We have all been invited to a wedding or a function. On the invitations, you are told what the dress code will be.
So… have you ever stood in front of your cupboard, before a wedding or function, and say, “Now, what am I going to wear?” For many people, this is a daunting task - as if it were a matter of life and death. Especially for ladies… the worst thing that could happen to a lady at a function, is for someone to be wearing the same dress as you! (Inge tells me, “not if you make it look better”). And yes, guys aren’t that much different, are we?
What are you wearing?
We all want to look the best and feel like we stand out – in a good way. We all subscribe to our own fashion style. It’s part of our identity.
I love watching people to see how they react to situations. Especially, when it comes to fashion sense.
This is what I mean, for example: when I walk in the mall I love looking at the faces of the people I walk past.
A classic for me; is when I watch two people walk past each other and both are scoping the other one out – up and down - at what the other one is wearing. And it’s all done in “secrecy”? Almost all the time, everyone is looking at what someone else is wearing.
Over time fashion changes. Some change with it, others don’t. However, one principle remains… what we wear says a lot about who we are.
Now you may be asking, "what on earth does what we wear have anything to do with Christianity." Well, let’s have a look and find out.
Text: Matthew 22:1 – 14.
Context: (commentaries info used).
- Matthew is the writer of this Gospel - written for the Jews to prove to them that Jesus was the Messiah. That’s important to know because Jesus uses imagery and terms that the Jews will understand.
- Jesus is in Jerusalem, days away from being arrested, teaching in the Temple Courts. The Herodians, Sadducees and Pharisees have gathered around Jesus and are questioning him. They’ve asked (chapter 21) “Who gave you the authority to teach?”
- Jesus then answers them with three parables about the Kingdom of God, telling them who will enter the kingdom and who wouldn’t make it.
- At the end of the second parable, we read… (to set the tone) – they were looking for ways to arrest Jesus.
WARNING: THIS PARABLE IS LOADED. YOU ARE GOING TO BE BOMBED WITH INFORMATION!
1 Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying:
2 “The kingdom of heaven is like a king who prepared a wedding banquet for his son.
- King is God.
- Son is Jesus.
- Wedding Banquet = celebrating a ceremony of unity. Two become one. A union is taking place. Between whom?
3 He sent his servants to those who had been invited to the banquet to tell them to come, but they refused to come.
4 “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.’
- In this culture, two invitations were expected. 1st - to invite the guests, and; 2nd - to tell them that everything was ready for them to attend.
- Notice here how this King has invited the people three times. The terminology in the two accounts ‘had been’ and ‘have been’, indicates that they had already been invited. These two accounts are the follow up invitations.
- The King is persistent in his inviting. This tells us that the Kings is serious about having people coming to the banquet – where EVERYTHING has been taken care of.
- Jesus is telling the Jews that they were the first to be invited, as God’s chosen people, but they want nothing to do with it… check it out…
5 “But they paid no attention and went off—one to his field, another to his business.
6 The rest seized his servants, mistreated them and killed them.
7 The king was enraged. He sent his army and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.
- · JESUS’ PROPHECY came true 40 years after he told this parable. (& Jesus prophesied in Matthew 24)
“Jewish historian, Flavius Josephus was present in Jerusalem when the city was captured and the Temple was burnt. He described the event in this manner: “On the 10th of August, in A.D. 70 -- the 9th of Av -- in Jewish reckoning, the very day when the King of Babylon burned the Temple in 586 B.C., the Temple was burned again. Titus took the city and put it to the torch, burning the Temple.
The prediction of Jesus with regard to the city and the Temple were now fulfilled.” (http://www.templemount.org/destruct2.html)
- This is a real life event that tells us that this parable is not just a simple story, but what Jesus is telling us is the truth and will come true.
8 “Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding banquet is ready, but those I invited did not deserve to come.
9 Go to the street corners and invite to the banquet anyone you find.’
10 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.
- Anyone = Gentiles: Good and Bad alike.
- Were the Gentiles only invited because the Jews declined the invitations? NO! “It was a custom among the Jews, when a rich man had a feast, to go out and invite all destitute travellers.”[i]
- Jesus says this to illustrate that the multitudes will comes together, good and bad alike, to form the visible Church of Christ.
