1 And Jesus answering spoke again in
parables, saying to them, 2 “The kingdom of heaven
is like a king who made a wedding feast for his son. 3 And
he sent his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding,
and they would not come. 4 Again he sent other
slaves, saying, ‘Say to those who were invited, “Look, I have
prepared my banquet, my oxen and fattened beasts have been
slaughtered, and all things are ready. Come to the wedding.” ’
5 But they did not care and went off, one to his
farm, another to his business; 6 and the rest laid
hands on his slaves, ill-treated them, and killed them. 7 But
the king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those
murderers and set their city on fire. 8 Then he says
to his slaves, ‘The banquet is ready, but those who were invited
were not worthy; 9 go therefore to the road
intersections, and as many as you find invite to the wedding.’
10 And those slaves went out into the highways and
gathered together all whom they found, both evil and good; and the
wedding was filled with guests. 11 But when the king
came in to see the guests, he saw there a man not wearing a wedding
garment. 12 And he says to him, ‘Friend, how did
you come in here not having a wedding garment?’ But he was
speechless. 13 Then the king said to the servants,
‘Bind him feet and hands, and throw him out into the outer
darkness; there there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.’
14 For many are called, but few chosen.”
The third in this trilogy of parables further hammers
home the danger in which the members of the ecclesiastical
establishment had placed themselves. It is not enough to have
accepted the invitation to the marriage feast—one must also go to
the marriage. The parable is not unlike that in Luke 14:15–24, and
many commentators assume that it is a variant of the same parable.
But there are some not insignificant differences. Matthew’s story
is related after Jesus had reached Jerusalem, Luke’s while he was
still on the journey. Matthew’s parable concerns a king making a
wedding feast, it speaks of the kingdom of heaven, it lists oxen and
fattened beasts as food items, it refers to many slaves as going with
the invitations, has no equivalent of the excuses that form the
central feature of Luke’s story, has slaves insulted and killed by
the potential guests, has the king sending armies to deal with the
rejectors of his invitation, and has an addendum about a man with no
wedding garment. Luke’s story arises from a remark made by a fellow
guest at a dinner Jesus attended, it refers to a man (not a king) who
put on a big dinner, it says nothing about the food, has only one
slave inviting the guests to turn up, makes a feature of the excuses
the guests made for not coming, and has the slave going out twice to
bring in the outcasts. Add to that the fact that there is very little
agreement in wording. There are obvious resemblances between the two
parables, but not enough to say that they are variants of the one
story. Rather, they are variations on a theme that a teller of
parables might well make on different occasions, before different
audiences. Is anyone prepared to say that Jesus used each of his
parables on only one occasion? Surely one of the advantages of the
parabolic method is that the parables can be adapted to new
situations. And if and when Jesus repeated a parable before a
different audience, is there any reason why he should not have
modified it to suit its new application? It fits the facts better to
take this as another parable embodying features Jesus had used before
than to take it as a second form of the same parable, modified in
transmission.
1. There have been no previous words that Jesus
was answering, but Matthew is fond of the verb (which he has
55 times) and he may have it in mind that Jesus was responding to the
hostility of the high priests and Pharisees who wanted to arrest him.
Again adds this to the previous parables and completes the
trio.
2. For the kingdom of heaven see on 3:2.
This time it is likened to a king3 giving a wedding
feast for his son (sons feature in all three of the
parables in this group). The use of the singular may point us to the
son, the one who would in due course succeed him (it is unlikely that
a king would have only one son). Any royal occasion would be notable,
but the wedding of the son would be especially significant. Jesus
says nothing about the preparations that went into the making of the
feast, but it would be expected that the king would put on a
magnificent banquet (and it would also be expected that people would
be very glad to receive an invitation and would make a point of being
there). Many see an eschatological significance in this parable and
draw attention to the messianic banquet that was so much part of
Jewish tradition. But no one seems to have found a wedding
feast as part of the eschatological expectation, so the application
to the end time must be seen as uncertain.
3. At the time when the banquet was about ready,
the king sent his slaves to tell the guests that it was time
to come. This presupposes a previous invitation that had been
accepted. There would be many slaves (over against the singular
“slave” in Luke’s parable), partly because of the number of
guests and partly because this befitted royalty. It seems that a
second invitation to a feast was usual (cf. Esth. 5:8; 6:14). In a
day when people had nothing equivalent to watches and when banquets
took a long time to prepare, it was obviously a very helpful thing to
be notified in this manner. From the Midrash Rabbah we find
that there was another reason: “None of them would attend a banquet
unless he was invited twice” (Lamentations 4:2; to explain
this the Midrash tells a story of a banquet to which an
invitation was sent by mistake to an enemy whose name was very
similar to that of a friend; there were disastrous consequences when
the enemy, once invited, refused to leave the feast, while the host
insisted that he go). So the customary second invitation went out.
But on this occasion they would not come. This was something
completely unnatural; in real life a royal invitation is not refused,
and people are very glad to be present at a royal banquet. We should
not miss the point that Jesus regards the actions of the
high-priestly party as completely unnatural. When they were summoned
by the King of heaven, they should surely have complied with his
gracious invitation. But they did not. Their outward profession was a
long way from the glad acceptance of the ways of God that was looked
for from men in their position.
4. There had to be some mistake; the guests had
been invited, and they would surely come. So the king sent other
slaves. This time they had a specific message from the king that
said, first, that the great feast had been prepared; second,
that oxen and fattened beasts had been butchered for the
occasion; and third, that all things are ready. Nothing could
be more explicit. So, the assurance having been given that everything
had been done to ensure that the guests would have a magnificent
banquet, the king concludes with “Come to the wedding.”
5. But all to no avail. The guests did not
care, an incredible attitude to take up in the face of a royal
command and the almost sacred duty of complying with an accepted
invitation. But this group of people were too concerned with their
own affairs to respond to the king’s invitation. Jesus illustrates
with two concerns, which we are expected to regard as typical. In the
parable in Luke the invitees all make excuses (Luke 14:18), but these
do not bother; they just go off to pursue their own concerns. One
prospective guest went off to his farm. In the Lukan parable
this was to look over his newly purchased field; Jesus does not say
in this parable what it was that took the man to the farm, but it
will be some concern of this sort. Whatever it was, it was surely
something that might easily have been held over. So with the second
and his business. No urgency is suggested, and this, too,
looks like an excuse. Jesus is citing typical shallow excuses to
bring out the point that the impolite guests had no real reason for
staying away from the banquet. They simply did not care.
