Matthew 22:1-14

CHAPTER 18

THE MARRIAGE OF THE KING'S SON

Matthew 22:1-14. “And Jesus, responding, again spoke to them in parables, saying: The kingdom of the heavens is like unto a kingly man, who made a marriage for his son.” We are betrothed to Christ in regeneration and married in sanctification. Luxuriant festivals have in all ages been customary at weddings, and especially in the Old World, where they constrain every one who even happens to come in to eat with them. I called to see a sick American friend, at a Moslem house in Jerusalem, during the time of a wedding festival, which had been protracted, the nuptials having been celebrated a few days previously, but the music and festivity still continuing. Stranger as I was, from this far-off land, they constrained me to eat. When the soul passes out of Satan's dreary starvation country into the kingdom of God, a wonderful time of spiritual festivity follows. Hence God's wedding festival has really been in progress about six thousand years, Abel, Seth, Enoch, and Noah being honored guests. While it is a blessed experimental fact that this wedding festival has been running in all ages, the Excarnate Christ being on the earth from the beginning, yet the incarnation of Jesus gave a grand and glorious ovation and culmination to this wedding festival, to which isolated references are frequently made by way of pre-eminence.

“And he sent his servants to call those who had been invited to the wedding, and they were not willing to come.” The patriarchs and prophets, from Abel down, had been calling the people to this wedding. Eventually John the Baptist came, the last and the greatest of the prophets, to invite those who had been called by all of his predecessors to come at once to the wedding festival, as the King's Son had already come on the earth, and the time had arrived for all the guests to enjoy the royal banquet of the heavenly nuptials.

“Again he sent other servants, saying, Say to those who have been called, Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fatlings have been slain, and all things are ready; come to the wedding.” John the Baptist and his disciples gave them the first call. Jesus not only called them Himself, but He sent out the twelve apostles, to go two by two throughout the whole country and invite them; and also the seventy evangelists, commissioned and restricted to Israel, besides the innumerable volunteers who, in homes, social circles, business places, and along the thoroughfares, had been calling them now three years. Hence the Jews were abundantly notified, and really left without excuse.

“And they, being careless, went away, the one to his farm, and another to his merchandise. But the rest, taking his servants, insulted and slew them.” Do you not remember how the apostles, during the Pentecostal revival, preached all day on the streets and spent the ensuing night in jail? At a very early day, James, the brother of John, was martyred right there in Jerusalem. Stephen leading the way O how the bloody tide did flow under the leadership of Saul the persecutor! Hence this was literally verified, some of the Jews treating the call with utter indifference, and others becoming demoniacally mad and killing them without mercy, beginning with Jesus, and going on, determined to exterminate the Nazarene heresy in blood.

“And the king, hearing, was angry, and sending forth his armies, destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city” That was literally fulfilled in the Roman wars, A. D. 66-73, deluging the whole country in Jewish blood, and culminating in the destruction of the city, leaving it a heap of ruins, without an inhabitant during the next fifty years, when the Emperor Adrian founded a Roman colony on the site, naming it Ella Capitolina, as there was no Jerusalem. It had been destroyed, and remained in oblivion till the conversion of Constantine, A. D. 325, who rebuilt and restored the name Jerusalem.

“Then he says to his servants, The marriage is ready, and those who have been called are not worthy. Therefore go ye into the highways, and as many as you may find, call to the wedding. And those servants, going out along the way, led in all so many as they found, both bad and good. And the marriage was filled with guests.” Here you see the call of the Gentiles, and we are at! so glad that we ever heard that call, and found our way into the marriage festival. Rest assured, we are delighted with it. I heard the call and responded fifty years ago, and the festival is far better now than ever. You see here a strange statement, that they brought in all indiscriminately, the bad and the good. How shall we understand that strange statement? “Good” is here used simply in a moral, practical, worldly sense; while “bad” is antithetical, and means the rough, dissipated, reckless, hard cases i.e., outbreaking sinners. Now, there is every encouragement for that class, because they are mentioned before the flood, showing up a broad, open door and a world-wide welcome for the worst reprobates that ever trod the globe. Though I was one of the “good,” my life when a sinner being morally irreproachable, yet I needed salvation just as much as the vilest debauchee that ever walked the earth. It is hard to tell which of these classes is the more hopeful and the easier saved, as there is nothing hard with God. The great trouble with the good is self-righteousness. Who knows but this fair, hypocritical garment of self-righteousness, hiding beneath it the very virus of hell, is as abominable in the sight of God as the blackest debaucheries, the most revolting blasphemy, and even theft and murder? The truth of it is, the whole world, out of Christ, are exposed to wrath and hell regardless of moral character or Church membership, these frequently being used by Satan to hoodwink the poor devotee, till he can dump him headlong into the bottomless pit.

“The king having come in to look upon his guests, saw there a man not having on the wedding garment. And he says to him, Friend, how camest thou in hither not having on a wedding garment? And he was dumb. Then the king said to the servants, Binding him hand and foot, take him away, and cast him into outer darkness and there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called, but few elected.” This scene of the drama is profoundly significant and momentously interesting, developing a phase characteristic of spiritual wedlock which should bring us all low down in the dust of humiliation, crying unto God for that deep illumination of the Holy Spirit, which is our only fortification against the appalling catastrophe which overtook this man in that final ordeal, when the last opportunity having fled, emendation was utterly impossible, doom and damnation opening wide the yawning vortex of the bottomless pit. How awful to be hurled from the celestial portals into the regions of irremediable woe! Now, what is the wedding garment? It is none other than the snowy-white, spotless robe, washed and perfectly purified in the blood of Calvary's Lamb. It is the righteousness of Christ, the robe of holiness, which the loving Father had the angels bring to clothe the prodigal son, preparatory for the salutations and congratulations which awaited him in the royal festival which followed. We see that this man had heard the gospel call, and had come along with the guests; but was never elected. Consequently the woeful discomfiture in the end supervened. “Chosen,” in E. V., is too weak a translation of eklektoi, “elected.” Peter says, “Elect through the sanctification of the Spirit.” Hence, you see, we are elected, and the Holy Spirit sanctifies us, having been nominated in conversion. No wonder Peter exhorts us to strive with all diligence to make our calling and election sure.

If we should meet the sad fate of the above guest, who was cast out into endless perdition because he there appeared without a wedding garment, infinitely better for us that we had never been born. Rely upon it, entire sanctification is this wedding garment, as we are betrothed to Christ in justification, but married to him in sanctification. All the guests collectively constitute the Bride, the Church. Since you have heard the gospel call, by the living ministry and the Holy Spirit, let it be the great enterprise of probationary life to make your calling and election sure, and settle the matter beyond all defalcation, lest you incur the sad fate of the guest without the wedding garment.