The parable, like a cubist painting, is disorienting. And finding a reasonable explanation is not going to make the disorientation go away.
When you look at a cubist painting, you experience disorientation. On one level, you know what the painting should be; a man playing a guitar, a nude woman reclining. But, on another level, that is not what you see. Instead, you see fragments of reality.
Life itself is broken, scattered, and everything you see is distorted and disordered. You can identify an eye. You see an ear. You can make out a leg. But they do not all go together. In fact, they are going in the wrong directions. They are seen from different perspectives. Nothing seems to fit. The world around you is falling apart rather than coming together.
This kind of experience happens not only with paintings. It happens with parables. In fact, I believe that is the experience we are supposed to have when hearing the parable of the wedding banquet for this Sunday.
There are moments we recognize. There is a bigger picture we can imagine, but everything seems to be out of proportion or oriented in the wrong direction. We are faced with particular pieces that we have a hard time holding together. The Kingdom of God has come and Christ, in love, is making a covenant with His people, promising to be faithful to His Church. And even though this is what we know is happening, it feels like everything is falling apart.
To be honest, in some ways, everything is falling apart. Jesus has spent three years in ministry with His disciples. He healed lepers and restored sight to blind beggars. He has cast out demons and calmed storms. He has fed five thousand people and raised the dead. The Kingdom of God has come, and Jesus is living among His people in God’s faithful, covenant love.
But opposition to Jesus is rising. The religious authorities have plotted against Jesus and are seeking to arrest Him (21:46). As God’s people gather to celebrate Passover, their religious leaders gather to condemn and kill Jesus.
It is absurd. For a moment, you see a flash of God’s grace, a mute man speaking the first intelligible words of his life, and then you immediately see a flash of human sin, a religious leader trying to entrap Jesus. It is hard to make sense of what you see.
In the same way, the language of Jesus in this parable is taken to its breaking point. The story becomes disordered, the figures become exaggerated, the emotional elements fuel contradictory feelings in instantaneous succession.
A king is hosting a wedding feast for his son. The joy of that wedding permeates the kingdom. But, before you can indulge in the beauty of Christ’s marriage to the Church, suddenly, there are those who ignore the king’s invitation. Vocational duties become enlarged and grossly out of proportion to the wedding going on. One travels to his farm and another to his business as if nothing else was happening in the kingdom.
God’s gracious work is disruptive. It enters our daily lives with a momentous revelation, a vision of steadfast love which receives sinners into the heavenly Kingdom, and that revelation shatters our vision.
Violence against the king’s servants arises. Some are seized and others are killed. Then, violence erupts as the king sends troops to kill his people and burn a city. The joyous slaughter of animals for a wedding is mixed with the angry slaughter of people in vengeance.
The wedding banquet is suddenly full, but the people are varied. Rich food is offered to poor beggars. Just as you think the king is about to invite people to sit and eat, he encounters a man who does not know what is happening and casts him out of the kingdom.
If you have questions: What is the wedding garment? Why does the wedding hall have to be full? Why do people refuse to come? It is appropriate. The parable, like a cubist painting, is disorienting. And finding a reasonable explanation is not going to make the disorientation go away.
Jesus wants the religious leaders and His disciples, then and now, to be disoriented. They are in the midst of one of the greatest mysteries of the faith. God desires all people to come to the knowledge of the truth and be saved. Yet, not all people respond to His call with God-given faith. Those whom you think would see and understand who Jesus is, like the religious authorities, are seeking to kill Him. Those whom you think would have no clue who Jesus is, like a tax collector or a fisherman from Galilee, are following him in faith. As Jesus says at the end of the parable, “Many are called but few are chosen” (22:14).
God’s gracious work is disruptive. It enters our daily lives with a momentous revelation, a vision of steadfast love which receives sinners into the heavenly Kingdom, and that revelation shatters our vision. It changes our understanding of what it means to be rich or to be poor. It changes our behavior regarding what it means to be strong or weak. It changes our experience of what it means to be cursed or blessed, to be wise or foolish. And it places firmly in the center of our life a crucified Lord.
God’s love for all people is made known most fully not by the celebrations we expect but by the mourning we experience as we encounter a crucified Lord. God’s love for all people is made certain not by the death and falling apart of all things that we anticipate but by the resurrection and coming together of all the things we did not foresee in the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.
God continues to call people to that wonderful event: The death and resurrection of Jesus for their salvation. They can encounter it in words or in water. But, however it comes, that call will upend their world.
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Additional Resources:
Craft of Preaching-Check out 1517’s resources on Matthew 22:1-14.
Concordia Theology-Various helps from Concordia Seminary in St. Louis, MO to assist you in preaching Matthew 22:1-14.
Lectionary Kick-Start-Check out this fantastic podcast from Craft of Preaching authors Peter Nafzger and David Schmitt as they dig into the texts for this Sunday!
The Pastor’s Workshop-Check out all the great preaching resources from our friends at the Pastor’s Workshop!