6. The rest leads into an account of those
who took hostile action and did not simply go about their own
affairs; the expression indicates that there were quite a few of
them. They treated the king’s messengers with scant respect. First,
they laid hands on his slaves. In no society is it considered
good manners to lay hands on people who come bearing a warm
invitation, even if one does not intend to accept it. Then two things
are said about what they did to the slaves sent to them with the
message of goodwill. The first is that they ill-treated them,
a term that covers a wide range of unpleasantness. The second is that
they killed them. This does not necessarily mean that they did
this to all of them, but it was a dreadful crime to do it to any.
There was nothing more serious they could possibly have done than to
take away these men’s lives. Their easy assumption apparently was
that they themselves were in no danger: they could do to the king and
his messengers anything they wished and do it with impunity. They had
no respect for the king and no fear of him.
7. But they had not thought hard enough about the
king; they had not allowed for the fact that he was not the kind
of man to take a snub lightly, nor did they reckon with the way their
refusal would inevitably be regarded. “For a subject to scorn the
summons to the royal feast implied disloyalty and rebellion”
(Carr). The king was very displeased and sent his troops,
which in this context will denote not an army but a detachment of
soldiers, sufficient to deal with the offending guests. Jesus speaks
of them as murderers and says that their city was set
… on fire. This envisages the insulters as being concentrated
in one city, and that not the place where the feast was to be held.
It would, of course, take time for this to take place, and other
events occurred before the destruction of the city. But Jesus takes
to its conclusion his account of the fate of those who rejected the
king’s invitation before returning to the subject of the feast. We
should not miss the point that the language is very much like that of
Old Testament passages dealing with judgment.
8. The narrative becomes vivid with the use of
the present tense, he says, as Jesus moves on to a further
instruction the king gave to his slaves. A wedding is an
important occasion, and the celebrations are not to be cancelled just
because some ill-mannered guests refuse the invitations and must be
dealt with. The king reminds some of his slaves that “the
banquet is ready,” a fact that has emerged as early as verse 4.
Normally the guests would even then be reclining at table and
consuming the magnificent repast. But “those who were invited
were not worthy,” which, considering what they had done to the
messengers, is a considerable understatement.
9.“Go therefore,” says the king, “to
the road intersections,” which seems to mean the places where
the main highways go out from the city to the country, evidently
places where poor people tended to congregate. Such people would not
expect to find themselves as guests at a royal banquet, but the king
is determined that the wedding feast go ahead, and that means that
there must be guests to fill the places. Poor people at the road
junctions are unlikely to refuse such an invitation. So the king
instructs his slaves to invite “as many as you find” in
these places to come to the wedding.
10. The slaves did as they were instructed. In
the parable in Luke the slave had to go out into the country because
he could not get enough guests in the city, but in this parable one
trip secured all that were needed. The slaves went out into the
highways and enlisted all whom they found, both evil and good.
In the application this means that Jesus accepts people the Jewish
establishment would regard as evil and therefore totally
unacceptable. Of course, those who accept Jesus’ invitation do not
stay evil, but the point is that Jesus welcomes people that the high
priests did not want to include among God’s own. The wedding was
filled with guests; in the end the king’s purpose was worked
out, and Jesus leaves his hearers to see that God’s purposes will
take effect; in the end those he calls will be present at his
heavenly feast.
11. The parable could have ended at this point
(as Luke’s parable in fact does). Indeed, many scholars hold that
as Jesus taught it the parable does end here; they contend that
Matthew has tacked on the bit at the end about the man without the
wedding garment. Sometimes they hold that this is another of Jesus’
parables, sometimes that it emanates from Matthew or the early
church. But the fact is that, as we read this Gospel, this section
certainly belongs to the parable of the wedding feast. The story
Matthew relates has a further point to make. Patte notes that
tensions like that between verses 10 and 11 occur elsewhere in this
Gospel, and “such tensions signal that at such places in the text
Matthew conveys major points (convictions) that are surprising for
the readers because they involve a view unknown to them—a view that
Matthew strives to convey to them. In brief, the concluding verses,
22:11–14, should be considered an integral part of Matthew’s
parable; they express its main point” (p. 301). Jesus says that the
king came in to see the guests. We know little about customs
at wedding banquets in first-century Judaism, but this seems
eminently reasonable, all the more so since the king would not have
known whom his slaves had brought in. So he came in to make his
presence known and to see for himself who had come to the feast. He
found a man not wearing a wedding garment. The precise
meaning of this is not known, but obviously a marriage is a time when
most people would wear appropriate clothing (cf. Isa. 61:10; Ezek.
16:10). In this case, when a king took all sorts of poor people right
from the streets into the banqueting hall, it is not impossible that
he made available suitable clothing and that this man did not bother
to make use of what the king provided (though evidence that this sort
of thing was done in ancient times is lacking; Lenski, however, draws
attention to Gen. 45:22; Judg. 14:12, 19; 2 Kings 5:22; 10:22; Esth.
6:8; 8:15; Rev. 19:8, 9; p. 857). Whether that was the way it was or
not, the words imply that suitable clothing was available and this
man had not made use of the opportunity.
12. The king greeted him as “Friend,”
a form of address found elsewhere in the New Testament only in 20:13;
26:50. In all three passages there is something ironical about the
greeting, for the “friend” in each case is doing something short
of a friendly action. But “Friend” is a kindly word, and
there is something of an appeal about it. The king goes on to ask how
the man came in without the right garment, but the offender has
nothing to say. Quite plainly he knew that he could have had the
right clothing but had declined to wear it.
13. It is puzzling that the man had come to the
feast but had not made use of the appropriate clothing as the other
guests had done. Commentators give a good deal of attention to the
significance of the robe, some seeing in it meritorious works, others
imputed righteousness or the righteousness that comes as a
consequence of God’s saving work in the sinner, and so on. It is
wiser to avoid speculation since the narrative gives no hint of a
particular meaning we should attach to it. But in this parable the
king is a strong personality, one who tolerates no nonsense. The man
has no business being where he is, clothed as he is. So the king
gives a command to his servants (“servants” this time, not
“slaves”), directing them to tie the man up, both feet and
hands being specified, after which he is to be thrown into the
outer darkness, an expression often used to denote the
uncomfortable lodging of those who are rejected.
14. Jesus rounds off the parable with a reason
for the rejection of this man. Many are called classes him
with the other guests; they had all heard the gracious invitation of
the royal host, and they were all where they were because of his
generosity. But Jesus sounds a warning. Those who hear God’s call
and know of his grace must not think that a call is the same as a
response. While many indeed hear the call, few are chosen.
In interpreting this we must bear in mind that Hebrew and Aramaic
both lack comparative forms of the adjective. Comparisons are
expressed by using expressions like “large” and “small,”
sometimes “many” and “few.” It is possible to understand this
passage to mean that the elect are fewer in number than those called;
the actual number of the elect is then not in mind.23
Jesus is not saying whether the elect will be a tiny remnant or not;
he is saying that not all the called will be finally chosen.
