Matthew 22:1-14

The Parable of the Wedding Banquet: Grace and Judgment

by Pastor Jim Lincoln on August 19, 2007

I love the way Jesus speaks about God. Some speak of God as an angry, vindictive, joyless being. I read about a minister who was fired because he spoke too much about hell. When the bishop interviewed the congregation they said that it wasn't that he spoke on hell that troubled them; it was the fact the he enjoyed it so much.

On the other hand there are those who see God as a nice guy, safe, tame, and obligated to forgive everyone except perhaps the most notorious of criminals. In this view, God is way too nice to have anything to do with the horrific realities of hell Jesus spoke of. Heinrich Heine the 19 c. German poet said of God's forgiveness, "C'est son me'tier." He has to forgive everyone. "That is His job."

The trouble of course with both of these views is that standing alone, neither submits to the teachings of Jesus. Jesus offers us a picture of God that declares Him as the most gracious, generous, kind, glad, merciful and inviting of all beings. At the same time God declares that there is an eternal judgment and wrath for those who reject His grace. Jesus says in our parable that it's the outer darkness. Hell is a very cold place. C.S. Lewis wrote that hell is, "Endless autobiography." The ability to love, enjoy God's gifts is frozen.

In our parable of the wedding banquet Jesus puts these two attributes of God -His grace and His judgment- side by side and compromises neither. I want us to consider three things Jesus says about the kingdom of heaven in this parable. The first has to do with what He says about the nature of heaven. The second is about who gets invited or summoned and the third thing He says is about the various responses people give to the king's kind invitation. We'll close with the good news of the gospel that is evident in the wedding clothes the king provides for his guests.

First, let's think about for what Jesus said the kingdom of heaven is like. If you grew up hearing anything about the kingdom of heaven you may have been given the idea that God was the kind of a king who made sure that folks didn't have too much fun in heaven. I don't know if our ministers meant to imply this. Inadvertently they did. The ministers in my home church were grey heads and they spoke of heaven as a place where you relaxed on a cloud playing a harp and singing very old slow and sleepy songs. I think these men were just tired and worn out. So, for them heaven was a place of quiet rest. They pictured heaven as an ethereal place, without substance, a spiritual place and all about spiritual realities. I couldn't imagine why anyone would want to go there. It seems so slow, boring, and dull. I was energetic and active. I wanted to do things, move around, work and play every sport possible.

Along comes Jesus and with this parable. And He says that the kingdom of heaven is like the most extravagant banquet or party that a person may ever enjoy. He says that heaven is like this king who is inviting folks from all around to attend the wedding celebration/feast for his son. He promises to spare no expense. He's made all the preparations and paid for all the food. There's barbecued ribs (beef not pork) from his oxen and medium rare, juicy steaks from his own Black Angus cattle. He provides the very best -organically grown- vegetables. There's music and dancing. It's extravagant and lavish! The kingdom of heaven is a lavish banquet organized, funded, and prepared by the King of Heaven, God. This wasn't a new picture of heaven. Listen to Isa.25:6-9:

6On this mountain the LORD Almighty will prepare
a feast of rich food for all peoples,
a banquet of aged wine--
the best of meats and the finest of wines.¹
7On this mountain he will destroy
the shroud that enfolds all peoples,
the sheet that covers all nations;
8he will swallow up death forever.
The Sovereign LORD will wipe away the tears
from all faces;
he will remove the disgrace of his people
from all the earth.
The LORD has spoken.

9In that day they will say,
"Surely this is our God;
we trusted in him, and he saved us.
This is the LORD, we trusted in him;
let us rejoice and be glad in his salvation."

This is so different than the image of heaven I remember hearing growing up. And of course in the Baptist church that I later attended, verses like these were redacted or aged wine was downgraded to grape juice.

