Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
Matthew 22:1-14
22:1 And again Jesus spoke to them in parables, saying, 2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son, 3 and sent his servants1 to call those who were invited to the wedding feast, but they would not come. 4 Again he sent other servants, saying, ‘Tell those who are invited, “See, I have prepared my dinner, my oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered, and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast.”’ 5 But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business, 6 while the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. 7 The king was angry, and he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city. 8 Then he said to his servants, ‘The wedding feast is ready, but those invited were not worthy. 9 Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you find.’ 10 And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.
11 “But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment. 12 And he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment?’ And he was speechless. 13 Then the king said to the attendants, ‘Bind him hand and foot and cast 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.”
[1] 22:3
(ESV)
Redeemer exists to celebrate and declare the gospel of God as we grow in knowing and following Jesus Christ.
If you have a bible, I invite you to open to Matthew chapter 22. Matthew chapter 22. And while you are turning there, I'd like to remind you of the tremendous opportunity. I would go so far as to say it's responsibility that we have as a church. The Lord has gifted us with this parking deck, which, has just worked fantastic for us.
Jeffrey Heine:In some ways, it reminds us of old school redeemer when we actually had to set up and take down each week. And and you couldn't really do much, but you can still gather together to pray and to sing and hear God's word preached. It thrills my heart to see so many people here this morning. And the opportunity that I want to remind us that we have is that God has given us facility where we can accommodate more and we can invite people. And I think this is actually our responsibility as well.
Jeffrey Heine:If you are a freshman and you are coming in town, for most people, school starts college students, it starts tomorrow or on Tuesday. So they will be arriving shortly. Worship right now because of this pandemic. You can't just go and show up. Almost every church out there, you have to make reservations right now.
Jeffrey Heine:They're at 25% capacity. And so what that means is for these 100, if not 1,000 of freshmen that are showing up at in Birmingham, is if they do not come here, it's not that they're not choosing another church to go to. It's that they're choosing not to go to church. Because the church is not available to them. That's a tremendous opportunity and responsibility for us as a church that we need to go and bring our college students in.
Jeffrey Heine:And not just our college students, but for those who have just moved into this city, perhaps for a new job. They've just graduated. They've moved here. What a terrible time to move into a city. But once again, they cannot just attend a church.
Jeffrey Heine:But the Lord has given us a facility in which we can invite people to come. So I want to encourage you to ask those who who can't find another place, those who would normally not be part of a church, ask them to come. Those who don't know the Lord, this is a great opportunity to invite them. Tell them you're not going to church. You just want them to check out a parking deck.
Jeffrey Heine:Alright? And then just, you know, just have them here. And let me say the next few weeks are going to be gospel saturated. A great opportunity for them to hear the gospel. And so this is our chance to do that.
Jeffrey Heine:And I want to encourage you, Church, to do so. We've been listening to a lot of experts, rightly so. And but what we haven't been hearing is, experts in soul care. And I would if I could humbly say I've been doing soul care for a long time. And what I'm finding is, what does it profit a person if he gains his whole body and he forfeits his soul?
Jeffrey Heine:And it's time for us to begin gathering. And I'm excited that we are gathering together in person and we're hearing one another sing and that we have this community of faith. So be sure to open this up and invite that, to those whom you know, who are not part of a church. Alright. Matthew 22.
Jeffrey Heine:We begin our or we continue our series, through the parables. And again, Jesus spoke to them in parables saying, the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son and sent his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding feast. But they would not come. Again, he sent other servants saying, tell those who are invited. See, I have prepared my dinner.
Jeffrey Heine:My oxen and my fat calves have been slaughtered and everything is ready. Come to the wedding feast. But they paid no attention and went off, one to his farm, another to his business, While the rest seized his servants, treated them shamefully, and killed them. The king was angry. And he sent his troops and destroyed those murderers and burned their city.