This is an expression of the doctrine of election that
we find in one form or another throughout the New Testament. The Jews
could say, “All Israelites have a share in the world to come”
(Sanh. 10:1), but Jesus rejects such views. The gospel
invitation goes far and wide, but not everyone who hears it is one of
God’s elect. We know those who are elect by their obedient
response. Perhaps it is worth noticing here that this doctrine is
also found in Paul, but that he expresses it differently. For him the
“call” is the effectual call, so that it is enough for him to
speak of people as being called by God. “Call” in his writings
means much the same as “chosen” here.1
This
third parable of the trilogy is a further answer to the religious
leaders. Some commentators see this parable as parallel to another
version in Luke 14:16–24. But as Tasker says, the differences are
as numerous as the agreements. Using the same theme, Jesus presented
different applications. In this account Jesus exposed the
indifference of the religious leaders, emphasizing the King’s
invitation to persons other than those originally invited. The
wedding feast calls to mind both the eschatological feast associated
with the messianic triumph—the marriage supper of the Lamb (Rev.
19:7–9)—and the deep relational meaning of Ephesians 5:25–27.
There are three divisions to the story: (1) the
invitation is rejected by many (vv. 1–7); (2) the invitation is
extended to strangers (vv. 8–9); and (3) the invited persons are
still expected to be properly considerate (vv. 10–14). The first
section is illustrative of Jewish people who were repeatedly invited
by the call of God’s gospel, but who would not come. They even
destroyed the messengers who brought the invitation. The second
section introduces the act of God in turning from the Jewish in-group
to invite the Gentiles, the strangers. And the third section is
actually another parable, making this a double-edged statement, which
perhaps accounts for verse 1 where Matthew says Jesus spoke to them
again by parables (plural). This section has to do with our
appropriate response to God’s gracious call.
The wedding garment is symbolic of a totally new mode of
existence. This man sat at the wedding banquet but his heart was not
there. In courtesy the host did not partake of the meal but appeared
among the guests during the meal. The soiled garments of this guest
were an insult to the host, especially since in God’s grace the
wedding garment is provided. For God clothes the redeemed (see Zech.
3:1–4; Is. 61:10; Rev. 3:4–5, 18). God rejects those who try to
enter the kingdom without doing the will of the King. They are cast
into outer darkness, the state of the lost who have turned their
backs on God. Perhaps in adding this second aspect of the parables
Jesus had Judas in mind. To address him as “friend” is to use the
same word that Jesus used in the garden when He addressed Judas. One
can be called to the messianic feast (v. 14) but not be among the
chosen who identify with the Son.2
This parable is the third in Jesus’ trilogy of
judgment parables given in response to the Jewish religious leaders
who maliciously challenged His authority (21:23, 28–30, 33–39).
It is among the most dramatic and powerful of all His parables,
which, though directed specifically at those leaders and all
unbelieving Israel whom they represented, also has far-reaching
significance and application for subsequent times, certainly
including our own.
For three years Jesus had been preaching and teaching
the gospel of the kingdom, which included proclaiming Himself as the
Messiah, the Son of God and Savior of the world. He had been offering
Himself and His kingdom to the people of Israel, His own people, the
chosen people of God. But at the end of those three years, all but a
handful of Jews had rejected Him. Although Jesus had always been
popular with the masses wherever He ministered, their acceptance of
Him was for the most part superficial and selfish.
The multitudes were awed by Jesus’ straightforward,
authoritative teaching, which was in refreshing contrast to the
confusing, legalistic, and complicated tradition taught by their
scribes and Pharisees. They were even more awed by His healing
miracles, which had brought restored health, sanity, and even life to
so many countless thousands of their friends and loved ones. They
doubtlessly appreciated the fact that Jesus never took financial
advantage of them, never taking payment for any supernatural good
work He did. On the contrary, He was always giving to them freely,
and had on several occasions miraculously fed thousands. They deeply
admired Jesus for His humble, self-giving love and compassion, and
they must have rejoiced when He rebuked and embarrassed their
hypocritical, self-righteous leaders, who looked down on them in
contemptuous superiority How wonderful, they must have thought, that
the Messiah not only is so powerful but also so compassionate.
But when the people finally realized the kind of Messiah
Jesus was, and especially that He had no plans to deliver them from
the Roman oppressors, their acclamation quickly turned to
rejection-as is evident in their change of mood from Sunday to
Thursday of this last Passover week of Jesus’ ministry. Therefore,
as He continued to respond to the Jewish leaders in the Temple, where
He was teaching on Wednesday morning (21:23), it was also to the
multitudes that the third judgment parable was directed.
The Invitation Rejected
And
Jesus answered and spoke to them again in parables, saying, “The
kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king, who gave a wedding feast
for his son. And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been
invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come. Again
he sent out other slaves saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited,
“Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened
livestock are all butchered and everything is ready; come to the
wedding feast.’ ” But they paid no attention and went their way,
one to his own farm, another to his business, and the rest seized his
slaves and mistreated them and killed them.” (22:1–6)
The parable contains four scenes, the first of which
depicts the rejection of the invitation. Although none of His hearers
may ever have attended a royal wedding feast, they were all familiar
with wedding feasts in general and had some idea of the importance
and magnificence of one that a king would prepare for his own son.
As Jesus answered the chief priests and elders
(21:23), He was continuing to respond to their bitter challenge of
His authority and spoke to them again in parables for the
third time. It is likely they heard little of what He said, because
their minds were by then singularly and unalterably bent on His
arrest and execution. They had wanted to seize Him after He related
the second parable but were still afraid of what the crowds might do
(21:46).
In His first two parables Jesus gave no introduction,
saving the explanation and application to the end. In this parable,
however, He begins by stating that it illustrates the kingdom of
heaven. Because most Jews believed that the kingdom of heaven
was reserved exclusively for them, and possibly a few Gentile
proselytes, the audience in the Temple immediately knew that what
Jesus was going to say closely applied to them.
Although they had many perverted ideas about the
kingdom of heaven, because the term heaven was so often
used as a substitute for the covenant name of God (Yahweh, or
Jehovah), most Jews would have understood that it was synonymous with
the kingdom of God and represented the realm of God’s sovereign
rule. There are past, present, and future as well as temporal and
eternal aspects of the kingdom, but it is not restricted to
any era or period of redemptive history. It is the continuing,
ongoing sphere of God’s rule by grace. In a narrower sense, the
phrase is also used in Scripture to refer to God’s dominion of
redemption, His divine program of gracious salvation. As Jesus uses
the phrase here, it specifically represents the spiritual community
of God’s redeemed people, those who are under His lordship in a
personal and unique way because of their trust in His Son.
