Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen
The text for this meditation is written in the 22nd Chapter of the Gospel according to St Matthew: Verses 1 - 14:
And again Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying, 2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son, 3 and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come. 4 Again he sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.” ’ 5 But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. 7 The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city. 8 Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’ 10 And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.
11 “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment. 12 And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14 For many are called, but few are chosen.”
In order to understand the parable in today’s Gospel, it is very helpful to understand the context of the culture of the day … especially the context of royal wedding customs. I Jesus’ parable, the wedding feast in the parable is the king’s feast given in honour of the wedding of the prince. The king has all the resources of the kingdom at his disposal … the best food … the best entertainment. The king might even have his best architects and builders build a whole new building just for the feast. The feast lasted many days and so the servants of the king prepared the best lodging for the wedding guests. Money is no object.
One of the things a king would do for wedding guests is provide a fashion spa for the guests when they arrived. The king understood that travel was hard work in those days. People would arrive exhausted and dirty. The difficulty of travel might even make them a little grumpy. The king provided facilities for refreshment … manicures … pedicures … fashion designers and expert tailors … everything a guest needed to look and feel their best when they entered the banquet hall. The king wanted everyone and everything to be perfect in order to honour the wedding of his son, the prince. This is one aspect of the culture of the parable that will help us understand it.
The other thing about the culture of that day has more to do with the simple fact that they did not have the same attitude about time that we do. We have digital wrist watches that can tell us the exact time. We have mobile phones and all other kinds of instant communication. At the time of the parable, even writing was expensive. Most communication was done orally, face-to-face. If you were important, like a king, you had servants do the communicating, but the communication was still a personal, oral communication.
This meant that there were always two invitations to a party. The first invitation was to inform everyone that plans were under way. This is the invitation that had the RSVP. Those who could attend would reply that they were coming. The second invitation informed the guests that everything was ready for them to come to the party. The people who received this second invitation had already promised to come. It was an incredible insult to excuse yourself after you had already promised to attend. Turning down the second invitation of the king was treason. Mistreating the servants who brought the second invitation was an act of war.
Jesus used these customs to illustrate His teaching about who enters the Kingdom of Heaven and who does not. This parable demonstrates the overwhelming generosity of God the Father and His justice. It also demonstrates the cruel insanity of those who reject the gift of salvation. The king is God the Father. The wedding feast is eternal life. The servants are God’s prophets, apostles, and pastors. Those who were invited and refused are the rank unbelievers. The travellers on the highways who were both bad and good are those ordinary people with no claim to entitlement, but who are at the wedding solely by the grace and mercy of God. The guest who was not dressed properly is a hypocrite. His name is on the church membership roll but he rejects the gifts of God.
So, what does this parable say to us today? Why is it important for us to hear this parable? It is very easy for us to look through the pages of the Old Testament and see the many ways that people rejected the prophets. We hear how the people put the prophets in prison, drove them out of their homes, and put them to death, and we rightly condemn such activity. We hear that of the original twelve apostles, only John died of old age. All the others died martyrs’ deaths. We wonder at such cruelty and once again, condemn it. It is very easy to point a finger of condemnation at people who lived long ago and far away, but what about you and me. What does Jesus say to us today?
Jesus used the man who refused the wedding clothes to warn you and me today. Regularly each week we gather in the wedding hall of the king. How are we dressed?
Imagine what this man had to do to get into the wedding hall without the right clothes. When he arrived, the servants of the king came to him and offered to clean him up and heal his wounds. They offered him clothing that was just the right style for the feast. They wanted to give him everything he needed to fully enjoy the wedding banquet of the king. The servants offered it all and he refused. He insisted on doing things his way instead of the king’s way. He insisted on wearing his clothes instead of the king’s clothes. He entered the wedding hall, but rejected the gifts of the king.
Trained and Ordained Priests and Pastors in the mainstream denominational Christian Church on earth are the servants of God. When they open up God’s Word, they offer the best of heavenly style. It is called the righteousness of Christ. It is a very expensive style. Jesus had to buy this style with His holy, precious blood, and His innocent suffering and death. The heavenly style is the righteousness that Jesus earned for us with His suffering and death on the cross. The righteousness of Jesus Christ is the only style that is elegant enough for eternal life. It is the only style that the true servants of God can offer to you.
As a servant of Christ, the priest’s / pastor’s role is to remove the filthy fashion of sin and clothe us in the heavenly style … the robes of Christ’s righteousness. To put that in modern context; within the Worship service we humble ourselves before God and confess that we are sinners in what we have done and in what we have failed to do. In response to this, the Priests / Pastor by virtue of their office of the servant of God’s Word, cleanses us of our sin with Christ’s forgiveness and clothes us with the robe of righteousness in the pronouncement of the Holy Absolution.
On receiving absolution, we can rejoice together at this great gift from our king by using the words of Isaiah the prophet. [Isaiah 61:10] “I will greatly rejoice in the Lord; my soul shall exult in my God, for he has clothed me with the garments of salvation; he has covered me with the robe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decks himself like a priest with a beautiful headdress, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.”
Sadly, Jesus teaches that there are those who reject the style of heaven. Jesus says that there will always be some in the banquet hall of heaven who insist on wearing their own clothes … their clothes of arrogance, narcissism, self-righteousness, adultery, hatred, and so forth. The old sinful nature insists that he is good enough. He has no sin. He does not need the heavenly style of the righteousness of Christ. His style is just fine. “Besides,” the old sinful nature will say, “A loving god doesn’t really send people to hell.”
Jesus tells it differently. The party crasher may have been able to fool the servants, but the servants are not the ultimate judge. We must all stand before almighty God. There is but one verdict for those who trust themselves and refuse the clothing of the righteousness of Christ. The king said to the attendants, “Bind him hand and foot and cast him into the outer darkness. In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
Those who reject Christ, reject salvation. Those who in any way depend on their own efforts for even the smallest fraction of their salvation will meet the king and He will order them out of the wedding hall.
It is a different story for those found in the road. The Holy Spirit works through His servants to bring them to the wedding hall and wash away all their sins. Through His servants He covers them with the righteousness of Christ … the righteousness earned on the cross. The day will come when they, like Christ, will rise from the dead and enter into the wedding feast of the Lamb. There they will receive the fulfilment of Isaiah 25: 7-8 :On this mountain the Lord of hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wine, of rich food full of marrow, of aged wine well refined. And he will swallow up on this mountain the covering that is cast over all peoples, the veil that is spread over all nations. He will swallow up death forever; and the Lord God will wipe away tears from all faces, and the reproach of his people he will take away from all the earth, for the Lord has spoken. They will rejoice at the eternal wedding feast of the Lamb. Amen
The love and peace of our Great Triune God that is beyond all human understanding, keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen
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