Jeffrey Heine:Then he said to his servants, the wedding feast is ready. But those invited were not worthy. Go therefore to the main roads and invite to the wedding feast as many as you can find. And those servants went out into the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. So the wedding hall was filled with guests.
Jeffrey Heine:But when the king came in to look at the guests, he saw there a man who had no wedding garment. And he said to him, friend, how did you get in here without a wedding garment? And he was speechless. Then the king said to the attendants, bind him hand and foot and cast them into the outer darkness, in that place where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few are chosen.
Jeffrey Heine:This is the word of the lord. Thank you, God. Pray with me. Father, I pray that now through your spirit, we would feast on your word, that your word would do its work in us, that it would not return out of your mouth void, but it would accomplish your purpose. I pray that my words would fall to the ground and blow away and not be remembered anymore.
Jeffrey Heine:But, Lord, may your words remain and may they change us. We pray this in the strong name of Jesus. Amen. The kingdom of God is often the subject of Jesus' parables. And I think the reason they are is because he knows we have a hard time grasping hold of what the kingdom of God means and what the kingdom of God is all about.
Jeffrey Heine:Often when we think of the kingdom of God, we we just think of it in terms of maybe things we have to give up. Like, we have to give up having fun. We now have to obey rules. We now have to get in line. Perhaps we have to give up listening to good music and start listening to cheesy music.
Jeffrey Heine:We have to start going to Chick Fil A. Maybe work at a soup kitchen. We have all of these strange notions as what it means to to become a Christian, to be a part of his kingdom. But Jesus here, he tells us what the Kingdom of God is actually like. He says, I don't know what you've heard, but this is what the Kingdom of life of God is like.
Jeffrey Heine:It's like a wedding feast. It's a party. We shouldn't be surprised that Jesus says this. After all, his very first miracle was not healing a lame person or healing someone blind. It wasn't raising someone from the dead.
Jeffrey Heine:His very first miracle was to turn water into wine. And to take what was a mediocre party and and take it up a few notches into it where it became the absolute best party. Because the kingdom of God is a feast. It's a party in which God is present. Now, in this parable we have before us, Jesus is going to teach us 4 things about this feast.
Jeffrey Heine:Actually, he teaches us more. I'm going to teach you only 4 things that Jesus says about this feast, about the Kingdom of God. And each one of these things is going to humble us. So let me go ahead and give you the outline of the sermon. We are going to look at the extravagance of the kingdom of God.
Jeffrey Heine:We're gonna look at, the slowness of the kingdom. Then we're gonna look at the openness of the kingdom. And then we are going to look at what we must wear to be a part of the kingdom. And each one of these things will humble us. Humility is required to be part of the kingdom of God.
Jeffrey Heine:So let's look at extravagance. Here we see the extravagance of the kingdom of God. This is a royal wedding feast. The parable begins with a king who has a son, who's getting married. And because he has tremendous love for his son, he wants to honor his son.
Jeffrey Heine:And he thinks the best way to do that is to have this elaborate feast. And the king is spared no expense. The oxen are killed. The fattened calves have been prepared. You have as much filet mignon as you want.
Jeffrey Heine:Eat as much rib eye as you can handle. Organic vegetables, if you're into to that sort of thing, available for you. The best food and wine. You have your champagne, Pappy Van Winkle, 23. Everything you could ever want there at this feast, it's all been extravagantly given to you.
Jeffrey Heine:And it's free. But because of its extravagance and because of its freeness, do you see how humbling that is? You're not being invited to a potluck dinner in which, you know, you are supposed to bring a dish to share with everybody. If somebody invites you to hot and hot fish club downtown, and say they're gonna pay for your meal, you you don't say, that's great. Let me first stop at home.
Jeffrey Heine:I'll, you know, I'll cook up some mac and cheese, and I'll bring it with me to share. Like, no. You'll ruin the dinner. You'll insult the host. This is a much better dinner than you are thinking.