In the ancient Near East, a wedding feast was
inseparable from the wedding itself, which involved a week-long
series of meals and festivities and was the highlight of all social
life. For a royal wedding such as the one Jesus mentions here,
the celebration often lasted for several weeks. Guests were invited
to stay at the house of the groom’s parents for the entire
occasion, and the father would make as elaborate provisions as he
could afford. A royal wedding, of course, would be held in the
palace, and a king would be able to afford whatever he desired.
A wedding feast that a king prepared for
his son would be a feast of all feasts, and Jesus was therefore
picturing the most elaborate celebration imaginable. The fact that it
was a wedding celebration was incidental to the purpose of the
parable, the only mention of the groom being that of identifying him
as the king’s son. No mention at all is made of the bride or
of any other aspect of a wedding. The point is that because the feast
represents the greatest festivity imaginable, given by the greatest
monarch imaginable, for the most-honored guests imaginable, a royal
wedding feast was chosen as the illustration of the ultimate
celebration.
When all the preparations were complete, the king sent
out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding
feast. The fact that they had been invited indicates that
the guests were invited earlier and already knew they were expected
to attend the wedding. To be a pre-invited guest to the king’s
wedding was among the highest honors possible, and no doubt those who
had received invitations were boasting to their neighbors and
friends. It is therefore inconceivable that, when the actual call
came to attend, they were unwilling to come.
As with the previous parable of the wicked vine-growers,
it is the shockingly extreme and unthinkable nature of the events
mentioned that are central to the story’s point. Jesus’ hearers
already would have begun to think to themselves, “Who would do such
a thing? The very idea is preposterous.” Attending the royal
wedding would be an even greater experience than receiving the
invitation, and it would have provided the finest food and the most
prestigious fellowship in the land. Not only that, but an invitation
from one’s king not only brought honor but obligation. It was a
serious offense to spurn the king’s favor.
The initial response of the king, like the initial
response of the vineyard owner, is as amazing as the responses of the
guests. Few monarchs were known for their humility and patience,
especially in the face of open insult. But that king sent out
other slaves saying, “Tell those who have been invited, ‘Behold,
I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened livestock are all
butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast.’ ”
The dinner was the first of many meals eaten
during the feast, and it was ready to be served. “Remind the
guests,” the king said in effect, “of all the preparations that
have been made. The oxen and fattened livestock are all butchered
and waiting to be roasted, and everything else is ready
also. Plead with the people to come to the wedding feast now.”
But as before, the invited guests disregarded the call
from the king, except that their refusal this time was even more
crass and brutal. Many of the invitees were coldly indifferent,
acting as if the wedding were of no consequence. They responded by
carrying on business as usual. They went their way, doing the
things they would normally have done in looking after their own
interests, represented by the farm and business. They
were so selfishly preoccupied with personal concerns for profit that
the invitation and the repeated calls of the king to stop work and
attend his son’s wedding were altogether ignored. They willingly
and purposely forfeited the beauty, grandeur, and honor of the
wedding for the sake of their everyday, mundane, self-serving
endeavors. They were not concerned about the king’s honor but only
about what they perceived as their own best interests.
But another group of guests were worse than indifferent.
Rather than being concerned about offending the king, they were
themselves offended at his persistence. In an act of unbelievably
brutal arrogance, they seized the king’s slaves and
mistreated them and killed them. Contempt for the king’s slaves
demonstrated contempt for the king himself, and in mistreating and
killing his slaves they committed a flagrant act of rebellion.
As already noted, because Jesus had said that the
parable was about the kingdom of heaven, its meaning needed no
interpretation to any thinking hearer. The king obviously was God,
and the invited guess were His chosen people, Israel, those who
already had been called by Him.
God first called His chosen people through Abraham,
whose descendants would be blessed and be a channel of blessing to
the rest of the world (Gen. 12:2–3). After being captive in Egypt
for 400 years, the chosen people were delivered through Moses.
Through His prophets the Lord declared, “When Israel was a youth I
loved him, and out of Egypt I called My son” (Hos. 11:1), and, “You
only have I chosen among all the families of the earth” (Amos 3:2).
In one of the most poignant accounts in Scripture, God described
Israel as an abandoned newborn, with its umbilical cord untied and
squirming in its own blood. To that hopeless infant He had said,
“Live!” and it lived and prospered. The Lord bathed it, anointed
it with oil, clothed and protected it, and adorned it with jewelry
(Ezek 16:4–14).
The wedding feast represented God’s promised blessing
to Israel, a figure understood by everyone in the Temple that day.
According to talmudic literature, the Messiah’s coming would be
accompanied by a grand banquet given for His chosen people.
The slaves God sent to call again and again those
who had been invited were John the Baptist, Jesus Himself in His
preaching-teaching ministry, and the New Testament apostles,
prophets, and other preachers and teachers. It would seem that the
slaves would also have to represent New Testament preachers,
because their message pertained to the King’s Son, Jesus Christ.
God was saying to Israel, His already invited guests, much the same
as He had said from heaven at Jesus’ baptism: “Here is My Son;
come and give Him honor.” But John the Baptist was rejected and
beheaded, Jesus was rejected and crucified, and the apostles and
prophets were rejected and persecuted, many being put to death.
The indifferent guests in the parable represent people
who are preoccupied with daily living and personal pursuits. They are
essentially the secular-minded, those who are interested in the here
and now and have no interest in spiritual things. They are the
materialists, whose primary interest is accumulating things, and the
ambitious, whose main concern is “getting ahead.” They are not
usually antagonistic to the things of God but simply have no time for
them.
Those who are actively hostile to the gospel invariably
are people involved in false religion, including the many forms of
humanistic religion that parade under a guise of philosophy,
mysticism, or scientism. The history of persecution of God’s people
shows that the chief persecutor has been false religion. It is the
purveyors of error who are the aggressive enemies of truth, and it is
therefore inevitable that, as God’s Word predicts, the final world
system of the antichrist will be religious, not secular.
The fact that the king sent his messengers on two
different occasions cannot be pressed to mean that only two calls
were extended or that the first group consisted of John the Baptist
and Jesus and the second consisted of the apostles. The parable makes
no distinction in the types of slaves, or messengers. The point of
the two callings of the invited guests was to illustrate God’s
gracious patience and forbearance with the rejecters, His willingness
to call Israel again and again-as John the Baptist had done for
perhaps a year, as Jesus did for three years, and as the apostles did
for some forty years, until Jerusalem and the Temple were destroyed
in a.d. 70.
