Day 280 - Matthew 21-22

ONE-YEAR JOURNEY OF THE BIBLE
Day 280 - Matthew 21-22 (You Are Invited to The Wedding in Heaven)
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"But when the king came in to see the guests, he saw a man there who did not have on a wedding garment.  So he said to him, "Friend, how did you come in here without a wedding garment?' And he was speechless.  Then the king said to the servants, "Bind him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'  "For many are called, but few are chosen."   (Matthew 22:11-14)

I have never been invited to a black tie event at the White House but I know enough that if I ever did get that coveted invite, I better comply to the strict attire requirements or expect to be sent away by the guards.  Our text above is the tail end of Jesus' parable of the Wedding Feast wherein He talked about a certain king who arranged a wedding for his son.  You need to read the whole parable to fully understand the lesson God has for us today.

To summarize the parable, those who were invited by the king "made light of it and went their ways, one to his own farm, another to his business.  And the rest seized his servants, treated them spitefully, and killed them (verses 5,6)."  The king then decided to invite anyone who was willing to attend the wedding. It is at this point of the story that the man not wearing the proper wedding garment appears and, shockingly, is arrested and thrown "into outer darkness; there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth (verse 14)."

As in all parables of Jesus, there is a spiritual meaning or lesson He wanted to teach and in this parable of the wedding feast, the King is God; the Son is Jesus; the wedding is the rapture of the Church which represents the Bride of Christ; the initial invitees is the nation of Israel, God's chosen people who killed the servants of God including John the Baptist and who rejected and killed Jesus their Messiah; and finally, the open invitation to anyone who wanted to come to the wedding represents the Gentiles to whom God turned to offer salvation through faith in His Son Jesus Christ.

But wait, who then is this man without proper wedding garment who was cast into outer darkness?  It is none other than the person who tried to make it to heaven, represented by the wedding party, through his own way usually through religion or philosophy or good deeds.  Although those ways may not appear to be bad, it is not what God has required to enter His kingdom and therefore those who insist on getting to heaven their way will find themselves cast away into everlasting darkness in hell.

You may be thinking, "That doesn't seem fair," or "That doesn't seem like what a loving God would do."  If God gave us "fairness" no one would make it to heaven because God said the "the wages of sin is death (Romans 6:23)," and since "all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23)."  But thank God He is a loving God who is full of grace (unmeritted favor for all) that "He gave His only Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life (John 3:16)."

When the great day of the wedding of Christ to His Bride finally happens, will you be found wearing the proper garment?  Did I forget to say that the wedding garment represents the blood of Christ shed as a covering for our sins?  In the book of Revelation, we read about the saints who are those who have "washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb (Revelation 7:14)."  Have you come to the Lamb of God who was sacrificed so that you and I could have our sins washed in the fount of His blood?  May you do so today if you have not yet done so.