Jesus says that heaven is like a banquet feast where people come together to dance, eat, drink, and celebrate. It's a palpable place. Jesus elsewhere said, "I confer on you a kingdom just as my Father conferred one on me, so that you may eat and drink at my table in my kingdom" (Luke 22:29-30). After his resurrection, Jesus told His disciples, "Come let's eat and have breakfast together." (Jn.21:4). He said, "Many will come from the east and the west, and will take their places at the feast with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven" (Mtt.8:11). And, "Blessed is the man who will eat at the feast in the kingdom of God.

The kingdom of God is a banquet feast, the kind you enjoy at a wedding. The best party Debby and I ever gave was Rebekah's wedding. There was eating, drinking, dancing, gladness, and beauty!

Unlike our wedding celebrations, first century Jewish weddings often lasted a whole week! There was much eating, joy, and dancing. Old men told stories and women prepared meals and enjoyed the glad companionship. They committed themselves to gladness for a whole week. Jesus says that the kingdom of God is a wedding feast.

There is love in the air. It's about a love you don't earn and so it's about a love you cannot loose. Not only that, this is a royal wedding party. The most noble man in the land -the king of the land- has invited everyone to share the covenant love his son has for his bride and her love for him. And of course we know from the rest of Scripture that those who trust in Jesus will come to that wedding feast of the Lamb as His bride and celebrate for all eternity His love for us, His joy over us, and faithfulness to us.

Such is the kingdom of heaven. It's a wedding feast. It may run counter to what you have heard about things religious. It's a fun and glad image and exactly the way we had hoped things would be. Today we get to taste the appetizers. Then, when the kingdom of heaven comes in its fullness, we'll get in on the whole thing. Beloved, be patient! The best is yet to come.

The second thing Jesus tells us about the kingdom of heaven is who is invited to the banquet. The simple answer is, "Everyone." Yes, the invitations do go out in stages. Not everyone gets an invitation at first. The first group receives invitations but, eventually no one is left off the list. Everyone is welcome. The king wants everyone to be there. The parable says, "Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find. So, the servants went out into the street and they gathered all the people they could find both good and bad. And the wedding hall was filled with guests."

People are invited regardless of their financial or social status, regardless of their character, race, gender or age. The riffraff and the outwardly respectable are all invited. This king doesn't care what their social standing is. He just wants to have many people enjoy His generosity, and His joy over His son. A small wedding won't do and He is just not going to be thwarted in this thing. He's full of joy in his heart and delight and he wants others to get in on that gladness.

If he has to drag people in, so be it. He did and the hall was full. Paul says that God wants all men to be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth. He is not stingy with his heart about this. The invitation goes out to everyone.

The custom of the day was that you sent out an initial invitation and eventually as the day approached you sent out a second invitation to let them know things were prepared and ready to go. But notice what is so strange. The guests who were initially invited refused his invitation. What does this king do? Graciously, He sends out a third invitation. In v. 4, He says, "Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner, my oxen, and my fattened livestock are all butchered and everything is ready, come to the wedding feast."

There is a piece of him that doesn't want them to miss out on the feast. Nothing disqualifies anyone from receiving this invitation. You can't say, "You just don't know where I've been or the things I have done. I couldn't possibly receive an invitation." He doesn't send out the invitation with respect to your life record. And you and I are as welcomed, no matter who you are or what you have done, as any other guest. The invitation stands.

The kingdom of heaven is like a banquet feast with eating, drinking, and dancing and where there is a love that never fails. It's offered to everyone who hears irrespective of our backgrounds, who we are or what we have done.

Finally, this morning what did the people do with the king's invitation?

I see four responses: The first two responses are from those guests who were initially invited. In both cases there is a conscious refusal of the invitation. One group responds with simply indifference. Verse 5, "They paid no attention, and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business." They took the invitation lightly. They were too busy to bother with such a thing.

The other group was filled with animosity and hatred. They seized the king's servants and mistreated them and killed them.