The Rejecters Punished
But
the king was enraged and sent his armies, and destroyed those
murderers, and set their city on fire. Then he said to his slaves,
‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy.
(22:7–8)
The second scene in the parable depicts the punishment
of the rebellious subjects who rejected the king’s call. As in the
parable of the vineyard, God’s patience is here shown to have its
limit. The king would have been perfectly justified in
punishing the offenders when they first ignored His call. After His
repeated invitations and their repeated wicked responses, He finally
became enraged. One is reminded of God’s statement with
regard to the antediluvian generation: “My Spirit shall not strive
with man forever” (Gen. 6:3).
The term behind armies (strateuma) refers
to any group of armed forces and is probably better translated
“troops,” since the king would hardly have needed his full
military might to accomplish his purpose. According to the king’s
instructions, the troops both destroyed the murderers
responsible for killing his emissaries and set their city on fire.
The fulfillment of the second prophetic feature in the story occurred
in a.d. 70.
When the Roman general Titus conquered Jerusalem in that
year, he killed some 1,100,000 Jews, threw their bodies over the
wall, and slaughtered countless thousands more throughout Palestine.
In his Jewish War, the Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, who
witnessed the destruction of Jerusalem, graphically chronicled the
horrible scene:
That building [the Temple at
Jerusalem], however, God long ago had sentenced to the flames; but
now in the revolution of the time periods the fateful day had
arrived, the tenth of the month Lous, the very day on which
previously it had been burned by the king of Babylon. … One of the
soldiers, neither awaiting orders nor filled with horror of so dread
an undertaking, but moved by some supernatural impulse, snatched a
brand from the blazing timber and, hoisted up by one of his fellow
soldiers, flung the fiery missile through a golden window. … When
the flame arose, a scream, as poignant as the tragedy, went up from
the Jews … now that the object which before they had guarded so
closely was going to ruin. …While the sanctuary was burning …
neither pity for age nor respect for rank was shown; on the contrary,
children and old people, laity and priests alike were massacred. …
The emperor ordered the entire city and sanctuary to be razed to the
ground, except only the highest towers, Phasael, Hippicus, and
Mariamne, and that part of the wall that enclosed the city on the
west.
The king explained to his slaves that the
wedding was ready, but those who were invited were not
worthy to attend. Their unworthiness was not because in
themselves they lacked the required righteousness. Neither the
original invitation nor the subsequent calls were based on merit but
solely on the king’s gracious favor. Ironically and tragically,
they were declared to be not worthy because they refused an
invitation that was in no way based on worth. As the parable goes on
to make clear (v. 10), “both evil and good” people were called.
That which makes a person worthy of receiving salvation
is not any sort of human goodness or religious or spiritual
accomplishment but simply his saying yes to God’s invitation to
receive His Son, Jesus Christ, as Lord. The people God here declared
not worthy were His chosen people, Israel, who would not come
to Him freely and without merit through His Son. And because they
rejected the Son, God rejected them for a season. Because they
rejected their own Messiah, they were temporarily cast off as a
nation and as God’s unique chosen people.
The New Guest Invited
Go
therefore to the main highways, and as many as you find there, invite
to the wedding feast.’ And those slaves went out into the streets,
and gathered together all they found, both evil and good; and the
wedding hall was filled with dinner guests. (22:9–10)
The third scene in the parable depicts the guests who
were finally invited to replace those who had repeatedly refused the
king’s call. The wedding feast for the king’s son was ready, but
there was no one to attend unless new guests were invited.
“Go therefore to the main highways,” the king
told His servants, “and as many as you find there, invite to the
wedding feast.” The plan was for them to go everywhere and find
everyone they could and invite them to come. That is precisely
what Jesus commanded in the Great Commission: “Go therefore and
make disciples of all the nations” (Matt. 28:19). God had long
beforehand predicted through Hosea, “I will call those who were not
My people, ‘My people,’ and her who was not beloved, ‘Beloved.’
And it shall be that in the place where it was said to them, ‘You
are not My people,’ there they shall be called sons of the living
God” (Rom. 9:25–26; cf. Hos. 2:23; 1:10). By the Jews’
“transgression,” Paul wrote in that same letter, “salvation has
come to the Gentiles” (11:11).
Just as their king commanded, those slaves went out
into the streets, and gathered together all they found, both evil and
good. They called the morally evil and the morally good
alike, their being equally unworthy - themselves to come to the
king’s feast. The original guests had not been invited because of
their moral or spiritual superiority, and neither were the
newly-invited guests. Among the ancient Jews were those who lived
exemplary, upright lives, who were helpful to their neighbors, told
the truth, never used the Lord’s name in vain, never cheated in
business, and never committed adultery or murder or theft. There were
also those whose lives were a moral cesspool. But the first kind of
person was no more acceptable to God in himself than the second. God
has always extended His call for salvation to both evil and good
people, because neither are righteous enough and both are equally in
need of salvation.
Paul makes clear that “neither fornicators, nor
idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor homosexuals, nor
thieves, nor the covetous, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor
swindlers, shall inherit the kingdom of God” (1 Cor. 6:9–10). God
will not allow those whose lives are characterized by such sins to
have any part of His kingdom. But He will receive for salvation a
person who is guilty of any or all of those and other sins and who
desires to be cleansed from his sins by the redeeming work of Christ
on the cross. Therefore Paul could continue to say to his Corinthian
brothers in Christ, “And such were some of you; but you were
washed, but you were sanctified” (v. 11).
What makes a person worthy of salvation today is exactly
what has made a person worthy of salvation since the Fall, namely,
personal faith in God’s gracious provision in Christ. All who
accept God’s invitation to His Son’s celebration, that is, who
follow the Son as their saving Lord, will be dinner guests in
His divine and eternally glorious wedding hall.
The Intruder Expelled
But
when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw there a
man not dressed in wedding clothes, and he said to him, ‘Friend,
how did you come in here without wedding clothes?’ And he was
speechless. Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and
foot, and cast him into the outer darkness; in that place there shall
be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ For many are called, but few are
chosen.” (22:11–14)
The fourth and last scene in the parable focuses on an
intruder into the wedding feast, who did not belong because he was
not dressed in wedding clothes. The man obviously had been
included in the general invitation, because the king made no
restrictions as to who was invited, having instructed his slaves to
call both the evil and good wherever they might be found. He was not
a party crasher who came without an invitation, but he had come
improperly dressed, and he obviously stood out in the great
wedding hall, in stark contrast to all the other dinner guests.
At first reading, one wonders how any of those who
accepted the king’s invitation could have been expected to come
properly attired. They had been rounded up from every part of the
land, and many had been taken off the streets. Even if they had time
to dress properly, they had no clothes befitting such an occasion as
the wedding of the king’s son.
