Matthew 22:1-14
October 15, 2023
Normally I try to begin my sermons
with a clever or pointed illustration that leads us into the passage before us.
But this has been a hard, sad, and frightening week. Too many weeks feels this
way because the news here at home and from around the world is often bad news.
But the terrible news coming out of Israel and Gaza, of the catastrophic loss
of life of both Israelis and Palestinians is horrific. Although it has been
many years since I was there, I vividly remember the people I met and the
places I saw so it feels personal in a way other conflicts have not. Sadly, I
believe the worst is still to come.
So, when I tried to think of a story
or illustration that would move us into this passage from Matthew’s gospel,
nothing seemed appropriate or helpful. It has been a disturbing week, and we
have a disturbing passage before us.
Last week I said that sometimes
there should be a warning label on scripture because scripture can both
challenge and change us. It can also disturb and unsettle us, sometimes making
me as a preacher want to skip the hard stories altogether and preach on
something “nice” instead. But I am convinced we need the hard stories, the
challenging stories, even the painful stories as much as we do the comforting
ones. So, we dig into this parable duly warned.
Matthew’s parables are getting
darker, but the times in which Jesus is telling them are getting darker as
well. The plots to have Jesus killed are fomenting. He is angering the
religious authorities. He speaks truth to those in power, and therefore he is a
threat to those in power. This parable, which is dark and hard to hear, is
right in line with what is happening in the world around Jesus.
“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.”
The context in which Jesus is
speaking this parable and the others that we have read is dark. As much as the
crowds around him have lauded him, followed him, sought after him, and
beseeched him, Jesus knows that his ultimate rejection by the world is fast
approaching. As I said earlier, he is angering the powers-that-be. He is making
enemies, and those enemies are plotting to seek their revenge. That is the context
in which Jesus is speaking these parables. But we are dealing with a larger
context as well because Matthew is writing his gospel account to a particular
audience in a particular context too.
Biblical
scholars believe that Matthew is writing to a community in conflict. In his
community, his church if you will, a split is happening. His community is
splintering and dividing. Matthew and those others who have heard the good news
of Jesus and believed are most likely the minority. It seems that the majority
are unwilling or unable to hear or believe the good news, and the result is a
theological and emotional battle for the soul of the community.
Although a similar parable to this
one is found in the gospel of Luke, Matthew takes this parable and makes it a
grave, even sinister, warning. If you do not accept the invitation to the
king’s feast, if you decline, even though you were supposed to be on the guest
list, you will not only be replaced by someone else, but you will also be
destroyed.
And, just as in last week’s parable
of the vineyard, the emissaries of the king who brought the invitations were
not only dismissed, but some of them were also abused, mistreated, and killed.
So it is understandable, sort of, why the king would be angry, but it is still
a struggle – at least for me – as to how to grasp the terrible turn that takes
place in the parable. The king is not only angry. The king sends out his troops
and destroys those who declined, those who murdered the emissaries and burns
down their city. Then, while the city is on fire, others are invited. The party
doors are thrown open to a brand-new guest list.
But as I said, Matthew is writing to
a community that is splintering over who believes and who does not. Matthew
Skinner, a professor at Luther Seminary in St. Paul, and one of the
contributors to WorkingPreacher.org. said that we must read this parable and
indeed this gospel with empathy. We must have empathy for what the community
Matthew is writing to is going through. We must have empathy because in moments
of division and polarization, do we not also wish that those on the other side
of the line might suffer consequences for what we feel are their wrong beliefs
or lack of belief entirely?
And
while it might be hard for us to consider the possibility that Matthew would be
manipulating this parable to awaken the collective conscious of those in his
community who have turned away from the gospel, that may be some of what is
happening here. Does this mean that Matthew is putting words into Jesus’ mouth
to evoke a particular response from his community? No. But I think Matthew is
putting into words what the minority group of believers in his community must
have felt. We have told you the truth, and you won’t believe, so here are the
consequences … the kingdom of heaven is like a king who gave a wedding banquet
for his son …
But
while I can by empathetic with Matthew’s community because I know that I have
also been guilty of wishing dire consequences for people I think have distorted
the truth, especially what I believe to be the truth of the gospel, the
violence of this passage is hard to take. That’s an understatement.
When I think about the kingdom of
heaven being like a banquet, I think more in terms of Isaiah’s poetry than I do
Matthew’s stark and violent depiction. I relate more to the imagery of people
from every nation gathered on the Lord’s holy mountain for a wonderful feast, a
feast of celebration and thanksgiving. I have had dreams of feasts like this,
where we sit at the table with friends and family, with neighbors and strangers
who we realize were our neighbors all along, with those who are living and
those who are living in God, and it is the most beautiful and wonderful dream.
But the stuff of my dreams is far from the reality that we are living in the
world today.
You see as hard as this parable is,
to hear, to read, to understand, to contend with, we also hold it in tension
with what we believe and know about God. What we believe and know is that God
is a God of grace. God is a God of love and mercy, and yes, judgment too. But
judgment in Matthew’s gospel is not so much about punishment as it is on opening
the eyes and heart and mind of the one being judged so that person can change
course and can turn back to God. That does not make this parable any easier to
hear or understand, but it helps – at least a little.
But there is one more piece of this
parable that we have not dealt with yet, and that is this poor, underdressed
wedding guest at the end. What about him and his fate?
This seems to take the parable from
difficult to downright impossible. In my study of this passage, I have heard a
few theories. One is that if we accept the invitation, then we must be prepared
to follow through in every way. Being a disciple of Christ is not just about
saying, “yes,” then sitting back and resting on our laurels. Being a disciple
means striving to live the life we have been called to live, in our words and
in our deeds. If we are going to show up to the banquet, then we must really
show up.
A second possibility is that the
idea of the king representing God is wrong. When it comes to the guest who is
thrown out of the banquet, we must consider that the party goers are us and the
man banished from our communion is Jesus himself. If Jesus, a Middle-Eastern
itinerant, hard truth speaking, temple cleansing, parable telling, welcomer of
society’s outcasts, misfits, and rogues preacher were to show up at our doors,
would we welcome him in? Would we make room at the table for him especially
since he would not look like us or sound like us or think like us?
And if this guest was Jesus, was his
banishment about being underdressed or was it that he refused to clothe himself
in the same violence and vengefulness as all the rest? Maybe it wasn’t so much
that he was underdressed but that he was wearing different clothes altogether?
I don’t know which of these ideas is
technically “correct.” I suppose there is a measure of truth in all of it. But
I do know that when it comes violence – whether in this parable or the violence
that we witness in our world – I want to put on different clothes. I want to
dress myself, head to toe, heart and mind, in the clothing of peace and
peacemaking. To paraphrase Dr. King, violence begets nothing but more violence.
The only way forward is to stop, even if that means I am banished from the
party altogether. The only way forward is to stop and trust that this banquet
of violence is not what God wants for us, for all of us, for all
of God’s children. The banquet God wants for us is the one described in Isaiah
– a rich feast where all people gather at the table on the Lord’s holy mountain
and God destroys death which hangs over all of us like a shroud. It is a feast
where every tear is wiped away, every disgrace is taken away, and we sit at
table together and give our God our thanks and praise. That is the banquet I
long to attend. That is the banquet we all must work for and live for, even die
for. May it be so. May it be so.
Let all of God’s children say,
“Alleluia.”
Amen.
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