Jeffrey Heine:This feast here is so extravagant. It can only be offered for free. Because no payment that any of us could possibly give could be remotely sufficient. So what this means is, we have to swallow our pride. We have to come to grips that there's absolutely nothing that we can contribute to this table.
Jeffrey Heine:We can't contribute to this party. We can only come. And to even try to contribute to this party shows we have no idea as to how glorious it is. To get into the kingdom of God and to enjoy its pleasures, you have to realize that no matter how good you are, no matter how many good deeds you have done, they will not buy you a seat at this table. So you submit to its extravagance.
Jeffrey Heine:You are humbled by its freeness. And next, we are to be humbled by the slowness of the kingdom. The kingdom of God does not come to us immediately. We've already learned this as we've been looking through the parables, because we've seen that the kingdom of God, it it comes to us like a seed that takes time to grow. It comes to us like leaven that's that's worked into the dough and takes time to leaven all of the bread.
Jeffrey Heine:Here we see it comes to us like a party, but to 1 in whom we are first invited, And then we have to wait. As you know, from being invited to many royal parties, I'm sure, Royal parties, you were invited to a series of invitations. First there would be an invitation that would be sent out to you, letting you know that there was going to be a royal feast, sometime in the weeks ahead, or perhaps the months ahead. Perhaps it came with a little save the date picture that you could put on your fridge so so you knew the time was coming. And it's then that you would RSVP to that invitation, and you would send in your yes.
Jeffrey Heine:And then you would wait for the next invitation that would come on the day that the wedding feast had arrived. So the story that Jesus tells us here, it doesn't begin with that first invitation. It begins with the second invitation. The king is calling on those who have already RSVP'd their yes. They've heard the gospel and they responded with yes.
Jeffrey Heine:They were coming. And actually, they literally said yes to the gospel. That's what the word gospel means. The word is euangelian. And it literally was a declaration from the king.
Jeffrey Heine:It's why we call it good news. The king is putting out good news, the gospel. So they literally heard the good news from the king, and they had said yes to the gospel. However, after saying yes to this party, they then had to wait for the party to come. It's kind of like the seed that responded to the to the gospel or it received the soil received that seed with great joy.
Jeffrey Heine:But then it wilted away. Because waiting is hard. I live in a house full of women. 3 daughters, my wife, even my dog is a girl. What that means is I get slapped a lot, not usually in the face.
Jeffrey Heine:No. Not in the face at all, but I get I get slapped whenever I'm trying to reach for something they are baking. Because my girls, they they love to bake things. All the time, they're making brownies. They're they're making cookies.
Jeffrey Heine:And and usually, when they come right out of the oven and they set them there and I can smell it, I immediately come up, and I'm reaching for it. And I immediately get slapped. Dad, those are not for now. Those are for later. You have to wait.
Jeffrey Heine:I'm like, but daddy wants them now. I'm like, no. You you can't have them. Here. We'll let you lick the bowl.
Jeffrey Heine:And be like, so I'll lick the bowl and be like, well that cookie's kind of broken. And so they're like, fine. And so they might they might give me a little taste of the cookie. But like, dad, you have to wait to eat those. That's what Jesus is doing here.
Jeffrey Heine:Says his father is making the preparations, but we have to wait. We we might be able to now smell the feast. Maybe at times, we we get a few tastes. We're allowed to lick the bowl, if you will, and it actually increases our appetite for what's to come. But ultimately, we have to submit to his timetable.
Jeffrey Heine:And we wait. And we wait. The people in this parable ended up not going. They couldn't wait that long. They they got settled into their lives.
Jeffrey Heine:If you read that what happened, they literally just went back to work. They went back to work instead of going to the feast. I think it's interesting that it wasn't, you know, like not going to the feast because they're meeting up with their mistress. You know? Or they're going off doing drugs, or, like, they're they're planning to rob some place.
Jeffrey Heine:They're not doing anything bad. It's actually doing something good that keeps them out of the kingdom of God. They just couldn't wait so long. So we have to humble ourselves to the Lord's timetable. The kingdom of God comes slowly.
