So how does it feel? How does it feel to be sitting in the banquet hall of a king. You have been invited! The King has selected you to be placed on His list of honored guests. He has prepared a meal especially for you! And here you sit on this very morning in the banquet hall of heaven’s King ready to be served with the finest foods, finer than any of the foods that have been offered on any table set by any king in any kingdom.
And there have been some pretty nice tables. We have all been to wedding receptions. We have all been to banquest. We have all tasted good food, food prepared by those who know what they are doing. We have tasted some of this ourselves.
We have all heard of lavish parties. Exclusive guest lists, people dressed in their best formal attire, rich foods prepared from only the finest ingredients – oh to live the life of the rich and famous, right? Oh, but what we have set before us here today puts all of those banquets to shame, our clothes are better, our food is richer, our host has set a grander and greater table, one that somebody’s super sweet 16 could only dream about – beyond their wildest imaginations and way beyond their means to provide.
Wait a minute, you might be saying. This makes no sense! This is a church, this is no banquet hall. We are sitting at pew, not at fancy tables. Maybe I or my husband has come in from the fields and cleaned up a bit, maybe we are dressed nicer than we will be later on this afternoon, but no one here is hardly dressed for a formal dinner. And look at the guest list – perhaps we might call it a who’s who list for those who live in Chuckery, but that’s not saying much, this is just about everybody who lives in and around Chuckery – we are hardly a cosmopolitan group. Not many of us are likely to be on anyone’s who’s who list – not many of us would be likely to be included at any state dinners with any people of any importance anywhere. We are just common everyday folks, sitting in our little country church, dressed in our common every day clothes here to go church.
YES! And that’s it! That’s the big deal. This right here, this common every day church and this common everyday worship service filled with our common everyday people – this is God’s church! The King of kings and the Lord of lords has sent out an invitation to you, he sent his own personal curriers to you to hand deliver your invitation. He has thrown out your common every day attire and he has given you a brand new outfit that would dazzle the eyes starlets in Las Angeles, He has set a table that cannot be rivaled anywhere on earth because the food has been prepared by God himself in heaven. All of this has been set. It is ready and waiting for you.
Out text today is about a wedding banquet. A party thrown by a king, and not just any king, the King of Heaven. That’s what Jesus says, this wedding feast is compared to the Reign of Heaven – the place where our heavenly King reigns and this is how he does it. He prepares every detail, gets it all set just right and then he sends out his invitations. He sends out his messengers to invite his guests.
So often when you and I hear, “Kingdom of Heaven” or “Reign of Heaven” we think off into the future. We think of what’s to come when we die, we think what’s to come when Christ returns on the last day. We sell ourselves so short! Yes, God has so much to give us after he has called us out of this sinful world and after our sorrow and suffering have gone away, but this is not just a future hope! It is a present reality. It is right here and right now! It is yours today! This banquet table has already been set and the Easter and Ascension Day party is already going on. It’s not somewhere off in the hazy future. It is right here and right now! The party has already started.
Jesus tells us that when the party first began, the King sent out his invitations but no one came. He was preparing the meal for the celebration for hundreds of years. Ever since Adam and Eve sinned God began planning the menu, preparing the ingredients, and setting the table. He made his guest list and he sent invitations to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, to the 12 tribes of Israel, to Moses and the Israelites, to David and Solomon and all the kings and people of Israel. But they grew tired of waiting for the party to start, so they went off to join other parties. The put off waiting for Heaven’s Eternal Party. They looked around them. There were other parties they could attend, with other hosts. They went off to eat at these other tables. They went off in search of false gods. Some of them even decided that they would throw their own party. Not just anyone can throw a party like God can throw in heaven. After all heaven has a vast treasury and a huge banquet hall, but these Jews thought they could throw their own party and then when God finally decided to show up he could simply join them. It didn’t work that way.
When the party was finally prepared and God sent his messenger, in fact when God himself showed up with the invitations to His heavenly party, his guests were too busy with their own little party to pay any attention. Jesus came to the Jews carrying an armload of invitations to Heaven’s eternal party but the people were too busy eating the food that they had prepared themselves.