But the fact that all of the dinner guests except
that one man were dressed in wedding clothes indicates that
the king had made provision for such clothes. It would have
been a moral mockery, especially for such an obviously kind and
gracious ruler, to invite even the most wicked people in the land to
come to the feast and then exclude one poor fellow because he had no
proper clothes to wear.
That man was fully accountable for being improperly
dressed, but the gracious king nevertheless gave him an opportunity
to justify himself, asking with undeserved respect, “Friend, how
did you come in here without wedding clothes?” Had the man had
a good reason, he would certainly have mentioned it immediately But
he was speechless, unable to offer the king even the feeblest
excuse. It is therefore obvious that he could have come in
wedding clothes had he been willing.
Until that point the man had been utterly presumptuous,
thinking he could come to the king’s feast on his own terms, in any
clothes he wanted. He was proud and self-willed, thoughtless of the
others, and, worst of all, insulting to the king. Arrogantly defying
royal protocol, he was determined to “be himself.”
But his arrogance was short-lived. When, as the king
knew in advance, the man could not excuse himself, the king said
to the servants, “Bind him hand and foot, and cast him into
the outer darkness; in that place there shall be weeping and gnashing
of teeth.” The binding of hand and foot probably
represents prevention of the man’s resisting as well as prevention
of his returning. By that time it was night, and although the wedding
hall would be well lighted, it was dark outside. The man was
permanently expelled from the presence of the king and of the king’s
people into the outer darkness. He would have great regret and
remorse, and, with everyone else in that place, he would
experience perpetual weeping and gnashing of teeth. But though
he had a great opportunity, he had never had, and did not now have,
the godly sorrow that leads to repentance and salvation (2 Cor. 7:
10).
Since Cain’s first attempt to please God by offering
his self-appointed sacrifice, men have been trying to come to the
Lord on their own terms. They may fellowship with believers, join the
church, become active in the leadership, give generously to its
support, and speak of devotion to God. Like the tares among the
wheat, they freely coexist for a while with God’s people. But in
the day of judgment their falsehood will become obvious and their
removal certain. Some will dare to say to God “on that day, ‘Lord,
Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out
demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?’ And then [Christ]
will declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from Me, you who
practice lawlessness’ ” (Matt. 7:22–23).
The proper wedding garment of a true believer is
God-imputed righteousness, without which no one can enter or live in
the kingdom. Unless a person’s righteousness exceeds the
hypocritical self-righteousness that typified the scribes and
Pharisees, he “shall not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matt.
5:20). The only acceptable wedding garment is the genuine
“sanctification without which no one will see the Lord” (Heb.
12:14).
Many of Jesus’ Jewish hearers that day would have
recalled the beautiful passage from Isaiah which declares, “I will
rejoice greatly in the Lord, my soul will exult in my God; for He has
clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe
of righteousness” (Isa. 61:10). Sincere Jews knew that, contrary to
the man-made, legalistic traditions of their rabbis, God not only
requires inner righteousness of men but He also offers it as a gift.
God’s eyes, of course, can see into men’s hearts to
know whether their righteousness is of their own making or His
granting. But even outwardly a true believer’s life will evidence
right living and reflect right thinking. The Lord not only imputes
but imparts righteousness to His children. Only He can
see the internal righteousness that He imputes, but everyone
can see the external righteousness that He imparts. A child of God is
characterized by a holy life. Peter made that fact clear when he
described salvation as “obedience to the truth” which has
“Purified your souls” (1 Pet. 1:22).
Just before Jesus declared that prophesying, casting out
demons, and performing miracles in His name may be false evidence of
salvation, He had said that true evidence of salvation will always be
apparent. A person’s spiritual condition will be manifested in the
fruit of his living. “Grapes are not gathered from thorn bushes,
nor figs from thistles, are they?” He had asked rhetorically “Even
so, every good tree bears good fruit; but the bad tree bears bad
fruit” (Matt. 7:16–17, 21–23). A holy, godly life cannot help
bearing righteous fruit, because it is the natural outgrowth of the
work of the Spirit within (Gal. 5:22–23).
Jesus surely would have been pleased had one of His
hearers interrupted and asked, “How can I be clothed in the proper
garment? What can I do to keep from being cast into the outer
darkness like that man?” He no doubt would have said to that person
as He had said many times before in various ways, “Come to Me, that
you may have life” (John 5:40). As Paul explained to the
Corinthians, God made Christ “who knew no sin to be sin on our
behalf, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him” (2
Cor. 5:21). That is the wedding garment that God demands and His Son
provides.
Jesus did not ask the Jewish leaders to comment on this
parable as He had done with the previous two, where in each case they
condemned themselves by their answers (21:31–32, 40–45). He knew
they would not be trapped again, because it was now obvious that the
whole thrust of the parables was to condemn them. Their only purpose,
now heating up to a fury, was to trap and condemn Him to death
(22:15; cf. 21:46).
Consequently, the Lord closed with the simple but
sobering statement, Many are called, but few are chosen. That
phrase reflects the scriptural balance between God’s sovereignty
and man’s will. The invitations to the wedding feast went out to
many, representative of everyone to whom the gospel message is
sent. But few of those who heard the call were willing to
accept it and thereby be among the chosen. The gospel
invitation is sent to everyone, because it is not the Father’s will
that a single person be excluded from His kingdom and perish in the
outer darkness of hell (2 Pet. 3:9). But not everyone wants God, and
many who claim to want Him do not want Him on His terms. Those who
are saved enter God’s kingdom because of their willing acceptance
of His sovereign, gracious provision. Those who are lost are excluded
from the kingdom because of their willing rejection of that same
sovereign g3
They rejected the Holy Spirit (vv. 1–14).
This parable must not be confused with the Parable of the Great
Supper (Luke 14:16–24) even though they have elements in common.
Again we meet the Father and the Son; and the Son is alive (in spite
of what the husbandmen did) and has a bride. The suggestion is that
the Lord Jesus and His church are depicted (Eph. 5:22–33). The
period described in this parable must be after His resurrection and
ascension and the coming of the Holy Spirit.
The Father is still inviting the people of Israel to
come, in spite of what they did to His Son. When we study the first
seven chapters of Acts, we discover that the message is going out to
none but Jews (Acts 2:5, 10, 14, 22, 36; 3:25; 6:7). “To the Jew
first” was God’s plan (Acts 3:26; Rom. 1:16). How did the
nation’s leaders respond to the ministry of the Holy Spirit through
the Apostles? They rejected the Word and persecuted the church. The
same rulers who permitted John to be killed, and who asked for Jesus
to be killed, themselves killed Stephen! Later, Herod killed James
(Acts 12:1ff).
