“The Wedding Banquet Will Happen; The Kingdom Will Come" October 12, 2008 Pentecost 22 Lectionary 28

(First, read the text for this sermon: Matthew 22:1-14)

Four months ago I was in Tanzania. One visit was to the Slahamo Lutheran Parish. Hundreds of people gathered on a Thursday afternoon for the graduation ceremony of the parish’s technical training school. There were hours of singing and dancing and ceremony! And, as part of the ceremony, since I am an mchugali (Swahili for “pastor”), the mchugali of the parish called me forward and presented me with …

… this club!

I was very gracious. I thanked them. I returned to my seat. And later I asked the mchugali, “Why did you give me this?”

He said, “It’s something to carry on your pastoral rounds. Now, it’s not to actually hit anyone with. But it’s a reminder that it is the pastor’s job to correct parishioners when that is necessary.”

I found out later that this is a club that would be used by a Masai warrior! In fact, the Mongai Parish had given me this ebony cane earlier, featuring a Masai warrior in the carving on the cane, and, indeed, he is holding such a club.

A Masai warrior’s club as a symbol of pastoral authority? Is this according to the model of Jesus?

I thought of this anew when encountering the passage we read this morning, from the gospel of Matthew. In the story, God is presented as the king. And the story starts out joyfully enough: Once more Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying: "The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding banquet for his son.” Doesn’t that sound wonderful? The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a wedding banquet? What joy! Patty and I threw a wedding party for our daughter and son-in-law when they were married this past Memorial Day weekend, and I can’t think of a more jubilant four days! If the kingdom of heaven, the wedding banquet, God’s fulfillment of all history and creation is to be this joyful, then we are filled with hope as we do the work God gives us to do in our day to day lives!

But soon, in the story from Matthew, strange and frightening things begin happening. The king can’t get anyone to come to the wedding banquet! The king has prepared the mother of all feasts – “my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready” – but the invited guests not only refuse the invitation, they react violently to it! They not only seize the messengers from the king, they not only mistreat them, they kill them! What is going on?

Understandably enough, the king becomes enraged at this! We read: “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.”

What radical inclusion! (This story would have been extremely offensive to the Pharisees it was aimed at: because they saw their God-given work to be keeping God’s people purified, and in the story the banquet hall is now filled with all kinds of unclean people.) "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."

Does this story describe God? The God who became flesh in Jesus the Christ?

Here’s the thing: we interpret the Bible according to the Word of God.

The Word of God, first, is Jesus – the word become flesh. According to Luther, the Bible is the Word of God as it witnesses to Jesus. And there is much that does not witness to Jesus in the Bible. That goes even for stories in the New Testament, even in the gospel of Matthew, even in the passage from Matthew that we read this morning. Certainly, the violent, enraged king does not correspond to the God that Jesus embodied in human flesh.

This story was added to the gospel of Matthew sometime during the two generations between Jesus’ death and resurrection and the gospel book being put into written form. The story was added, perhaps, to address the anxiety in this ancient Christian community: because so many were rejecting the good news of Jesus. Perhaps it was comforting to think that God would get those people! But, as Biblical commentator Warren Carter puts it, “In envisioning God acting in [this] way, the gospel is again co-opted by the very imperial world it seeks to resist.”

So, we critique this morning’s story according to Jesus. We read this morning’s story according to God embodied in Jesus. Do we simply dismiss the story, then? No. If we look beneath the violence and rage in the story, we do see clues of what God is like, as embodied in Jesus. For one thing, we see God’s persistence! We see that God is untiring in inviting all people to the wedding banquet, into the kingdom of heaven. The wedding banquet will happen. The kingdom will come. And we see that there is an urgency to this. Will we respond? Will we be wearing a wedding garment?

God continually extends the invitation, even to “the good and the bad,” even to people like you and me. God invites all to the wedding banquet, into the kingdom of heaven: the joyous fulfillment of God’s purposes for creation.

Indeed, in the richness of our liturgy of Holy Communion, in what we are doing right now, we celebrate our inclusion in that wedding banquet. In our Holy Communion meal we taste the feast of the kingdom which is already dawning in the resurrection.

Notice this theme in our liturgy. Listen again to this morning’s Prayer of the Day: “Lord of the feast, you have prepared a table before all peoples and poured out your life with abundance. Call us again to your banquet. Strengthen us by what is honorable, just, and pure, and transform us into a people of righteousness and peace, through Jesus Christ our Savior and Lord. Amen.

Then, a few minutes after that prayer, in the Hymn of Praise, we sang: “This is the feast of victory for our God. Alleluia.” This communion meal is a foretaste of the feast to come – the wedding banquet of the coming kingdom.

Then, in a few minutes, as we prepare for the feast of the altar banquet, we include in our prayer those who hunger in any way. This happens after the offering of money and bread and wine is brought forward: “Holy God, gracious and merciful, you bring forth food from the earth and nourish your whole creation. Turn our hearts toward those who hunger in any way, that all may know your care; and prepare us now to feast on the bread of life, Jesus Christ, our Savior and Lord. Amen.”

Then, after all of us have received the bread and wine of the feast, the foretaste of the wedding banquet of the kingdom, I will speak this blessing: “The body and blood of our Lord Jesus Christ strengthen and preserve you in eternal life. Amen.” Strengthen and preserve you in eternal life which has begun!

And hear the repeated imagery in the prayer that comes right after that blessing: “O God, we give you thanks that you have set before us this feast, the body and blood of your Son. By your Spirit strengthen us to serve all in need and to give ourselves away as bread for the hungry, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

The wedding banquet will happen. The kingdom will come.

What joy – to be fed, and to be sent to feed others.

In the name of God, who is Father and Son and Holy Spirit. Amen.

Pastor Andy Ballentine
St. Stephen Lutheran Church
Williamsburg, Virginia