Jeffrey Heine:3rd, we see the openness of the Kingdom. After being rejected by some, the King then orders his messengers to go to the main roads and to invite as many people as possible to this wedding feast. The main roads, some of your bibles might say the intersections, these were just outside of the main gates of the city. And it was here that you would find all sorts of people on these main roads, these highways, if you will. You would find the wealthy and the poor and the master and the servant.
Jeffrey Heine:You would find the the thief and the honest laborer, the Jew and the gentile. Everybody would be on the main roads. Once they got into the city, they could take the smaller little winding roads all to their own neighborhoods. But they would have to share this main road first. So when the king tells his servants to go to the main roads, he is saying, everyone's invited.
Jeffrey Heine:Everyone is invited to this feast. Not one person is to be excluded. And in verse 10, we read that both the bad and the good are even gathered to come. Look at verse 10 again. Verse 10, he says, now when those hired first came Whoops.
Jeffrey Heine:I'm in the wrong chapter. Here we go. The wind flipped it over. 22:10 says, and the servants went onto the roads and gathered all whom they found, both bad and good. And almost like to tell you that there was more bad than good.
Jeffrey Heine:We always say, the good and bad. But you're saying, there was bad, got the bad and the good. So that the wedding hall was filled with guests. When Jesus says that the bad and the good come, this was a bombshell shocking these people. Because that is not how religion works.
Jeffrey Heine:It's those who are good who are invited into the kingdom. Those who are bad are excluded. Those who are good get to go to heaven. Those who are bad go to hell. That's literally what the world is is hanging its hat on.
Jeffrey Heine:That's what the world believes. And Jesus blows that all apart, and he says, no. This is a feast for the bad and the good. What kind of king wants a feast for both bad and good people? I'll tell you, it's a king who wants his wedding hall full.
Jeffrey Heine:Who wants as many people as possible to pack out this wedding hall, so that his son might receive honor. That's the type of king who want wants this. Jeremy, I know that some of you have you you think you've done too many bad things. You've hurt too many people. You have failed too many times.
Jeffrey Heine:You've said terrible things to people. You've thought even darker things. And you think there's absolutely no way that God could ever forgive me or love me. I want you to know that Jesus knows all of this. And you don't know the half of how bad you are.
Jeffrey Heine:You're far worse, but he still has reserved a seat for you at his table. He still has reserved it. He is still pleading with you to come to his feast, to enter into his kingdom. He's saying, your good works do not get you into this kingdom, nor do your bad works exclude you. All you have to do is respond to my invitation and come.
Jeffrey Heine:So throughout this parable, we see Jesus pleading with people to come. Good or bad. Doesn't matter. Just come. Come to the feast that his father is throwing in his honor.
Jeffrey Heine:But do not make the mistake of thinking that Jesus is saying, just come as you are. Jesus is not saying, just come as you are. The parable here, it seems, has reached its conclusion at the end of verse 10 with this wedding hall being filled with guests. However, Jesus, he continues the story. Is he just he adds this unusual addition to the story about the king going out, finding someone who wasn't wearing a wedding garment, and then kicking him out of the party.
Jeffrey Heine:And then just to make sure you know what Jesus is really talking about, said, this person's gonna be bound, cast into outer darkness where there's gonna be weeping and gnashing of teeth. In other words, he is talking about eternal judgment if you were caught wearing the wrong thing. Charles Spurgeon, he's known as the prince of preachers. He preached on this parable. And it actually took him 3 weeks to preach through it.
Jeffrey Heine:It's only gonna take me 20 5 because I'm a lot better. No. It it took him he he 3 whole weeks to to flesh out this, yet he failed to actually mention anything about the wedding garments. As a result, there was a number of people who were going to join his church, and they didn't. And he asked why, and they said, we're scared.
