October
12, 2008
Doug Clay
Proper 14A - RCL
To
read the lessons for the day click here:
http://www.io.com/~kellywp/YearA_RCL/Pentecost/AProp23_RCL.html
Wedding
Banquet
Lord,
we pray that your grace may always precede and follow us, that we may
continually be given to good works; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now
and for ever. Amen.
Once more Jesus spoke to the people in parables, saying: "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son. He sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding banquet, but they would not come. Again he sent other slaves, saying, `Tell those who have been invited: Look, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready; come to the wedding banquet.' But they made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business, while the rest seized his slaves, mistreated them, and killed them. The king was enraged. He sent his troops, destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. Then he said to his slaves, `The wedding is ready, but those invited were not worthy. Go therefore into the main streets, and invite everyone you find to the wedding banquet.' Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered all whom they found, both good and bad; so the wedding hall was filled with guests.
"But when the king came in to see the guests, he noticed a man there who was not wearing a wedding robe, and he said to him, `Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding robe?' And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, `Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.' For many are called, but few are chosen."
Parables
are puzzles, and in the Gospels we have many parables told by Jesus to his
followers. Jesus didn't use these puzzling stories simply to entertain or to
perplex his audiences, or even give them games to play. Parables are more like
pieces of string that have been rolled up into a ball. On the surface they may
seem to be simple stories but actually they contain deeper meaning and can
often be understood on multiple levels. A parable is a story at whose heart lies a metaphor. Jesus used the language of parable because
he was speaking of things that were intangible, of things not readily visible, he
had the difficult task of making the unseen, seen.
The
meanings contained in Jesus’ parables were initially left covered by the
ordinary scenes in the stories. Even the disciples had difficulty
understanding, and more than once asked Jesus to explain them. Understanding
them can be difficult. It takes work. The prophet Sirach
praised those people who "penetrate the subtleties of parables," and are
"at home with their obscurities."
A
minister once wrote, "Only the poetic imagination can understand the
Bible. Like unsolved puzzles, the meaning of parables can lie hidden in the
mind. Hindrances to our understanding abound-like bars on a door or locks on a
gate. But one does remain curious about what lies on the other side.
One
of the things that bars us from entrance through the
door of meaning is our attempt to interpret the meaning of the parables as
though the stories are meant to be understood literally.
Today
in Matthew’s Gospel, we have the strange story of the king who held a wedding
banquet for his son. The invited guests would not come, so the king sent
his slaves out to bring people in from the street. Now we might think that
this is just a strange, rude, unkind man, full of himself and his power as
king. We might think this is just an odd story, if it weren’t for the
opening sentence of this passage: “Once more Jesus spoke to the people in
parables, saying: ‘the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a
wedding banquet for his son.’”
“The
kingdom of heaven may be compared to….” We can get the part about the
kingdom of heaven being like a wedding banquet. It is a joyous occasion to have
a wedding and it is an occasion that is meant to be shared with the community
with all our friends and families. In this way the story starts out in a normal
enough way, but quickly takes a strange turn when the invited guests refuse to
attend the party. This is unexpected behavior. We can understand
the connection between the kingdom of heaven and people being invited in from
the streets. On an outward level it is easy for us to see that the king is
likened to God as the Father and the son likened to Christ: those who would not
come are the Jews who were originally the chosen guests but did not accept him
as the messiah—this makes sense to us. This is a simple understanding but
not particularly morally edifying.
And
this does not take into account the unexpected behavior of the king toward one
of the guests. This man isn’t dressed in appropriate wedding
clothes. So the king has him bound and thrown out into the
darkness. What does this say about the kingdom of heaven? One explanation I found was that “it may have
been the custom for a host to provide the guests with wedding garments. This
would have been necessary for the guests at this banquet in particular, as they
had been literally rounded-up and brought directly from the streets. The
failure of this man to avail himself of the garments provided would be a
refusal to participate fully in the banquet and would be seen as a rejection
and an insult to the host who had made the special clothing available. The
guests were expected to fully participate in the feast not be there as spectators.
Bible
parables can make us uncomfortable. We don’t know how to interpret the stories
of the God talking about destroying his people, or these strange, confusing stories
told by Jesus. We usually ignore them, or try to find some way to explain
them away. But there is a way of understanding them—by not taking them
literally but by seeking the meaning within. This is the way Jesus
challenges our preconceived ideas about what God’s kingdom is like because we
cannot know for certain in what form it exists. This means only that we
are human and our knowledge and our understanding are limited. But if we
are open to God’s Spirit, if we listen and pay attention, we can catch glimpses
here and there of the kingdom.
Coming back to our parable, we notice that the wedding in not
cancelled because the invited guests would not come to the banquet. No, the
wedding and the feast went on as scheduled. Only the guest list was changed.
God does not alter God's plans because of the indifference of
human beings. God does not withdraw the feast. On a personal level this story
lets us know that the choice is up to us. We accept or reject the invitation to
joy. The feast is still there for those who would come to the banquet, who
would honor the invitation.
But most of us have other things to think about. We have work to
do. We have our jobs. We don't have time to read about the faith, to worship
with others, to serve others; we have work to do. In
the gospel of Luke, who also tells this parable, the excuses are more specific:
the purchase of land, the purchase of animals, and a marriage. The first two
made sense in an agricultural society, of course. They dealt with work, with
physical survival. Land had to be tilled, oxen had to be fed. The example of
marriage gets even closer to where we live. We cannot even use our families,
our dearest and nearest, as an excuse for staying away from the Kingdom. No
excuse is acceptable when the offering is a matter of life and death. Our
spiritual survival is at stake. Yet, we find excuses and are attracted by the
affairs of the world more than by the needs of the spirit.
