Love and Commitment

 Charlotte Collins Reed

Christ Church Episcopal

October 11, 2020

23 Proper A 

          Some years ago, the church I was serving threw a funeral for a beloved 99 year old parishioner.  The parishioner had grown up in the community and at the church and loved both deeply and generously.  She was one of the great philanthropists of the city, supporting the arts, education, and, of course, her church.  Overstating her impact on the community would be difficult.  Her family was small, unwell, and out of town, so when the time came to plan her funeral, we were on our own.  The choir of her university was asked to sing.  Speakers from the arts community were lined up.  The parishioner’s own artwork-creations from her own hand-were borrowed to put in the entryway to the church.  All the arrangements were made to celebrate the life of this remarkable, humble, gracious and generous woman.  When the time for the service arrived, we had a small army of greeters and ushers ready to welcome and assist, musicians prepped, and a fine service planned.  And no one came.  Other than the choir, the speakers, and parishioners, many of whom were helping with the celebration, almost no one showed.  I remember one parishioner, a dear friend of the deceased, sitting in the back of the church weeping and furious that so very few people had come to pay their respects and show their gratitude.  We were sad, angry, disappointed, and felt a bit betrayed by the community.

          So I understand something of the king’s anger when he throws a wedding feast for his son and no one comes.  This is one of the most bizarre of Jesus’ parables about the Kingdom of Heaven.  Because the parable is about a wedding banquet, our thoughts go to love, rejoicing, commitment, and all those things we might learn from a parable about a wedding banquet.  But here we have a king, who we understand to be God, who sends out his servants to call all the invited guests to the wedding banquet for his son, who we understand to be Jesus, but the people would not come. Why?  Were they too busy?  Were they afraid of the king who does seem to have quite a temper?  The king sends more servants with a glorious, mouthwatering description of the wedding feast, and still the guests won’t come.  Some even seized the slaves, mistreated them and killed them.  This is a rather extreme way to send back an RSVP with regrets.  Now the king is understandably enraged, even if his reaction is over the top.  He sent his troops, burned their city, and destroyed the murderers.  Then he sends his servants to invite everyone they find to the wedding banquet, both good and bad, and the wedding hall was filled with guests.  By this time, one would think that the food would be either burned to a crisp, stone cold, or even begun to rot.

          But all’s well that ends well, right?  If the parable just stopped there, we would have a lovely parable about the way the king, or the kingdom of heaven, never gives up even in the face of rejection, trying over and over again to invite people to the banquet, and inviting everyone, good or bad, to the feast that never grows old.  But, unfortunately, the parable does not end there.  One poor guy is not wearing a wedding robe, and he is thrown into utter darkness where there is weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth.  For many are called but few are chosen. 

          What has this poor man done to deserve such judgement?  He had not planned on going to a wedding banquet when he left home that morning.  He was probably going to work, or out running errands, or dropping the kids off at school when he was summoned to the banquet.  He put down what he was doing and answered the summons.  How could he be expected to have a wedding garment?   And how do we avoid making the same mistake since, after all, we are talking about the Kingdom of Heaven here.

          Since this is a parable about a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son, let’s back up a minute and see what we have learned about the king so far.  First, the king is passionate about the banquet for his son.  This banquet is really, really important to him.  Secondly, it is so important that he never gives up on inviting people to come, despite some startlingly negative responses.  Thirdly, we learn that the king is capable of deep anger in response to rejection, the same deep anger that we see in our reading from Exodus when God is so angry with God’s own people that God threatens to consume them for breaking the second commandment and making and worshipping a golden calf.  My hunch is that in both cases, behind the anger, are feelings of sadness, disappointment, and betrayal.  But the banquet is so important to the king, that when none of the invited guests will come, he opens the doors to everyone, good and bad, and finally the wedding hall is full.  The banquet apparently cannot start until the hall is full.  And the food, whatever is being served, has no expiration date. 

          There are as many theories about why the man got thrown out of the hall and into the utter darkness as there are commentaries on the subject.   Most likely, no one arrived at the wedding banquet with the correct clothes since no one had planned on attending the feast when they left home that morning.  However, in the first century, people often traveled for days on foot to attend a wedding, which often lasted for a week to make the festivities worth the travel.  Wedding garments were often supplied by the host when the guests arrived.  So, by refusing to wear the wedding garment, guest was likely refusing a piece of the king’s hospitality and refusing to enter fully into the celebration of the king’s son.  He wants to enjoy the food and entertainment without giving himself fully to the occasion.

          This parable, along with the story of the golden calf in Exodus, reminds us of two great truths.  First, the God of love is not immune to anger.  God loves us too much not to be hurt and angered by our betrayal and failure to live in faithful response to God’s tremendous love and gracious hospitality.  Secondly, the invitation to the marriage banquet, the feast that celebrates the giving of God’s son Jesus to the world, is so important that the feast demands our whole selves, not just whatever little bit we care to part with at the moment.  In this odd parable about a marriage banquet, we actually do learn a powerful and clear teaching about love and commitment. 

                                                                   Amen.