“Jesus said, ‘The kingdom of heaven is like…’” (Matt. 22.1). Most Sundays there is at least one very obvious theme that binds together the readings appointed for the day. Some, such as today, offer more than one theme for us to contemplate.
By my initial quote, we might be lead to assume that the theme is the kingdom of heaven - which is fair enough, as Jesus was often talking about the kingdom of heaven, especially in Matthew’s record - “The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field … is like a grain of mustard seed … is like unto leaven,” and so on. Important as this topic is, it is not the clearest binding theme for today.
A helpful little book from England that I have, “The Eucharistic Year” by Harold Riley, published in 1951, offers, week by week, concise descriptions of the themes contained within not only the Collect, Epistle (or Lesson) and Gospel, but also the minor propers - Introit, Gradual, Offertory and Communion verses. For today, Riley suggested that the primary theme is the contrast between the vanity of the world and the joy to be found in accepting God’s will. Fair enough.
The Prayer Book Commentary
from St. Peter Publications in Charlottetown suggests that the binding theme is
that of cheerful obedience and service to God - only slightly different than
that of Riley. Fair enough as well.
There is however a word that
appears in both the Collect and Gospel, and while the actual word is not used
there, it is described in the Epistle - a word that I should like us to
contemplate today - “ready,” which, as we shall discover, brings us back around
to the theme of the kingdom of heaven.
“Ready.” The Oxford Dictionary defines it as: “with
preparation complete; in fit state” and so on, but those first two fit quite
well with the presumed intent in today’s readings.
In the Collect, after asking
for the safeguard of the Divine protection, we pray that we might be “ready
both in body and soul” so that we might “cheerfully accomplish those things” that
God would have done. In a very short
Collect, our minds should be prompted to think very deeply of the implications
of the prayer. In praying that we might
be ready - in fit state - both in body and soul, we are acknowledging the need
for preparedness both physically and spiritually. Which is to say, our entire being is to be in
fit state, with preparation complete to carry out God’s will, or as the Collect
states, “that we … may cheerfully accomplish those things that thou wouldest
have done.”
And is this something that
we do, say, on Sunday mornings only, or when we visit the sick and shut-in in
hospitals and retirement homes, or assist at the Shepherds or the Mission? No, the prayer is not qualified in terms of
any sort of 9 to 5 occupational commitment.
This is underlined by St.
Paul in the Epistle, “See then that ye walk circumspectly,” - which is to say,
taking everything into account, even wary - “not as fools, but as wise,
redeeming the time, because the days are evil.”
This might seem to be aimed at a slightly different mark than the
Collect, until we continue, “Wherefore be ye not unwise, but understanding what
the will of the Lord is.” In another of
his well-beloved, sometimes very stark contrasts, St. Paul urges Christians to
live the life of the wise, not of fools.
The world, alienated from God, lives in vanity and sin; Christians are
urged to “redeem the time” by using it to fulfill God’s will. St. Paul is encouraging us, no less than the
Collect, to be in a state of constant readiness, almost like a sentinel on
night watch, to maintain our focus on God’s will, avoiding distracting or even
evil influences.
Both the Collect and the
Epistle therefore, in their respective calls for us to be in fit state, taking
everything into account, encourage us to be intent on the fulfilment of God’s
will. In so doing, and quite properly
without really thinking about it, we shall be participating in the earthly
manifestation of the kingdom of heaven.
Which brings us to not only
one of the aforementioned themes for this Sunday, but also the question of
whether the parable as presented by Jesus in the Gospel reading refers just to
the heavenly kingdom of the afterlife, or to the kingdom of heaven on earth, or
to both. Some will maintain that, in his
use of clear, easily visualized earthly analogies, people and situations, Jesus
was primarily referring to the kingdom of heaven on earth in today’s parable,
even perhaps intending that the parable would prompt his Jewish listeners to
think of the call of Israel, interpreting the servants as the Prophets of
God. The extension of the invitation to
the marriage to anyone the servants could find meant the extension of God’s
call to the Gentile world.
