news to take root.
3 The tree is also a visual reference to the Tell Me Something Good logo, which includes abstract people forming the branches of a tree.
4 The final green ring holds the texture of the leaves of a healthy, thriving tree.