- So everyone is part of God’s salvation plan…
- What are we all gathered for? Judgement day…
11 “But when the king came in to see the guests(Judgement day), he noticed a man there who was not wearing wedding clothes.
12 ‘Friend,’ he asked, ‘how did you get in here without wedding clothes?’ The man was speechless.
13 “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.’
14 “For many are invited, but few are chosen.”
Wait a minute! If the invitation is for everyone, then why is this king throwing this person out? Isn’t He contradiction himself? He invites everyone and then he throws someone out, because he is dressed differently?
Also weddings were held at night and The hall would be illuminated. So when being chucked out, you would have been thrown into the dark ad he was tied up to remove all power from him. Isn’t the king merciless, graceless and cruel now?
The answer is 'no'. It may seem like it but it’s not.
- According to Jewish custom those days, when you arrived at a wedding, you were given a wedding cloak to wear. This would have been given to you at the door; you put it on and then you would enter. So everyone would be dresses the same. If a person did not wear the robe, it was seen as an insult to the host. Then that person would no longer be welcome at the wedding.
So what happened here was, that the person who wore something different was insulting the King and did NOT accept the Gift. That’s why he had to be removed. That’s why he had to be punished.
Remember, the imagery that Jesus is using is what the Jews are very familiar with. If we didn’t know that, this parable would not make sense to us.
Zephaniah 1:8 “On the day of the Lord’s sacrifice I will punish the officials and the king’s sons and all those clad in foreign clothes.”
You see, in order to be in the presence of God, you need to wear the wedding cloak. But, am I literally talking about our physical clothes? Nope.
What Jesus is talking about here is a spiritual cloak that we wear. It’s not something that we can acquire ourselves. As we have learnt from this parable, it has to be given to us, as a gift, and it’s only thing that can keep us in the banquet - And we have ALL been invited to the banquet.
It’s called the cloak of righteousness (sounds like something out of harry potter, doesn’t it?). It’s a figure of speech describes receiving and wearing the righteousness of God. No one can be in the presence of God in eternity unless they have the righteousness of God.
But there problem is, we are sinners.
Original sin: Adam and Eve were in union with God, but they sinned and were cast out of the presence of God. Then a huge dividing wall, called sin, was erected between us and God. God one side = Holy. Us on the other = unholy.
No matter what we do ourselves, we will never be righteous in the eyes of God. Righteous means; we must do everything right according to God’s standards all the time. We stick to God’s rules and follow God every second. Then we might be righteous. Is that possible? Nope, we are sinners.
The guy who was thrown out in the parable, refused to put on the cloak of righteousness. The gift would have been offered to him, but he did his own thing and wanted to wear his own brand of righteousness – not the righteousness of God.
And he must have been a really good guy on earth because he found himself in the banquet hall. He must have done all the right things, especially in obeying the law of God – just as the Pharisees were trying to do. But when the time came for the Lord to judge, no matter what he did in his lifetime would ever be good enough. Only the people who are wearing the cloak of righteousness are considered good enough to stay.
So then, if we are sinners, what do we do? What’s the solution?
The solution is in this parable:
- You have been invited to the wedding banquet of the Son, Jesus Christ.
- Whose wedding is it? It’s the union between God to humankind - Between God and you.
- How is that union possible? Through a gift, God has given you! His Son, Jesus Christ who died for your sins.
- 2 Corinthians 5:21) For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.
- Only through Jesus can we become the righteousness of God.
- We need the cloak of Righteousness. So how do we receive it?
- Romans 3:22 “the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe.”
- When we believe, through faith, we are given the Holy Spirit who helps us in righteous living. We put on the Cloak of righteousness.
HOW do you do this?
Accept the invitation = accept Jesus as your Lord and Saviour. God is inviting you to an eternal banquet.
God still invites today. He sent His servants out in Jesus’ day, and He sends His servants out today. I am one of them handing you an invitation. And if you are a Christian, then, you too, are a servant who has to go out to invite others to the eternal banquet of Jesus Christ. I hope you are doing it.
What we wear says a lot about who we are.
May you not wear your own brand of righteousness; May you accept the invitation to be wear glory of Jesus; And may you live as the righteousness of God.
God has taken care of everything!
[i] (Clarke, 1976 p. 812)