How did the king in the parable respond to the way the
people treated his servants? He became angry and sent his armies to
destroy them and their city. He then turned to other people and
invited them to come to the feast. This is a picture of God’s
dealing with Israel. They rejected the Father when they refused to
obey John the Baptist’s preaching. Israel rejected the Son when
they arrested Him and crucified Him. In His grace and patience, God
sent other witnesses. The Holy Spirit came on the early believers and
they witnessed with great power that Jesus was alive and the nation
could be saved (Acts 2:32–36; 3:19–26). The miracles they did
were proof that God was at work in and through them.
But Israel also rejected the Holy Spirit! This was
Stephen’s indictment against the nation: “You do always resist
the Holy Ghost” (Acts 7:51). With the stoning of Stephen, God’s
patience with Israel began to end, though He delayed the judgment for
almost forty years. In Acts 8 we read that the message went to the
Samaritans, and in Acts 10 we read that it even went to the Gentiles.
This final rejection is, to me, the awful “blasphemy
against the Holy Spirit” that Jesus spoke about in Matthew
12:22–32. This was a national sin, committed by Israel. When they
rejected John, they rejected the Father who sent him; but there
remained the ministry of the Son. When they rejected the Son, they
were forgiven because of their ignorance (Luke 23:34; Acts 3:17).
No sinner today can be forgiven for rejecting Christ, for this
rejection is what condemns the soul (John 3:16–22).
But there remained the ministry of the Holy Spirit. The
Spirit came on the church at Pentecost, and the Apostles performed
great signs and wonders (Acts 2:43; Heb. 2:1–4). The rulers
rejected the witness of the Spirit, and this brought final
judgment. They had rejected the Father, the Son, and the Spirit,
and there were no more opportunities left.
This “sin against the Holy Spirit” cannot be
committed today in the same way as Israel committed it, because the
situation is different. The Spirit of God is bearing witness through
the Word to the person and work of Jesus Christ. It is the Spirit who
convinces the world of sin (John 16:7–11). The Spirit can be
resisted by unbelievers (Acts 7:51), but nobody knows that crisis
hour (if there is one) when the Spirit stops dealing with a lost
sinner.
Matthew 22:11–14 seems like an appendix to the
parable, but it is vitally important. The wedding garment was
provided by the host so that everybody was properly attired and the
poor did not feel conspicuous. Salvation is personal and individual.
We must accept what God gives to us—the righteousness of Christ—and
not try to make it on our own. Since these parables had a definite
national emphasis, this personal emphasis at the end
was most important.
The
nation’s leaders were guilty of spiritual blindness, hypocrisy, and
deliberate disobedience to the Word. Instead of accepting this
indictment from Jesus, and repenting, they decided to attack Him and
argue with Him. The result: judgment. We should be careful not to
follow their example of disobedie
Matthew 22:1–14
During the original Holy Week, that
week leading up to His betrayal, arrest, trial, crucifixion, and
death, Jesus taught extensively in the temple precincts. When Matthew
put together his gospel years later and selected material from that
crucial week, he chose to include many teachings that Jesus aimed
directly at the Jewish religious leaders, as well as some of Jesus’
exchanges with them. Much of what Jesus said during this time was
designed to confront, challenge, and expose these leaders, and the
parable we are examining in this chapter, the parable of the wedding
feast, was part of that design.
However, we have seen throughout our study in Matthew
that many of Jesus’ parables were about the kingdom of heaven.
Usually, Jesus would begin one of these parables by saying, “The
kingdom of heaven is like …” Jesus’ entrance into His public
ministry was heralded by John the Baptist, who cried to the people,
“Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand!” (3:2). Jesus
began His preaching with the very same message: “Repent, for the
kingdom of heaven is at hand” (4:17). Throughout His teaching
ministry, many of His parables focused on this urgent reality of
entering the kingdom of God, and the parable of the wedding feast
also served this purpose.
Matthew tells us: And Jesus answered and spoke to
them again by parables and said: “The kingdom of heaven is like a
certain king who arranged a marriage for his son” (vv. 1–2).
It seems clear that the son for whom the king arranged this great
marriage and feast was the crown prince. I cannot imagine a more
significant social event in any kingdom than the marriage of the
crown prince. The king wants to honor his son on the occasion of his
wedding by means of a feast to end all feasts. It is an incredible
honor to receive an invitation from the palace to observe the
marriage ceremony and to join in the celebration. So, Jesus began
this parable by painting a picture of a forthcoming joyous occasion.
But then, Jesus introduced a nearly unbelievable twist
to this story: “and [the king] sent out his servants to call
those who were invited to the wedding; and they were not willing to
come” (v. 3). The servants went out to people who had received
invitations earlier. It was not that these invitees were incapable of
coming or were too busy to come. In other words, it was not that they
could not come; they simply would not come.
We could inject theological ramifications into this
development. We know from other passages of Scripture that those who
refuse God’s invitation to come to the wedding feast designed for
His Son really cannot come, for they are dead in their trespasses and
sins (Eph. 2:1). The Lord Jesus Himself said on one occasion, “No
one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him” (John
6:44a). So, it would be easy to conclude that it was not really the
case that these invitees would not come; rather, they could not come
because their hearts needed to be changed so that they would have a
desire or disposition to come. That is all true, but it is also true
that we cannot do what we will not do. Thus, there is a sense in
which these people could not come to the feast precisely because they
would not.
I have made the point countless times that every human
being in every moment of decision chooses according to his strongest
inclination at the moment. That is, no one ever does something that,
in the final analysis, he does not want to do. Even if someone points
a gun at you and asks for your money, you do not necessarily have to
give it to him. You can allow the robber to shoot you and then take
your money, gambling that you can survive the gunshot. Or you can
hand over your money, gambling that the robber will take the money
and run, leaving you unharmed. That is not exactly quintessential
free will, but the will is not altogether eliminated in this case.
But in any case, the ones who were invited to the king’s feast were
not willing to come.
In modern evangelicalism, the customary way of doing
evangelism is to invite people to place their trust in Christ.
However, that concept is virtually foreign to the Scriptures. God
does not invite people to come to Christ; He commands them to come.
The invitation in Jesus’ parable was no different. The invitees
were given a royal summons.
Indifference and Hostility
Jesus continued: “Again, he sent out other
servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have
prepared my dinner; my oxen and fatted cattle are killed, and all
things are ready. Come to the wedding.” ’ But they made
light of it and went their ways, one to his own farm, another to his
business” (vv. 4–5). The king was patient, sending other
servants to summon the invitees again. But even though it was their
king who was calling them to come, some “made light of it.” It
was not a matter of concern for them. They just did not care. They
were more concerned about their farms and businesses, the ordinary
matters of their lives. Others, however, reacted much more
negatively: “And the rest seized his servants, treated them
spitefully, and killed them” (v. 6). They so hated their king
that they mistreated and murdered his servants.