As with so many of His
teachings, the earthly symbology has eternal implications, no less in this
parable than in many others. I daresay
that most of us, 2,000 years later, would think primarily of the heavenly
kingdom of the afterlife when we read this parable, and I say, fair enough.
Variations of this passage
come up twice yearly in our course of Sunday readings. Luke’s account of the same parable is on the
Second Sunday after Trinity. There are
three notable differences in the two accounts: first, in Luke’s account, we are
told that the originally invited guests all just made excuses, whereas in
Matthew’s account, as we heard today, on top of making excuses, some of those
who had been invited took the messenger servants of the master and treated them
so badly, even killing some of them, that the master exacted punishment on
those ungrateful guests. Consider what
impact that must have had on the Jewish listeners in term so their being the
Chosen People, the originally invited guests!
Second, at the end of Luke’s account, after relating the same situation that the invited guests found excuses to not come, and that the house, even after the servants had invited all that they could find, was still not full, the master says, “None of those men which were bidden shall taste of my supper.” In a purely earthly interpretation, that would imply that unbelieving Jews were shut out. Against that, in Matthew’s account, the master concludes with the statement, “For many are called, but few are chosen.” Without reading the passage again, we know that in fact all were called, but few chose to respond. Even though the two accounts end differently, the essential message is the same: there is room in the kingdom of heaven for everyone, and the master calls all of us to join in that heavenly banquet.
The third notable difference
between Luke’s account and Matthew’s is something that only appears in
Matthew’s and that is directly related to today’s theme of readiness - that
almost nightmarish scenario of the poor fellow that responded to the call, came
in, and then was quite unceremoniously chucked out. We might even say that the situation around
him is a parable within a parable. At
the beginning, I mentioned that the word “ready” appears twice in the Gospel
passage, but it doesn’t refer to readiness on our part, such as we pray for in
the Collect, or St. Paul exhorts in the Epistle. Rather, the word in the Gospel is used in
terms of the wedding banquet being ready.
Still, in terms of things
being “with preparation complete; in fit state” the readiness of the wedding
banquet, and its symbolism as the kingdom of heaven, is well and truly of
importance as it relates to our personal state of walking circumspectly and
always being ready both in body and soul.
We might suspect that there is something very special about that figure in the parable who accepted the invitation, and came - but was thrown out. To the original hearers, the scene would have been well-known; they would have recognized that he had no excuse for coming improperly dressed. Had he been in need, the king's generosity would have taken care of that. Indeed, there was a tradition at earthly marriage feasts that the guests were actually provided with a garment to wear to the occasion. Jesus’ original hearers of this parable would have known that, and quickly concluded that there must also be something very symbolic about that man. Mere attendance, says Jesus, commenting on the attitude we might hear today expressed as “God has to take me the way I am”, well, Jesus tells us that isn’t enough.
Something else
must happen to any of us who presume to respond to the invitation, and that is
nothing less than the transformation of our lives in order for us to be welcome
guests. As Christians, we all know that
of prime importance, in this exercise that we call Church, is salvation. We all stand in need of God's saving grace:
personally, individually. Upon
responding to that grace, accepting the invitation to the heavenly banquet, if
we would say, "Well, my mere presence is enough," then this second
parable within a parable today should be fair warning that we are in fact not
ready either in body or soul, not with preparation complete and in a fit
state. There must be conversion, the
change of clothing representing a change of heart, “casting off the works of
darkness and putting on the armour of light,” as St. Paul tells us in the 13th
chapter of his letter to the Romans, and as he states just a few lines later in
the same letter, “put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ.”
When we place all of this within the larger context of Jesus’ warnings that the day will come upon us unexpectedly, the Lord will come as a thief in the night, we should take to heart the importance, at all times and in all places, of clothing ourselves in the righteousness that is Jesus Christ so that, both in body and soul, we shall be in a fit state, ready, to be welcomed to His heavenly banquet.
ANNUNCIATION,
OTTAWA 2006 CLRK