Jeffrey Heine:Well, why are you scared? Like, well, you never told us what the wedding garments were about. And we're scared that if we get into church, you might kick us out for wearing the wrong thing. So then Spurgeon spent 2 more weeks preaching on nothing about what only what these wedding garments were all about. He began to realize, actually, this is the point of the entire parable.
Jeffrey Heine:At this party, the king is interacting now with the guest. He's looking all around, and he notices one person not wearing their wedding garment. And so in verse 12, he approaches him, kindly approaches him, and just says, friend, how did he get in here without wearing a wedding garment? And now today, this king might have said, how did you get in here without wearing a tuxedo? How did you not get in here without get in here without wearing your evening gown, evening dress?
Jeffrey Heine:Now we might think that this is an unusual question because this man had literally just been invited off the street. And I don't know about you, but I don't normally carry a tuxedo with me when I'm just out and about. But he was invited off the street and told to come immediately. So he didn't have time to go home. And perhaps even if he did have time to go home, he perhaps wasn't wealthy enough to own a wedding garment.
Jeffrey Heine:We don't know. However, notice that when the King asked him, how did he get in here without a wedding garment? He had no excuse. There was no valid reason for him not wearing it. And the reason that he doesn't have any excuse is because we know at this time, during the most lavish royal parties, the king himself would provide the garments.
Jeffrey Heine:If it was a costume party, you were given a costume. If it was a wedding feast, you were given wedding robes. The man apparently here had simply refused to wear the wedding garments that he had been given. Which is why when the king approached him and asked him, why isn't he wearing it wearing his garments? He had no answer to give.
Jeffrey Heine:And this is why he was bound and he was cast into darkness. You see that the King, he he comes. And in his generosity, he invites us to his feast. But we are not allowed to come as we are. We have to have allow ourselves to be clothed by him.
Jeffrey Heine:And this is humbling. Because what this means is that the best clothes we have will not suffice. No matter how much we clean up ourselves, no matter how nice we think we look in comparison to others, or when we look in the mirror, we must be stripped of our own clothes and put on the clothes the king gives us in order to come to this feast. 3 years ago, my wife and I, we bought tickets to go and see U2 in concert at the Superdome in New Orleans. We're huge U2 fans.
Jeffrey Heine:I think I was, like, 8 or 9 years old when I first asked Bono into my heart. Anyway, as as the day for the concert approached, Lauren's mom reached out because she she really needed our help. She was battling cancer, and Lauren needed to take her to an appointment. We kept trying to figure out how we could do both. And ultimately, we realized, we just would not have the time to be able to do it.
Jeffrey Heine:And so, we decided we would not go to the concert. And then we get this phone call from a friend of a friend, who calls up and says, hey. I heard you were going to the U2 concert. Would you mind if my wife and I just tagged along with you? And so I'd explain.
Jeffrey Heine:I said, well, we were gonna go, but now I don't think we have enough time to go. And so I'm sorry about that. And he says, Well, why don't you just ride with me in my private jet there? I said, woah. Are are you sure?
Jeffrey Heine:Because we could take mine. And And he goes, no. I'll if if you're open to that, I'll just have my driver swing by and pick you up and, and take you to the airport. And I said, done. And so he his driver came by, picked us up, took us to the airport.
Jeffrey Heine:We get on his private jet. We're flying to the concert, and and and during this flight, you know, we are served champagne, strawberries, caviar, like all of this stuff. It's it's really over the top. And I was surprised at the thoughts I had. It it took me about 10 minutes to think, I think redeemer needs a jet.
Jeffrey Heine:Like, I wonder, like, if we really ran the numbers in our budget. Like, think of the ministry I could do if I had a private jet. So so those thoughts were filling my mind, and, and then the other thing that was happening was I was trying to act like I've been there before. Like, oh, this is just another private jet ride for me. But that went out the window after about 10 minutes, before Lauren and I started just shamelessly throwing all the snacks in our pockets, stuffing our, her purse, like everything we had, like we had never seen nice bags of M and M's before.