Now, we've said that this is an invitation. Our God is an inviting God. I find it amazing that He would be so generous and inviting given the way we have all treated the One to whom we owe our very breath. His graciousness overrides our rebellion and He invites us anyway. But, when the king invites, it's also a summons. This is still the king. He's still the ultimate authority in the land. To refuse the king is to reject His authority.

There is no reason why they should spurn his love and generosity. He's ruled them with grace and generosity. The invitation is an extension of both His authority and His love. Their indifference and their animosity is really an offence against Him.

Many don't get this. They say, "Look, I've got no beef with God. I'm just not interested in His thing. Surely He wouldn't be bothered that I'm not interested in Him?" But He is.

As we said some weeks ago, you have been created by Him and for him. You are a contingent being. You owe the fact that your heart beats this very moment to His doing and will. If He tells it to stop it will stop. You are in his debt for the life you get to enjoy. He is the one who gives you taste buds to taste a thousand different kinds of foods. He is the one who makes it possible for you to get up in the morning and live and move and breathe. He makes it possible for us to enjoy music, art, sports, riding a bicycle, holding a newborn and the love of a wife, husband, sister or brother. Indifference to His invitation is to reject His offer of grace and to set ourselves up over His authority over us. It's to reject Him.

The original sin of our rebellion against God is not always a conscious animosity towards Him. Like the people in the parable, it can show up as simply indifference and even a politely refusing of His invitation. It's saying that God, your creator and sustainer is irrelevant to you.

Yet, both of those responses: indifference and animosity land us outside the banquet and in a heap of trouble as well. Notice that when the king makes His response to these people He doesn't just say, "Fine, be that way." They perish and are thrown into the outer darkness with gnashing of teeth. Those who spurn God's love and turn away from him express the worst kind of ingratitude and contempt to the One who has made us and gives us every breath we take. To turn from Him is to put yourself under His wrath and under His judgment. He destroyed the murderers and destroyed their city. In Luke 14, Jesus says, "None of those invited, who refused to come will taste of my dinner." They just won't.

The third group receives the invitation and they show up and even with them it appears that they are dragged in or compelled in some way to be there. And among this group there is another separation.

One of them came to the wedding and wasn't wearing the appropriate clothes. What separates this final group is the garment or the clothes they are wearing. We're told that the King comes in, He surveys the crowd and as he looks out he sees a man there who was not wearing the appropriate clothes. He goes up to the person, "What's going on here? Why aren't you wearing the wedding clothes?"

At first, reading this seems knit picking and a petty reason for throwing the man out. I've read that in the first century, it was the custom for the king to supply the wedding garments for those who couldn't have afforded them. When Hollywood studios throw a big party the corporate sponsors give gift bags of expensive gifts to the guests. In the first century, it was part of the graciousness of the host to give gifts to guests. One of those gifts would have been the wedding apparel. When the king comes up to him and asks, "What's going on?" The man is speechless. He's thrown out.

What can we make of that wedding garment? It's critical to the parable because it separates those who enjoy the banquet with all its love and blessing from those who live out in the cold.

Now, remember no one got in to the wedding on their own record or their own merit. Admission to the banquet had nothing to do with the person's record. The invitation went out to all. Even those who were initially invited demonstrated that they weren't worthy to be invited. In the second group, both the good and the bad were found among them. Those who were relatively good and those who had no moral character at all were invited. The decision was made irrespective of their worthiness. The major issue here then is, "Will they accept the king's wedding clothes that he provides or will they think they can get in as they are and own their own terms, without accepting His gift?

He seeks them out by His own initiative. He tracks them down. He invites them. He calls them in. He prepares the feast for them. His condition is this; they must let Him dress them in the garments that only He can provide.

If you knew your Scriptures you would get it. The Scriptures repeatedly say that everyone needs the garments of God's righteousness and God's goodness to enter into His kingdom.

When Jacob prepared to reconcile with Esau he told his family. "Put away the foreign gods that are among you, purify yourselves, and change your garments. Gen 35:2-3.