Think about it. How ridiculous is that? Jesus, the Son of God himself, comes with invitations to a party that has behind all the wealth of heaven and the people were too busy and too engaged with their own party. Sure Jesus, you have a rich banquet table set in Heaven for me to feast and be filled and to enjoy. I am sitting here undernourished and starving to death with the food that I have prepared – it tastes bad and it is filled with poison and it is going to be the death of me but I am just going to stay right here where I am comfortable in my own skin.
Why did the Jews do that? Why did they insist that Jesus join their party? Why didn’t they receive Heaven’s invitation with anticipation and joy? Why didn’t they jump right up, leave behind what they were doing, and run off to join Jesus at His banquet table? There is no reason that will ever come close to making sense.
Why do we do the same? Why is it that we are so often drawn to earthly glory, why is it that we are so eager to sit down at the table of worldly wealth and power that we get up from our seat at Heaven’s table, that God has set for us. Why is it that we are so drawn to walk down earth’s red carpet when it’s glory is only like those photographers flash bulb’s shining bright for an instant but then gone, when the Glory of God in heaven shines brighter than the sun for ever and ever. There simply is no explanation! It just does not make sense.
When the guests in the parable rejected the king’s invitation to the banquet when they treated the messengers with violence and contempt the king became angry. He sent his army to destroy them and to burn their city to the ground. The Jews rejected Jesus. The insulted him, they beat him, and then they killed him. He came offering them invitations to join the banquet that had been prepared for them and they did not care to attend and they crucified Jesus so the angry king did destroy them. 40 years later the Roman army laid siege to their city, Jerusalem. They pulled it down and they set it on fire. This judgment was only a shadow of the judgment that comes on those who reject the kings invitation when he send them to their eternal punishment in hell.
But then the king, who had prepared his feast and made ready his banquet hall, had a feast prepared with no guests to attend. So he sent out his messengers into the highways and byways, out to the common everyday folks in their common everyday lives, wearing their common every day clothes and he invited them to come.
That’s you and me. We are those common everyday folks out in the streets. We are not important people. We are not powerful people. We are not even good people, we’re sinners. But Jesus, the High King of Heaven wants his banquet hall to be filled so he sent his messengers to you. They called you by name and said to you, “Come enjoy the feast prepared for you in heaven by the hands of God himself.”
It seems that most women, the moment they receive an invitation to some party or event think to themselves, “I have nothing to wear.” And the next thing is to plan a shopping trip – go find the perfect outfit to wear to this event. Ladies, regardless of what you have in your closets, this time you are right. You don’t have a thing to wear. Guys, sorry to tell you but the suit you always pull out to wear to wedding and banquets isn’t going to cut it either. And no luck going to look for a rental, not even the finest tailor using the finest materials could make you an gown or a suit that would be fit for heaven’s banquet hall. The only clothes you could wear that would even get you in the door are the clothes made for you by God himself.
Everyday that Jesus lived, from the moment he was born in a stable to Mary and Joseph to the moment of His ascension he lived his life weaving together the material for the garments that you and I wear to His banquet hall. Every act of obedience, every act of love was another thread in your heavenly robe of righteousness. And then, on the day that you were baptized that material was cut and fitted just for you. Christ’s righteousness, his acts of love and obedience became the clothes that you wear to get you into heaven, became the gown, the suit that you will wear for all eternity. The righteousness of Jesus covered your sin so that you have just the right thing to wear.
And now that you are dressed, now that your sins have been covered with the righteousness of Jesus you are ready to sit down at the table. The fattened calf has been slaughtered and prepared just right, just for you. And what’s on the menu? Food that comes from heaven. To you and I it might look like small wafers of bread and a small cup of wine, but in this festal hall here in heaven God will hide in that wafer the very body of Christ, God will hide in that cup of wine the very blood of Jesus. You will eat, you will drink and you will be fed and forgiven and all your sins will be washed away.
You know what? We look around here and there is nothing that looks too terribly out of the ordinary. We see regular people in regular clothes in a regular church on a regular Sunday morning, but hidden here is the hand of God who has invited us, who has dressed us, and who is prepared to feed us with the forgiveness of sins earned and won by Jesus himself.
Amen.
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