If you are a minister of the gospel or you regularly
share your faith with others, you know well that many who hear the
good news simply shrug it off. They just do not seem to care about
what they are hearing. But others get irritated by the message. They
show forth the natural human hatred for God and His messengers. His
gracious offer of salvation only provokes them to rage.
The king’s patience was exhausted by this violence
against his servants: “But when the king heard about it, he was
furious. And he sent out his armies, destroyed those murderers, and
burned up their city” (v. 7). Does God have an army? Yes. The
Bible calls Him “the Lord of hosts” (Ps. 24:10; Isa. 1:9; Mal.
1:4). These hosts are armies, heavenly forces, angelic legions that
are at His command in every moment.
Jesus continued with His parable, saying: “Then he
said to his servants, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were
invited were not worthy. Therefore go into the highways, and as many
as you find, invite to the wedding.’ So those servants went out
into the highways and gathered together all whom they found, both bad
and good. And the wedding hall was filled with guests” (vv.
8–10). The king would not be thwarted. It was his desire that his
son should be honored and that every seat be taken at his wedding
feast. If the original invitees were not interested in coming or were
violently opposed to the king, still the king would find people who
would come to the wedding feast.
One of the most remarkable moments in evangelism I ever
experienced happened when I was leading a group of laypeople in a
church in Cincinnati, Ohio. We used to go out into the community
every Tuesday night in teams of three. On one occasion, one of my
elders was going to make a presentation of the gospel for the first
time. We knocked on the door of an apartment building and the door
was opened by a young lady, who was one of two single women who lived
there. Her apartment was one of the most weird, scary places I had
ever seen. The walls were painted black and strobe lights were
scattered around. Nevertheless, the elder who was with me began to go
through a gospel presentation with the young lady. However, she
interrupted him halfway through and said: “Stop right there, I’ve
heard this a thousand times. I’m just not interested. I don’t
want to hear it.” I was training our people not to be obnoxious and
pushy in presenting the gospel, so the elder said quietly: “Well,
thank you for listening so far and for inviting us in. And I hope
that maybe someday we’ll be able to finish this.”
At that point, I spoke up. I said to the young lady, “If
you’ve really heard this a thousand times, could it possibly hurt
you to hear it one more time?” She said, “Well, no.” So, I
said, “Will you let me take just five minutes to finish this?”
and she agreed. I finished the gospel presentation, but I did not ask
her for a commitment. I simply thanked her for her patience with us
and bade her farewell. However, six weeks later that young woman
showed up in our church’s new-member class, and she told all of us
who were there that after we walked out of her door that night, she
went into her room, dissolved in tears, got down on her knees beside
her bed, and gave her life to Christ. She had to hear the gospel a
thousand and one times before the Spirit pierced her heart with the
Word of God.
This portion of the parable of the wedding feast had
much in common with some of Jesus’ previous teachings since His
triumphal entry. It showed once again that those who had been
entrusted with the kingdom—the priests, elders, scribes, and so
on—had forfeited their place by rejecting the King, Jesus Himself.
Therefore, the kingdom would be taken from them and given to others.
Proper Wedding Attire
Jesus closed this parable with what almost seems to be a
footnote, but it is very significant. He said: “But when the
king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have
on a wedding garment. So he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come
in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless”
(vv. 11–12). Remember, the last group of servants went out to the
highway and invited whomever they found there to come to the king’s
banquet. These people were delighted to come, so they hurriedly
prepared themselves. But when the guests were assembled together and
the king came into their midst, he encountered one man who had come
in without proper attire.
What is the proper clothing to which the parable was
pointing? Augustine, the fifth-century bishop of Hippo in North
Africa, was convinced that it is righteousness of Christ. If we are
not clothed in that righteousness, we will not be welcome at the
wedding feast of the Lamb in heaven, because all of our
righteousness, the Bible says, is like filthy rags (Isa. 64:6). We
can enter the kingdom of heaven only if we are dressed in the
righteousness of Jesus, which is imputed to all who believe (Zech.
3:3–4). Other scholars have disagreed with Augustine, saying that
there is no direct indication in the parable that the proper attire
for the wedding feast pointed to the righteousness of Christ. Well, I
read these commentators and I think: “What’s wrong with you? What
else can it refer to?”
When the king noticed the man in his improper clothes
and questioned him about it, what did he say? Did he say: “I’m so
sorry, your highness. I was so busy that I had no time to go home and
get dressed. I came directly here in response to the invitation from
your servants”? Did he say: “What difference does it make how I’m
dressed? Why are you so uppity, O king? I don’t think I should have
to get dressed to the nines in order to be welcome at your party”?
No. Jesus said that the man could find nothing to say. Rather, “he
was speechless.”
This is consistent with what the Bible universally
teaches about human responses at the day of judgment, where every
human being will be brought to the tribunal of God and the sins of
every one of them will be made manifest. We are told in Scripture
that every person will be silent before Him (Ps. 76:8–9; Zeph. 1:7;
Zech. 2:13). When we stand before an omniscient God who knows
everything we have ever done or thought, what excuse can we give Him?
Anyone who stands before God at the last judgment will at least have
the good sense to keep his or her mouth shut, because there will be
nothing to say.
When the man without proper wedding attire said nothing,
the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, take him
away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and
gnashing of teeth’ ” (v. 13). Without proper attire, he
simply could not remain at the feast; his place was in the outer
darkness, the place of suffering and torment.
Finally, Jesus said, “For many are called, but few
are chosen” (v. 14). This verse has caused a great deal of
consternation for many people. It drips with the doctrine of
election. It says that many receive the outward call of the gospel,
but not everyone hears it inwardly. The Apostle Paul speaks of the
“effectual call” of the gospel that is given only to the elect:
“Whom He predestined, these He also called; whom He called, these
He also justified” (Rom. 8:30). Many hear the gospel, and some make
a false profession of faith. However, from every nation God not only
calls people outwardly, but by the power of His Holy Spirit He calls
them inwardly, changing the dispositions of their hearts so that
whereas they once were unwilling to come into the presence of the
King and His Son, suddenly they are both willing and eager.
None of us can change our hearts like that. Only the
Holy Spirit can do it. He makes the unwilling willing. It makes those
who do not care to care very much. He does it because God is
determined that His Son will be honored. All whom the Father has
given to the Son come to the Son with joy.4
1
Morris, L. (1992). The
Gospel according to Matthew (pp. 546–553).
Grand Rapids, MI; Leicester, England: W.B. Eerdmans; Inter-Varsity
Press.
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