Seeds for 12/19/2023 - Matthew 22:1-14
Scripture: Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying: “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son. He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused to come.
“Then he sent some more servants and said, ‘Tell those who have been invited that I have prepared my dinner: My oxen and fattened cattle have been butchered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding banquet.’
“But they paid no attention and went off—one to his field, another to his business. The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them. The king was enraged. He sent his army and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.
“Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come. So go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.’ So the servants went out into the streets and gathered all the people they could find, the bad as well as the good, and 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 wedding clothes. He asked, ‘How did you get in here without wedding clothes, friend?’ The man was speechless.
“Then the king told the attendants, ‘Tie him hand and foot, and throw him outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
“For many are invited, but few are chosen.”
Observation: The king prepares a great wedding banquet for his son and invites many, as we would expect. Strangely, those at the top of the guest list refused to attend. It was no great priority for them. Who would do this to the king? Not only did they refuse to come, they seized the servants who were sent to invite them, then abuse and kill them. Clearly, this parable is parallel to the one Jesus just told indicting the Jewish people’s religious leaders. They refused to respond to the prophets’ warning and pleading, and even killed them though they were sent to try and turn them around.
One of the messages within this parable is that God’s judgment is always in the context of many invitations to come to the feast, many attempts to reconcile and bring the hard-headed and stiff-necked people around. The invitation was extended to those on the original guest list (the Israelites, the people of the promise) and then to everyone else too (the Gentiles). The king’s invitation was extended broadly and generously. It was the invitees who determined whether or not they partook of the king’s gracious provision.
Likewise, there’s a similar dynamic with the the man discovered without wedding clothes who was thrown out. An invitation calls for a certain response. An invitation to a wedding banquet assumes that one will arrive dressed for the occasion. Many are called, but few are chosen. In these examples, those who are not chosen seem to have chosen that path by their own response to the king’s invitation, whether refusing it or ignoring what sort of invitation it is.
What shall we do with an invitation to the King’s table? Come! Come to the banquet, for He wants it to be full. What shall we wear? “Clothe yourselves with Christ…” “dressed in His righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne.”
Application:
What do you observe people placing above responding to God’s invitation in Christ?
What else might the Holy Spirit be speaking with you about in the text today?
Prayer: Lord, dress me in the righteousness of Christ. Fill my heart with joy and anticipation for the heavenly kingdom banquet. Amen.
“But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hears the word and understands it. This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.” (Matthew 13:23)
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