"The world is too much with us," the poet said. We are
consumed by commerce; our lives are too busy and cluttered; too noisy to hear
the invitation to a banquet of joy. And when we are reminded of it, we are
embarrassed. We have found other things to occupy our time and consume our
energy. When we are asked to take time to pray, to think, to learn God's truth,
to share it with others, to focus on what is of eternal importance instead of
on temporary needs, we make light of it. The cares of this world loom much
greater than the cares of the Kingdom.
But listen to what
And that brings us to the paradox of this invitation to a
banquet of joy. Turning our back to the cares of the world in order to go to
the banquet, in order to focus our minds on God, is not achieved because we are
already good and holy. The Matthew passage tells us that the servants invited
both those who were good and those who were bad. They were invited not because
they had done something to deserve the invitation but because of the generosity
of the King.
But
the story doesn't end there. It seems surprising, and a bit unreasonable, that
after handing out invitations indiscriminately, the king rejects one man for
not being appropriately dressed. After all, he had sent his servants out into
the streets to invite all persons. I've been to functions, where, after I had
arrived, I realized I wasn't appropriately dressed. It's not a comfortable
feeling. Fortunately, I've never been thrown out as a result!
And
if this is a story about the
Perhaps
his point is that there are still certain standards we must fulfill if we are
to enter the kingdom. The wedding guests, the guests at the heavenly banquet will
show they have been righteous and just in their dealings with others. They will
have been good stewards. They will have used their God-given gifts responsibly
and well not to earn a place at the table but because a thorough appreciation
of the invitation naturally compels these active responses.
Perhaps
the man without the wedding garment was like someone today, who heard the
Gospel but had not put on the garment of love God gives us. Perhaps after
hearing the Gospel, he had not "put on" the new life of generosity,
and faithfulness God asks of us.
Once
we have heard the good news of Jesus Christ, we have been chosen by God for a
new life of love. Therefore, we should dress in the wardrobe God has selected
for us: compassion, kindness, humility, quiet strength, discipline. We are to
be even tempered, content with second place, and quick to forgive an offense.
But most importantly, we are to wear love as our "all-purpose
garment." We should never be without it. Having done all that, we are to
cultivate thankfulness and generosity that are naturally aligned with love.
Perhaps
the man without the wedding garment is trying to get by only as a spectator not
a participant in the joyous occasion who fully appreciates the gift of the
invitation to this banquet
Many
of us do not fully appreciate the offertory words "All things come of
thee, O Lord, and of thine own have we given thee." We do not believe them
or do not pay attention to the words we are saying. We think everything we have
is ours. We are into control. We think all we have is ours. And our money is
one of our possessions we most wanted to hang onto and to control.
An
understanding of the true meaning of stewardship can help us deal with some of
these control issues. By understanding stewardship we and begin to acknowledge
that everything we have is a gift from God. Then, we can understand how to
express our thanks to God for the incredible gifts with which we are entrusted.
We will begin to understand a critically important discipline in our quest to become
the people God had created us to be. We will begin to understand how giving a
percentage of our gifts back thankfully as an offering is
an essential discipline for them in our journey. We participate in the joy and experience
the spiritual wholeness that our relationship with God brings into our lives.
It may occur that perhaps the tithe is an essential discipline for us also.
As
we became tithers, both in spirit and in fact, the
tithe became not a burden, as some think disciplines are, it will become a way
to become the person we have always wanted to be. It may lead us from being
controlling persons with high needs to hold onto what we have, to becoming the
generous people God wants us to be. For the first time in our lives we may
experience the true joy of giving. We may learn that giving is not a duty, it
is not a burden, it is not something we ought to do or should do, it may become something we want to do because it draws us
closer to Jesus Christ. We may sense we are becoming more like the person God
created us to be. We may sense we are becoming not only a more thankful people,
but a more loving people. The gospel, the good news of Jesus Christ, may truly
become part of our lives in a new and wonderful way. We may experience the joy
of putting on the garment of love which God provides for each of us if we will
but accept God's invitation. We may begin to experience the promises God makes
to each one of us.
This
is a life of stewardship. This is a lifestyle, an attitude of generosity and
love. It is a lifestyle in which we are using all the gifts God has so
generously given us to do the "good works" God expects of us. Let us
ensure that every detail of our lives, our words, our actions, all we do, are
done in the name of Jesus, thanking God, our creator and the giver of all good
gifts, every step of the way.
This is responding
affirmatively to the invitation to join in the joyous wedding feast. This is
putting on the wedding garments provided for us and this is fully participating
in the spiritual life God desires for us.
How many of us are hesitating still because of fear that
attending the feast will make too many demands upon our time? How barren the
heart feels outside this banquet hall. How much we would miss of companionship
and of the peace that passes understanding!
Why should we reject such an invitation? Let us hurry to the
banquet. Let us sing with Isaiah,
It will be said on that day,
Lo, this is our God; we have waited for him,
so that he might save us.
This is the Lord for whom we have waited;
Let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation. (Isaiah 25:9)
adapted from Sermons that Work (Katerina Whitley, The
Rev. Kathleen L Wakefiield, Mr. Craig Canfield, Dr.
Diane M. Porter