When Joseph reconciled with his brothers, forgave them, accepted them, and loved them he gave them all new garments. Gen 45:22; Benjamin got five new garments. Isaiah wrote,

"I will greatly rejoice in the LORD,
My soul shall be joyful in my God;
For He has clothed me with the garments of salvation,
He has covered me with the robe of righteousness, Isa. 61:10

It's essential that God clothe us with the garments of His righteousness because our garments are stained with sin.

"And all our righteousnesses are like filthy rags." Isa 64:6

When God spoke of His covenant love toward Israel He used the marriage ceremony as the analogy. In Ezk.16, listen to the way He clothed His bride.

8"'Later I passed by, and when I looked at you and saw that you were old enough for love... I gave you my solemn oath and entered into a covenant with you, declares the Sovereign LORD, and you became mine.
... I clothed you with an embroidered dress and put leather sandals on you. I dressed you in fine linen and covered you with costly garments. 11 I adorned you with jewelry: I put bracelets on your arms and a necklace around your neck, 12and I put a ring on your nose, earrings on your ears and a beautiful crown on your head. 13So you were adorned with gold and silver; your clothes were of fine linen and costly fabric and embroidered cloth. Your food was fine flour, honey and olive oil. You became very beautiful and rose to be a queen." Ezek 16:8-13.

The Scriptures made it clear that we all need a garment if we are to stand before God. It must be a garment of His making and not our record. We need the garment of Christ's righteousness. In and of ourselves none deserve to attend His banquet. The only thing that makes us worthy is what Jesus has done for us on our behalf. The thing that allows you to stand before God and to enjoy His presence is the righteousness Jesus achieved for us by His life and death on the cross. Jesus, the one who knew no sin became sin for us that we might be clothed with the righteousness of God. On the cross He took the judgment we deserve in order that we might know the love and favor He alone deserved.

Paul wrote, "Now a righteousness from God apart from the law has been made known. This righteousness from God comes through faith in Jesus Christ to all who believe." The wedding garment is the robe of Christ's righteousness. And we must humble ourselves and say that we can't get in on the banquet of God as we are on our own record. We can only enjoy the feast by humbly accepting His gift of righteousness purchased by Jesus.

Last week, I had to watch as my girls did a lot of the hard work around my yard. Because of a bad arm, I was unable to join in on the hard work. It was humbling to let someone do it for me. It punctured my pride. We also helped friends move into their rental home. I had to watch Mel Terwiliger lift one end of a heavy couch and snake it around the door jams. It was too much for her. While she was doing the heavy lifting I had to stand there and watch. To watch my girls do things for me that I am used to doing for myself was almost too much for my pride to bear.

Yet, when it comes to entering and enjoying the kingdom of heaven the only way we can is to say, "I come with empty and unworthy hands." This is something someone else must merit for me. That someone is the Lord Jesus Christ.

When the prodigal went home to the Father, the first thing the Father said after kissing him and embracing him was, "Quickly, go get the robe." His son stood there wretchedly undone, with the stench of pork manure all over his mucked up clothes. His father wanted his son's shame of living in the pigsty covered immediately. He doesn't worry about his filth ruining his Armani suit. He wants evidence of his son's guilt and shame to be covered as fast as possible. Without delay!

The kingdom of heaven is like a wedding banquet for the king's son. He has prepared everything, the finest of wines, the best of meats and vegetables. He has even offered us the garments of His own righteousness as a gift to be received by faith.

He offers you and me the sweetest deal you will ever receive. Come join the feast! And if this parable gets through to us, others will see the essence of our faith in all its beauty, gladness, and grace. Jesus said, "Many are called, few are chosen." Will you give yourself to Him? Will you receive the invitation with joy and gladness? Will you receive and rejoice in the righteousness of Christ which is made your very own when you received it with empty hands? Will you let Him dress you with the robes of Jesus' righteousness? If you have not, do so today. The kingdom of heaven is a wedding banquet for the King's son.