Parable of Royal Wedding Feast

Parable of royal wedding feast (Mt22:1-14) Lesson 26 5/1/24

Jesus the party animal? OK, well Jesus liked to celebrate and used celebrations in several of the parables and this is one of them.

Q: Have you learned things by going to a celebration, or remembering one? - - - some may be good things, others not so good, and you will see this in this parable this afternoon too.

I think I would like to point out a couple of things before getting to the text.

This is not just a wedding feast, this is a king’s wedding feast, a royal wedding feast.

This parable is not the same as the parable of the great supper we looked at before in Mt14:15-24. There are some similarities in them, but we are looking at this one under our section warning and rewards section of the parables.

Insert Mt22:1-14 and ask the questions.

Matthew 22:1–14 NASB95

1 Jesus spoke to them again in parables, saying, 2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. 3 “And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come. 4 “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.” ’ 5 “But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business, 6 and the rest seized his slaves and mistreated them and killed them. 7 “But the king was enraged, and he sent his armies and destroyed those murderers and set their city on fire. 8 “Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. 9 ‘Go therefore to the main highways, and as many as you find there, invite to the wedding feast.’ 10 “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. 11 “But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed in wedding clothes, 12 and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?’ And the man was speechless. 13 “Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ 14 “For many are called, but few are chosen.”

I mentioned the parable of great supper, or parable of excuses we may have called it, but in our parable there is judgment that is delved out.

There are a few commentators like Barclay that take this parable and break it into two parables

Mt22:1-10 (the invitation)

Then Mt22:11-14 (the judgment)

Some push back on this, on the judgment is this really what Jesus would do then? Or is it foretelling of what was to come in AD70 or the end of days at His return?

We do need to know that the Lamb of God is going to return as conquering King and judgment is going to be passed down, just as it was to Jerusalem in AD70.

In this parable we see the Eastern tradition of the time of the great wedding celebrations that happened

First invitation of the wedding would be sent, no specifics given, just that it was coming

Second invitation would go out with approximate date

Third would be when all things are ready and to come for the bridegroom has come for his bride

Matthew has this placed behind the parable of the landowner where in like we see servants sent out, mistreated, and then the son who was killed.

There is a parallel of the two in the aspects of the Jews rejecting Jesus and the word going to the Gentiles.

The warning in this parable is don’t turn your back on Jesus.

Explaining the text:

Due to verbiage (plural vs. singular) being used in this, this is a wedding feast vs. a wedding itself.

AB Bruce “The word for wedding feast was plural because marriage feasts lasted for several days, probably seven.” (The Expositors Greek Testament, pg. 269)

The king sent out the invitation, then sent out a second one, but those who were invited gave no attention to it. The correct translation is “they paid no attention, to be negligent.” This is not being mean, insulting, it is they just did not give any mind to the invitation. They did not consider for they did consider other things more important.

Is this not how it is today, the invitation to come to Christ is there and many give it no mind, or ignore it?

In the parable they ignored, but then they took the kings servants and mistreated and killed them (like the parable of landowner) but this is the king, the one with authority too, and judgment was coming. In the parable the armies were sent out.

Purpose and application:

Ah, think about this, by the gospel message you have been invited to the wedding supper of the Lamb as the bride of Christ. Let me go from there

Major point of this parable was directed at the Jews who are rejecting the invitation, rejecting Gods call for mercy, and they persecuted, mistreated, killed the prophets of God, and were about to kill the Son as mentioned earlier.

Jesus is pointing out the rejecting comes with a great consequence, it will be severe

The universality of God’s mercy is seen in the calls made to those who were invited (invitation 2 and 3).

You can see God’s patience and His mercy of which they spurned.

The final invitation (v8) shows it goes out to the Gentiles, all the people the servants could find (vv.9-10) God has made great preparation for the coming of the bridegroom, the coming of Christ and was not, is not going to let the preparation to be a wasted effort.

God expects those of us who attend the feast to make proper preparation too!.

One man came unprepared (vv.11-12).

Some commentators way that at a wedding, wedding clothes were provided all you had to do was put them on.

Most commentators say it was to wear something appropriate, so plan to put on appropriate clothes to come to the celebration.

Womack: “The same will be true when we approach the wedding feat of the Lamb of God. We will be expected to be appropriately attired with the clothing of Christ living and to be clothed in Christ Himself, and with virtue.

God does not expect perfection, but does expect direction (Rom12:2) and does give us some things to consider in our risen life (time permitting put in summary of Col3:1-17) - - - need to pull out the characteristics from the passage as you go.

Colossians 3:1–17 NASB95

1 Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God. 2 Set your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on earth. 3 For you have died and your life is hidden with Christ in God. 4 When Christ, who is our life, is revealed, then you also will be revealed with Him in glory. 5 Therefore consider the members of your earthly body as dead to immorality, impurity, passion, evil desire, and greed, which amounts to idolatry. 6 For it is because of these things that the wrath of God will come upon the sons of disobedience, 7 and in them you also once walked, when you were living in them. 8 But now you also, put them all aside: anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive speech from your mouth. 9 Do not lie to one another, since you laid aside the old self with its evil practices, 10 and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him— 11 a renewal in which there is no distinction between Greek and Jew, circumcised and uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave and freeman, but Christ is all, and in all. 12 So, as those who have been chosen of God, holy and beloved, put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience; 13 bearing with one another, and forgiving each other, whoever has a complaint against anyone; just as the Lord forgave you, so also should you. 14 Beyond all these things put on love, which is the perfect bond of unity. 15 Let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in one body; and be thankful. 16 Let the word of Christ richly dwell within you, with all wisdom teaching and admonishing one another with psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with thankfulness in your hearts to God. 17 Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks through Him to God the Father.

Learning to live the parable:

All invited, all have opportunity to be clothed appropriately for this great feast. We know we are all recipients of God’s great mercy, patience (longsuffering) and His grace. We know He has given 2nd, 3rd, and continual chances to come, but be sure you know one day the doors will be closed. In the book Womack points to four ways of treating God’s invitation

First, ignore it. As mentioned before this is to neglect it. A result of as Womack puts it indifference, putting other things before a great royal invitation. You can have great intentions, but here we see they neglected to go. They did not make excuses, they just ignored the invitation when the time came to go.

Second, you can reject the invitation. Here we see the rejection was with violence even, with malice, with prejudice, we see that today don’t we, people who reject the gospel message in hostility.

Third, we can respond with insolence or laziness as Womack states. These are those who put no effort into their Christian attire (spiritual). They had good intentions, but put not effort into do it. Or they think God is asking too much of them by asking them to love on another, to pray, to hide His word in their heart so they just don’t do it.

Forth, a hearty acceptance of the offer, of the invitation! Do not think more needs to be said on this.

This parable illustrates to us both the goodness and the severity of God.

The goodness in the time and time again invitation. From the God of second chances

To the severity seen in the fact that He will punish disobedience.

Insert (Rom11:22)

Romans 11:22 NASB95

22 Behold then the kindness and severity of God; to those who fell, severity, but to you, God’s kindness, if you continue in His kindness; otherwise you also will be cut off.

Summary: God wants us to be prepared for when that final invitation comes to be ready to go! May we also help others to be prepared too for we do not know the day or the hour!