Proper 23 year A RCL

October 12, 2008

Matthew 22:1-14

Once more Jesus spoke to the people 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."

Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable to you, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer. In the name of the Triune God: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Let me try to more clearly picture the scene of the above parable. There is to be a big wedding banquet. The king invites the “in crowd.” But they are too busy tending to their businesses and their personal lives. Their own pursuits were more important than the king’s celebration. So the king opens up the party to all people. Anyone that will come is to be an honored guest. So far, so good.

But there is this one man comes to the party and is loading up at the buffet table without actually participating in the festivities. He is by himself, in the shadows, not talking to any of the other guests. In fact, he kind of snuck in and, while inside, he has been sneaking around even still. The king notices that he has not put on the festal wedding gown that everyone else is wearing. The king is troubled about this.

Now, I see two choices for why the guy isn’t wearing the appropriate attire. First, he is poor and doesn’t own that set of clothes. In which case the king is just tossing him out for being poor. This runs contrary to all that I believe about the nature of God. The other possibility is that the wedding clothes were available to him to wear, but he demised the idea of wearing what he knew he should. He wanted the food at the party, but didn’t want the hassle of putting on the wedding robe. Surely the wedding robe fit well and would have been easy to acquire. He just didn’t want to be bothered. So he lurks in the corners, planning not to be noticed, while he is sticking out like a sore thumb the whole time.

The key to the whole parable, I think, is when the king asks him why he isn’t wearing the garb. The man has the opportunity to say that his is at the dry cleaners, or that it doesn’t fit any more, or whatever good excuse he might have. But he just stands there speechless, like the proverbial child with his hand in the cookie jar, knowing full well that he has been caught doing what he ought not be doing. When you are caught red-handed there is no excuse (unless you are a very good, very fast liar).

I got caught a few years ago talking smack about a guy. I told a guy that I thought this other guy was lazy. Of course, I didn’t know it, but the wives of these two guys where good friends. Pretty soon I got a call from the second guy demanding to know why I was calling him lazy. There I was, like the man in the parable, caught red-handed in my lameness. I had nothing to say. I knew at that moment that calling this guy lazy was purely judgmental on my part. And I knew that I had really described him as lazy to the first guy so that I would feel like I was ambitious and hard working by comparison.

Maybe the guy at the wedding banquet was thinking similar thoughts. “I don’t have to conform to your stupid tradition of wearing that wedding robe. I’m fine exactly as I am. In fact, I’m better than the rest of those other guests that have to wear these robes so that they can fit in.” I think maybe the wedding guest with no robe and I were both trying to feel better than everyone else even though we had to put down others to feel “better than.” And when we were called on it, we were both speechless.

One difference, however, was that after I had been initially stunned into silence I accepted responsibility for what I had said and apologized. See the guy started his confrontation with me by giving me the benefit of the doubt. “I heard that you said I was lazy. You didn’t really say that, did you?” He gave me the opportunity to deny the whole thing. That was the awkward silence part as I contemplated lying and the odds of getting caught in that too, making everything that much worse. Accepting responsibility and apologizing was the first step toward reconciliation with the lazy guy. Had the wedding guest done this he would not have been “bound hand and foot, and thrown into the outer darkness.” That is what our faith tradition teaches—that repentance leads to redemption. That is the good news. The bad news is that not everyone seeks redemption. That is sad. As a Christian I need to lead others to the goal of redemption, if I can. But first I must seek all the redemption for myself that I can. I can’t lead others to a place where I haven’t been.

==AMEN==