Jeffrey Heine:But we are like, all of this is free, and we're taking it all. It was enough to, to put in our kids' lunches for weeks. And so we're doing all of this. And then as we're getting close to landing, the guy who's Jet we're in, he he says, hey, if if you guys don't mind. You've been so kind to allow me to tag along with you.
Jeffrey Heine:Can I buy you guys dinner? And I said, Yes. We have been kind to you. Sure. We will allow you to buy us dinner.
Jeffrey Heine:And so, he goes we walk up to the nicest restaurant there in New Orleans. And he waves his little magic wand, which was just a lot of cash. And it and it opened up the doors for us. And they allowed us in. And so I can already smell the food and and we're going in there.
Jeffrey Heine:And then the hostess said, why not? She goes, you have to be wearing a coat to come in. I said, Why not? She goes, You have to be wearing a coat to come in. It's like, Are you kidding me?
Jeffrey Heine:I've I've got to wear a coat to come in. It was terribly embarrassing. And it's not like, you know, I was I was wearing camouflage shorts and a tank top. I was I was wearing my private jet clothes, which are nicer than these. They're the they're the khakis, you know, with just a nice dress shirt.
Jeffrey Heine:I thought I looked pretty respectable. But I wasn't dressed nice enough for that place. And it was humiliating. The hostess then said, don't worry, sir. If you want, I've got a blazer that you can wear.
Jeffrey Heine:And so he went and he got the blazer. And he said, you could wear this if you like. Now I'll tell you, in that moment, my pride swelled up in me. And I felt like saying, hey, if you won't accept me as I am, I'll just go someplace else. Like, I'm too good for this place.
Jeffrey Heine:But then I could smell the food. I could literally look in, and I could see the empty table where our our they they made a reservation for it. I could see it there. And I realized I had a choice. I could either, in my pride, just leave wearing the clothes I was wearing, or I could humble myself and allow myself to be dressed by someone else, and to go in and enjoy this feast.
Jeffrey Heine:And so I allowed myself to be dressed by this hostess. And then I went in and I feasted. What Jesus here is teaching us is that our best righteousness, the best clothes of righteousness that we can put on is not sufficient. If we were to clothe ourselves with our best works, with all of our good deeds, the prophet Isaiah says, it's nothing more than filthy rags. It's not gonna get us into a feast like this.
Jeffrey Heine:However, we have a kind king. He says this feast won't cost you anything, but at great expense to himself, he gives us the clothes to wear. Such a great expense it would actually cost the very blood of his son. Throughout these parables, throughout the teachings of Jesus, we're often reminded that it is not the good who get into the kingdom and the bad who are denied. No.
Jeffrey Heine:We see both good and bad in the kingdom enjoying the feast. It's the humble who get in and it's the proud who were denied. So the question is, have you humbled yourself? Have you humbled yourself before Jesus asking for his forgiveness, asking to be dressed in his righteousness and not your own, knowing you do not have the right clothes to wear and you have nothing to bring to the table? If so, ask today.
Jeffrey Heine:Plead today for Jesus to clothe you, so that you can go into that feast. All throughout the bible, that invitation that goes out, You will never hear Jesus saying, respond tomorrow. Always you are to respond immediately when the invitation goes out. And for some of you, you are hearing that invitation right now in this moment. That invitation might not be there tomorrow, but it's here today.
Jeffrey Heine:And I would ask that you would respond. Come and enjoy the feast with your king. Pray with me. Lord Jesus, we thank you that you are the Lord of the feast. That to be part of your kingdom, we'll still enjoy pleasures forevermore.
Jeffrey Heine:Because there we will be in your presence. Lord, and I pray that right now the bad and the good, everyone, will hear your invitation and will respond. We will respond with humility and allow you to dress us with your righteousness. Thank you, Jesus. We pray this in your name.
Jeffrey Heine:Amen.