Fr. Troy Beecham
Sermon, Proper 23 A 2023
Matthew 22:1-14
“Once more Jesus spoke to them 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.”
This is the third parable of Jesus in a row as recorded in the Gospel according to St. Matthew about the kingdom of heaven. Given the teaching of the prophets, those Jewish listeners who heard Jesus’ parable would have readily associated a festive meal with the celebration of God’s covenant people after the Day of Judgement. This parable falls under the category of the “hard sayings” of Jesus because in it he unflinchingly speaks about judgement and punishment, and we 21st century Western folks find it difficult to think in such ways. We have been taught to perceive Jesus, and God the Father, as being our buddy, a laid-back self-help guru who only wants us to be nice to each other. Being nice to each other is certainly a laudable thing, but when we cast Jesus in such a non-Scriptural role it can obscure, or completely eliminate, the clarity of Jesus when he speaks about judgement and punishment. We must also remember that he preached this parable only days before his crucifixion. Knowing how little time he had left, Jesus pulls no punches, but rather pleads with us to be changed and made ready for what is to come.
One particular criticism of Jesus in this parable is that it sounds harsh to our ears, and the punishments seem disproportionate to the crime. For his contemporaries, this language sounded like the realities of their lives, even appropriate, and some took pleasure in hearing about the just punishment of the wrong-doers. They heard their own prejudices affirmed: all the “bad” people, the “wrong type of people” were getting their just punishments. As much as we like to think that we have matured out of seeing God as Judge, we today are just as happy when we hear how our enemies are going to “get what’s coming to them”. I see it in print daily as we judge each other over our responses to the political and social issues of the moment, the absolute glee as each side fantasizes about how their enemies are going to suffer when their side wins or loses. To be clear, there are some political ideologies that are profoundly evil and must be confronted as being wholly incompatible with Biblical, orthodox/catholic Christianity. In particular, the Leftist ideologies of the last century, socialism/communism being the most evil, which, in the course of overturning and destroying from within multiples cultures, are directly responsible for the deaths of 22% of the human population of the 20th century. It has been in full view over the last few years, and this week, with violent protests, anti-Jewish hatred, the looting and burning in cities, all displayed before us and lauded by mainstream media. The continuing scourge of Leftist ideology continues to plague our nation and the world. We must pray that God would deliver us from the evils of the anti-life, anti-freedom ideology. Even so, we can make no spiritual progress without the willingness to look at our secret desire for the judgement of others and the desire for a wrathful God when it comes to our enemies.
But is that all there is to be seen in this parable? Can God only be a wrathful enforcer of arbitrary rules on the one hand or the indulgent, doting father who cannot see that his children are anything other than wonderful on the other? God, Jesus teaches us, is much more than either of these extremes. Let’s look further into the parable to see why.
The parallel to this parable as recounted in the Gospel according to St. Luke follows a dinner at the home of a Pharisee, whom Jesus challenges to invite those who cannot repay his hospitality: the “the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind”. It is more than mere hospitality and money that is being examined here. To share a meal with the cripples, the lame, and the blind would render the Pharisee unclean according to his understanding of the Torah. This is no simple thing, but literally an issue of the Pharisee being in right relationship with God. Jesus challenges him to see that his understanding of the Torah is clouded, and so is his soul, with the prejudices of his time. His slow, or complete lack of, response is entirely understandable. How easily could any of us be told that the core of our beliefs is wrong, have been wrong, for centuries, and that our right standing with God is in jeopardy because of our inability, or unwillingness, to have our beliefs challenged and redirected in a new way? This is no less true for a culture as for an individual. Change is difficult, especially around our core beliefs about God, ourselves, and each other.
But change is at the heart of Jesus’ proclamation of the coming of the kingdom of God. We all of us are called to be changed, or using biblical language to repent, and to be open to God in ways that usually challenge and frighten us. Allowing the Holy Spirit to come and transform us from within is frightening when you think about the consequences of a truly transformed life. Jesus uses the language of being born again, being born anew, born from above. We must be born again, a throughgoing and wholesale transformation of our values, our core beliefs, and our conditioned loves and hatreds. Anything less is to show up, as the parable says, to the banquet wearing the wrong robes.
There’s a contemporary parable in the Talmud:
A king who summoned his servants to a banquet, but did not appoint a day or a time. Now kings can be unpredictable: one day merciful, another wrathful. The wise invitees dropped all that they were doing, got dressed in their best, and sat at the door of the palace to await the pleasure of the king. They said to themselves “It may not look like a banquet is being prepared, but this is the palace of the great king! He can order a banquet at any moment and his will shall be done!” The foolish invitees went about their daily lives, saying to themselves “We will wait until we hear that preparations are being made, and the we will bathe, clothe ourselves in finery, and present ourselves to the palace of the great king.” Without warning, the king ordered his servants to prepare a banquet immediately, to open the doors and escort his invitees into the feast. The wise ones entered into the presence of the king, prepared and adorned in their finery, but the foolish ones hurried to the palace and entered the presence of the king unbathed, clothes in dirty work clothes, totally unprepared even though they had been told to prepare for the banquet by the servants of the king. The king warmly received the wise, who entered rejoicing, but with the fools he was angry. Then the king proclaimed “Those who heeded my invitation, prepared themselves and waiting for me cleansed and dressed in finery, let them be seated with me and rejoice with me. But those foolish ones, cast them out, confiscate their lands, and let them be placed in chains!”
Kings are unpredictable. They keep their own counsel and answer to only themselves. It is entirely their decision as to when they will open the doors of the kingdom and set out a feast. But the king’s son, Jesus, and his servants, the prophets and the apostles, have proclaimed the invitation of the king. To refuse to come, to refuse a king’s command, is treason; to kill his son or his servants amounts to insurrection, so the king will send his troops, his angels, to put down the rebellion. We have been invited. We are awaiting the command of the king. How have we responded? Have we allowed the Holy Spirit to enter into our lives to transform us? Have we welcomed the Son, our Savior Jesus, into our souls so that we might be born again and clothed in the robes of his righteousness? Have we dropped everything to await the Day of the Lord at the doors of the kingdom, ready to enter when God calls for the end of time and the Day of Judgement? Or are we still clothed in the rags of our own busyness, our own righteousness, and filled with the prejudices, hatreds, and loves of this world? There will come a day when we must all stand before the judgment of God. Are you prepared?
My prayer is that we may all receive the invitation of God with the wisdom that is the gift of grace, and so yield ourselves and our of our lives to his Holy Spirit that we might be born again and clothed in the righteousness of Jesus, having our deepest selves remade in his image so that we may love what he loves and desire only what he desires. We must be prepared, my friends, for no one knows the day or the hour except the Father.
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 forever.
Amen.
